No Leeds United favours from Alex Mowatt in quest to fire Barnsley to safety

It was something that famously used to rankle with ebullient former Doncaster Rovers chairman John Ryan, who wore the broadest smile in football when Rovers downed Leeds in the League One play-off final at Wembley in May 2008.

Testament to Leeds’s influence in Doncaster was even seen on that bitter day with scores of Whites supporters waiting on the platform with Rovers fans to get on London-bound trains on that Sunday in late spring.

Many sat with Rovers fans in their designated section after purchasing tickets from the Keepmoat Stadium – no doubt after giving a DN postcode.

On his recent shopping visits in Doncaster, Mowatt has been reminded of just what today’s meeting with the Reds means to Leeds by supporters who are desperate to see the Whites return to the Premier League after an absence of 16 years.

There has even been a bit of banter along the way, but tomorrow’s Elland Road meeting is deadly serious for Barnsley and not just Leeds.

The Reds’ form since the arrival of Gerhard Struber may have been enough to keep away from the relegation positions, but seasons start in August, not November.

The problem in early-season was defensive ineptitude and now the issue revolves around a lack of goals, with Struber’s side having hit a bit of a wall on that front at the worst possible time.

Mowatt, for one, is not giving up and just as Leeds legend Billy Bremner famously once hung up that famous ‘Keep Fighting’ mantra on his dressing room peg, so the Reds leader is 
persevering.

If it means upsetting the locals, then so be it.

The midfielder, returning to Elland Road as a player for the first time since leaving the club in January 2017, said: “The amount of people I have seen in the shops over the past week who have said: ‘Let Leeds win on Thursday’.

“People keep saying it and it is mad how many have kept saying that.

“They want Leeds to do well, but we want to as well.

“I am going there as Barnsley captain in a relegation fight and we need the points.

“I have to forget everything about Leeds and it is nothing about them, it is just another game for me.

“If we can come out with a win there, it will be one of the biggest wins of the season for us and hopefully, we can perform on Thursday and do that.”

On his return to LS11, the 25-year-old continued: “I only went to the Derby game in the play-offs. That is the only game I have been to. It did not end too well.

“A few of my mates are still there and I always want my mates to do well.”

Of course, the ideal scenario for Mowatt is for Barnsley to claim a survival lifeline on Thursday and for Leeds to then go and finish off their own job in the final two matches.

The hosts must do it without someone Mowatt knows well in Kalvin Phillips, who is sidelined for the rest of the 2019-20 campaign with a knee injury.

The Reds schemer remains good friends with his fellow Academy product, but from a purely Barnsley perspective, he will be happy not to see him on the pitch at Elland Road today.

Mowatt said: “I think Kalvin has been outstanding. He is out for the rest of the season now, but this season, he has been outstanding again.

“It is a shame he is not playing, but I think it benefits us that he is not playing as he is such a big player for them.

“I still speak to him and spoke to him (on Tuesday) and asked how his injury was and things like that.

“He will not be playing in the game against us, which is a shame (for him).”

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