Watford 1 Leeds Utd 0: Prove you deserve to be with us next season, challenges Steve Evans

The death of the play-off push in January meant that the FA Cup, that eternal source of hope for wistful dreamers, was the last opportunity for the Whites to take anything of value from this season.

Unfortunately for them, it was not Watford’s Premier League quality but their own flaws that woke them from the dream.

Scott Wootton was unlucky to shin the ball into the back of his own net in the second half after Leeds had spent the majority of the game looking comfortable.

Evans felt it was “a particularly cruel way to go out of the FA Cup”.

Marco Silvestri will be counting his blessings that the black mark of an own goal was not handed out for missing Ben Watson’s cross en route to the key moment of the match.

It is also not Wootton’s fault that the systems Leeds have played this season demand that he operate as an important attacking outlet.

This is a player who will have spent the vast majority of his footballing education being taught how to prevent goals rather than score them.

There should be no surprise to find that he is not a creative force, as was repeatedly exposed on Saturday.

Even after Leeds made it two league games without a goal last Monday against Middlesbrough, Sol Bamba was the only change, coming in for the injured Liam Cooper in defence.

Watford head coach Quique Sanchez Flores made six alterations, but could still field eight full internationals in his starting line-up.

The 4,100 fans gathered in the away end for this tie will have looked at the team and realised that a cutting edge would be hard to find, especially with injured striker Chris Wood still absent.

“You need your top players,” admitted Evans. “Chris was signed for a lot of money, around £3.5m, and if you’re signed for that you need to be on the pitch more than you’re sitting upstairs.”

Without the Kiwi striker, barring a 25-minute cameo at Brentford, Leeds have scored just eight times since the turn of the year.

While they dominated the play at times on Saturday, they quite simply could not find the final incisive pass to create a goal.

Some players deserve credit for their continued effort in the face of a season that is clearly not going to pan out as hoped.

Giuseppe Bellusci put in an assured display in the centre of defence as he continues to exorcise the ghosts of last season. Returning to Vicarage Road cannot have been a highlight in his calendar, having been sent off on his Leeds debut at this ground.

Leeds’s clearest sight of goal in the game came through Bellusci after he released Souleymane Doukara, but the striker hesitated as much as dod Costel Pantilimon in the Watford net, and before the Leeds player could get his shot away, the Hornets surrounded him to smother the chance.

Ultimately, Evans has been left without the players to do what the fans demand of every coach or manager who walks in the door at Elland Road – earn promotion to the Premier League.

That was also the case for a list of unfortunates who came before: Uwe Rosler, Neil Redfearn, Darko Milanic, David Hockaday, Brian McDermott, Neil Warnock and Simon Grayson. Their managerial merits can be debated until the end of time, and the same can be said for Evans, but they have all been asked to achieve the impossible with a team of improbables.

That long list highlights a reality that Evans himself brought up.

“I look at managers at the top end of the league and they get about 10 transfer windows to build a team. We’ve had two – the last one and the one that’s coming.”

Evans knows he does not have the players. The surprise inclusion of Jordan Botaka on the bench said as much, as did his introduction when Leeds were trying to push for a late equaliser, although the Congolese winger will not have been happy to have heard his coach talk about him in the terms he did after the game.

“He’s very fortunate to be on the pitch,” said Evans. “His performances aren’t on the level we need them to be.”

Just like in 10 of the last 11 seasons, a move up a division for Leeds is not on the cards.

Evans called on his squad to give him a reason to involve them in a promotion push next season, saying: “People are playing to be part of next season. People have to produce performances. I’ve got no respect for them having contracts that go beyond the summer.”

What is Evans’s aim between now and May, starting with Fulham on Tuesday? “The target would be to finish in 10th position,” he said.

This is where Leeds have been left by their infamous financial meltdown, subsequent mismanagement, and now the chaos at the top of the club.

Currently 17th, though 11 points clear of the drop zone, they will have to try their hardest for nothing more than a mid-table finish in the second tier.