LEEDS BITTEN BY DOGS OF WAR

NEIL WARNOCK will wake up with a big smile on his face this morning.

The Cardiff chief ( below) returned to Yorkshire and put a huge dent in Leeds’ bid for promotion thanks to second-half strikes from Sean Morrison and Ken Zohore.

He purred: “I really enjoyed that. It’s going to be a very pleasant rest of the weekend.

“As a manager coming back to a former club these are moments you have to treasure – and I’ll savour this one.

“We set our stall out to frustrate Leeds by not giving them the space to work through us and, the longer the game went on, the more comfortable we became.

“That’s got to be our best away performance of the season by a mile.”

Warnock had an eventful 14 months at Elland Road before being ejected from office in April 2013, but he holds no grudge and ahead of his return hailed the Whites as “a truly massive club”.

He even reckons current boss Garry Monk should be manager of the year for transforming Leeds’ fortunes.

Monk was rocked by the e late loss of centre- back Pontus us Jansson through illness.

Winger Alfonso Pedraza, on loan from Villarreal with a view to a permanent £ 8.5million switch, was handed a full debut.

Cardiff were withoutt defenders Lee Peltier and nd Bruno Manga, but had hitman Ricky Lambert on the bench after a back problem.

Pedraza was bright as Leeds shaded the early sparring and set up Pablo Hernandez, who fired wide from just outside the box.

Stuart Dallas then had a fierce, low drive blocked by Bluebirds’ former Leeds skipper Sol Bamba, before Greg Halford fluffed a glorious opportunity on 28 minutes.

Craig Noone caused confusion with a beautifully-flighted free-kick and Halford, just 10 yards out, should have buried his header. Instead, he could only arrow his weak effort into the arms of Robert Green.

Two minutes later, Pedraza had a low drive well blocked by Morrison before Cardiff keeper Allan McGregor denied United’s 21-goal top scorer Chris Wood.

Morrison broke through in the 53rd minute with a 12-yard header from Noone’s free-kick, and Zohore drilled home from Aron Gunnarsson’s pass 18 minutes later.

To compound Leeds’ woes, skipper Liam Bridcutt was sent off for a second bookable offence four minutes from time.

Monk said: “We had no cutting edge, we couldn’t find a way to break them down and we gave away two bad goals. “Cardiff delivered a classic away perf performance, but we’ ll bounce ba back from this because we are a

g good side.”