Leeds United exited the Carabao Cup after a thriller of a 6-3 defeat to Chelsea on Wednesday evening. (Image: Adam Davy/PA Wire)
Leeds United exited the Carabao Cup after a thriller of a 6-3 defeat to Chelsea on Wednesday evening.
LEEDS United’s dreams of Carabao Cup glory were sunk by Chelsea’s deadly subs.
Leading 2-0 at Stamford Bridge, the Whites were torpedoed by the Blues’ deadly accurate second-half replacements who engineered a remarkable 6-3 third round win.
Daniel Farke’s men seemed to be cruising when Brenden Aaronson crashed the ball home after a fine Leeds move down the right three minutes into the second half to build on Tarik Muharemovic’s excellent first-half header.
At that point the visitors were well worth their two-goal lead but Chelsea hit back in astonishing fashion.
Cole Palmer, Morgan Rodgers, Pedro Neto and Reece James had come on at the break and turned the game on its head after Leeds had controlled the first half.
Five minutes after going 2-0 up, Dan James threw Chelsea a lifeline when he caught Pep Chavarria in the box with a challenge he didn’t need to make and Palmer drilled the resulting penalty past debut goalkeeper Michael Zetterer.
That opened the floodgates as just about everything Xavi Alonso’s side hit towards the Leeds goal found the back of the net.
Before Leeds knew it Chelsea were level. Palmer stroking the ball past a static Zetterer and they rattled in a third in a devastating 12-minute spell as Pedro Neto struck a curling effort into the bottom corner from 20 yards.
Five minutes later Chelsea were 4-2 ahead as veteran Danny Welbeck was allowed far too much space to turn and fire home from 12 yards out.
However, for all their attacking prowess Chelsea have defensive deficiencies. Leeds finally managed to regain their composure after making four substitutions of their own and two of them made an immediate impact.
Noah Okafor whipped the ball in from the left for Dominic Calvert-Lewin to sweep the ball home and halve Chelsea’s deficit with quarter of an hour remaining.
Five minutes later Chelsea got back on the scoresheet when Valtentin Barco smashed the ball past Zetterer to restore Chelsea's two-goal lead.
To rub salt into United’s wounds Welbeck cleverly deflected Barco’s wayward shot home in stoppage time to complete the scoring of a game which produced a real goal-fest in a bonkers second-half.
Farke, who made eight changes from the side which drew at Brighton on Saturday, was philosophical about the heavy defeat.
“It was a bit of a crazy game. Sometimes it happens when there are loads of changes,” he said.
“We played with confidence, there was not even a chance for them, then the referee decided to give a penalty, nobody was asking for it, all of a sudden, their players came into the game. The momentum was on their side.”
Leeds had more possession and more shots than Chelsea, but Farke conceded his side needed to defend crucial moments better.
“The focus and detail could have been better. We tried to come back, but small, small details made the difference.
“I like the mentality of my players. Even after 4-2 down, we tried to turn the game”.