Leeds Utd 2 Hull City 1: Evans says Cellino has no influence on United team

Such were the contrasting moods and fortunes at the end of a pulsating Yorkshire derby that was settled in the favour of the hosts by goals from Chris Wood and Tom Adeyemi.

It meant an upbeat end to another turbulent week in LS11 that had seen Leeds in the headlines for all the wrong reasons.

Evans awoke on Saturday morning to claims in a tabloid that Cellino had ordered the United head coach to change formation at half-time during the club’s previous game, a 1-0 defeat at QPR.

The report is one the Scot totally refutes, insisting: “It just simply never happened. Mr Cellino didn’t say anything at half-time last week. (Former Leeds manager) Brian McDermott said to me, ‘You’ll wake up most days and read things that surprise you’.

“If it had happened, I’d be getting a taxi home. I have got too much pride. If I am going to fail here then I need to be the one who fails, not fail by picking someone else’s teams, shapes or systems.

“It was an alarming story. With previous chairmen, I would always discuss shapes and systems. I did it with (Rotherham United’s) Tony Stewart for three and a half years. But he would never say a word about what we should do and neither has Mr Cellino.”

Evans’s ebullient mood at the final whistle as he celebrated in front of the United fans was in stark contrast to that of Bruce.

The Tigers’ chief labelled his players “big-time Charlies” for the manner of their lacklustre first-half performance as Leeds seized control.

“The one thing I cannot abide is that we don’t show up,” said Bruce, who lost son Alex to a back injury that could keep the defender out for several weeks.

“If you get beat but you get beat with your boots on, that’s fine. That is football.

“I can’t remember in my time at Hull seeing many games like that. The one thing a team of mine has to do is show up. If you give the ball away and make mistakes, fine.

“But I cannot stand players jumping out of tackles, not winning a header, not being willing to try and get the ball back in a derby game. I won’t accept it. All I can do is apologise to the supporters.

“I will pick a team next week that will do those basics, that’s for sure. It hurts even more because it is a derby game. You come to Leeds United, a big ground with a big tradition and we came here like a bunch of ‘big-time Charlies’.

“I just cannot describe what I have seen in that first half. I didn’t give the players chance for an explanation at half-time. They shouldn’t have a chance.

“What I say in the dressing room stays there, but I think you get the point. Burnley away last season was the last time I have been this angry. It won’t happen again.”

The only blot on Leeds’s day was confirmation that Sam Byram had rejected the club’s offer of a new contract.

The 22-year-old’s current deal is due to expire next summer and United are understood to have offered the Academy graduate a year’s extension on his existing wages of £12,000 per week.

Evans refuses to admit defeat in the club’s attempts to agree an extension, though the Leeds head coach also says there could be repercussions in the new year if no progress has been made.

“I want Sam to have a week or two where we are not discussing it on a daily basis,” said the Scot. “Where Sam gets the time to think really hard about whether he wants to leave this club.

“I will make it clear when we get to January that if he doesn’t want to commit his future, I don’t want him around. We want players who want to be here. He is not going to sit around and be a bit-part player, he has got too much in the locker for that.

“He is a young man who I have got the utmost respect for. He conducts himself in an extremely professional manner. If he turned up with my daughter on his arm, I don’t like any boys but I would accept it because of how he lives.

“But they have to want to be here. I don’t care who they are. If they don’t want to be here, we don’t want them around.”

Match report: Page 3.