Leeds United's 'crowning' this weekend as the club everyone loves to hate may have left many of the national newspapers 'amazed' and 'stunned', but to anyone with even a cursory interest in English football it was surely to be expected.

Always more reviled than revered, even when dominating English football in the Seventies, Leeds are possibly the only club who could be the subject of a best-selling book called the 'Damned United' without anyone batting an eyelid.

They are surely the only club who could be 'welcomed' back into the top flight after promotion with newspaper headlines such as 'Leeds Scum are back' and 'Say the Leeds and you're snarling', as happened to Howard Wilkinson's side in 1990 after the club's fans had run amok in Bournemouth. And they are certainly the only club who are sung about every week by rival fans at stadia up and down the country when actually playing hundreds of miles away in League One.

This correspondent, for example, was at Pride Park on Saturday when fans of Doncaster and Derby united to chant their hatred of all things Elland Road before and during the game.

The same happened at Stamford Bridge last season when Chelsea and Huddersfield supporters went so far as to applaud each other after the singing of anti-Leeds ditties, while a popular half-time pastime at Manchester United games sees hundreds of Reds regularly come together in the concourses to chant 'we all hate Leeds scum'.

The official confirmation of United's unpopularity came in a survey commissioned by sales company Sandler Training, where supporters of all 92 clubs were asked to name the club they hated the most – and which team they liked best after their own.

Published over the weekend, it showed that Leeds had come out on top in the 'Hate League' ahead of Manchester United and Chelsea.

Others to feature in the top 20 included Millwall and West Ham, while Sheffield United were the only other Yorkshire representative with a 17th-place finish. Morecambe were the surprise choice as the nation's favourite 'other club', followed by Arsenal, Liverpool, Hartlepool and Brighton.

It was the most hated league table that drew most interest, however, with The Sun seemingly being the most surprised newspaper.

It read: "The survey had been expected to throw up Manchester United as the most disliked club because of jealousy over their worldwide fanbase, massive resources, bulging trophy cabinet and Cristiano Ronaldo. But when the results came in Leeds beat Alex Ferguson's Red Devils into second place, with Roman Abramovich's moneybags Chelsea, third."

The Sun, after offering a helpful explanation guide entitled 'five reasons to loathe Leeds', then went on to say how the Elland Road fans would be 'shocked' by the survey's findings. The reality, though, has been rather different with most fans having taken a rather perverse pride in their club's confirmed standing in the eyes of others. Not least because it disproves the chant 'you're not famous any more' that is sung by opposition fans whenever Leeds are in town.