Leeds feel pain of derby defeat as Blades go top
DAVID Brooks’ first goal for Sheffield United clinched a 2-1 win at their Yorkshire rivals and sent them top of the Sky Bet Championship. Second-half substitute Brooks fired home a low angled shot late in the game after Kalvin Phillips had cancelled out Blades striker Billy Sharps’ opener against his former club. Victory for Chris Wilder’s side, automatically promoted from League One in May, is their eighth in their last 10 league games and lifted them top of the second tier for the first time since November 2005. The Blades tore into Leeds from the very first whistle and stormed into a secondminute lead with Sharp, unmarked at the far post, heading home a Mark Duffy cross from the right. Only Andy Lonergan’s brilliant reaction save denied Sharp a second from Clarke’s pin-point cross after Matthew Pennington’s blunder as Leeds were in danger of being swept away. But Thomas Christiansen’s side stemmed the tide with a superbly-taken equaliser in the 35th minute. Ezgjan Alioski’s cross was only half headed clear by Blades defender Cameron Carter-Vickers and Phillips slammed home a sweetlystruck volley from the edge of the area. A pulsating derby hung in the balance as the game entered the final 15 minutes. Sharp made way for Brooks in the 75th minute and, six minutes later, the Blades substitute fired his side ahead for the second time, steering home a low shot into the far corner as the Blades reached the Championship summit for the first time in 12 years. LEEDS: Lonergan, Ayling, Penning ton, Cooper( J ans son 56), Anita (Grot 83), Phillips, O’Kane, Vieira, Alioski (Hernandez 70), Lasogga, Samuel. Subs Not Used: Roofe, Wiedwald, Dallas, Shaughnessy. Booked: Phillips, Vieira. SHEFF UTD: Blackman, Basham, Carter-Vickers, O’Connell, Baldock, Coutts, Duffy (Lundstram 86), Fleck, Stevens, Clarke, Sharp (Brooks 76). Subs Not Used: Moore, Donaldson, Wright, La ff er ty, Car rut hers. Booked: Stevens, Coutts, O’Connell, Baldock, Clarke, Fleck. Ref: Scott Duncan