For a long time at Elland Road yesterday Lent seemed to have come early. As a footballing feast the game between the Uniteds of Leeds and West Ham offered only hard rations.
Nevertheless, George Graham's Leeds team eventually continued their upward surge in the Premiership by scoring three times in the last 15 minutes after Frank Lampard had given West Ham the lead just past the hour. Until their opening goal, Leeds did not manage one shot on target.
The victory takes them back to the fourth place they held briefly just over a fortnight ago, and they were the first side to beat Manchester United this season. Leeds, moreover, have now won seven times in 10 league fixtures, which is surely championship form in any language.
Well, maybe not the halting phrases and mispronunciations of yesterday's match. For the most part West Ham, who since winning at Barnsley on the opening day had only gained a point on their travels, promised themselves some reward.
Although a calf injury had denied Harry Redknapp's team the sweeping services of Rio Ferdinand, West Ham remained tightly organised at the back and more convincing in attack when they broke away. Leeds, by contrast, looked unimaginative and unambitious.
Their approach reflected not only the absence of Harry Kewell, the talented young winger who had been on World Cup duty for Australia in Iran over the weekend, but Graham's displeasure at conceding six goals in two matches, the last of which had seen his team dumped from the English League Cup by Reading.
Yet they still won with a sufficient flourish to suggest that, with Kewell back, their season will continue to improve.
West Ham's fourth defeat in five league matches leaves Redknapp's players poised anxiously above the relegation area. Well though they played at times yesterday, this was yet another game where goals, and eventually points, simply slipped away.
During an unmemorable first half, West Ham had the better of the few chances created. After 18 minutes, John Hartson headed down Tim Breacker's high ball and Nigel Martyn had to move quickly to scoop the ball clear after Gunnar Halle had chested it back to him from an uncomfortably close range.
All Leeds seemed to be capable of at this point were trundling, predictable attacks which tended to peter out long before they offered any sort of threat to West Ham's three centre-backs. All too often Leeds's passing was square and inconsequential, with the ball either over-hit into touch or under-hit and easily intercepted.
Thankfully, the football woke up after half-time, woke up with confident appeals for a penalty, in fact, after a rash lunge by David Unsworth had appeared to bring down Rod Wallace as the Leeds striker turned on a ball from Halle near the right-hand byline. Gerald Ashby, however, did not buy Wallace's dramatic fall and the TV replay suggested that no contact had been made.
At least Leeds's sense of injustice roused them to more positive things, but West Ham rode out the mini-crisis before going ahead in the 64th minute with a classic counterattack. Hartson beat David Wetherall to another high ball from Breacker and nodded it down into a space quickly occupied by Frank Lampard, who scored his fourth goal in two matches with a firm drive into the far corner of the net.
No impartial judge would have begrudged West Ham a win at that stage, but in the 75th minute Leeds were level when Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink curled a low shot inside the right-hand post after Alf Inge Haaland's tapped free kick had been stunned by Lee Bowyer.
Unsworth's interception denied Hasselbaink a second goal from an almost identical set piece, but in the 87th minute Haaland, 25 yesterday, exploited poor marking to head Bruno Ribeiro's corner past Ludek Miklosko. In stoppage time Hasselbaink did score again after Robertson had side-stepped a lunge from a West Ham substitute, Iain Dowie, before crossing from the left.
