07-08-01: Preston North End (a) 5-0 (HT 1-0) Crowd (?)

Match Action:

Dominic Matteo moves in to dispossess Steve Robinson with David Batty close on hand

High fliying Harry Kewell beats two Preston defenders to the ball

Jonathan Woodgate cuts off David Healy

Programme:

Preston had no answer to the Wizard of Oz and in the end they were lucky to restrict the score to less than double figures, such was the Leeds dominance in the torrential rain that soaked the Deepdale pitch and was not condusive to good football. The only problem was that they missed innumerable chances which would have been bulging the net on a dry pitch. Leeds totally dominated the opening half hour and as early as the first minute Harry Kewell broke free on the left and crossed high for Alan Smith to get in a powerful headerwhich was well saved by Teuvo Moilanen. Mark Viduka was next to profit from his fellow Australianwho played him in behind full-back Lee Cartwright, but he was narrowly wide. Then Kewell himself fizzed in a cross-shot which deflected off Cartwright and looped agonizingly over the bar. Smith should have scored in the sixteenth minute, but when a cross from Ian Harte found him free at the far post his header was wide. The inevitable goal duly arrived in the twenty-fifth minute when Olivier Dacourt managed a well flighted through ball which Viduka chested down and buried under the body of the Preston keeper. The expected avalanche of goals never arrived and the teams went in a half time with just one goal between them. The second half saw Smith miss another golden oppurtunityafter Mark Viduka had put the ball in his path, only for him to shoot wide. Then Dacourt had a piledriver well saved by Moilanen. Two minutes into the half the second goal did arrive thanks to Smith and Viduka combining to put Lee Bowyer through and he made no mistake in touching the ball past the advancing keeper and into an empty net. Man-of-the-match Harry Kewell added a third three minutes later when he drilled the ball low and true past the keeper into the corner of the net. Robbie Keane replaced Alan Smith on the hour mark and immediately created two chances. The first was smothered by the keeperand the second the keeper tipped it over the bar. A trademark Ian Harte free-kick made it 4-0 in the eighty-sixth minute and Olivier Dacourt finished the scoring three minutes later but Bowyer almost added a sixth in the final minute. Preston brought on Iain Anderson for Mark Rankine, at half-time, Steve Robinson for Sean Gregan two minutes later, Pawel Abbott for Colin Murdock and Mendiarez for David Healy in the fifty-fifth minute and Adam Eaton for Paul McKenna seven minutes later.