Leeds and Burnley’s predictable stalemate shows the grim reality of the Championship’s promotion race | OneFootball

Daniel Farke had sat through a grim northern drama of a match, an exercise in downbeat realism as he tried to shelter himself from the teeming rain in the Turf Moor dugout. He then showed a nice line in understatement. “I wouldn’t say it was the most sexiest piece of football,” he reflected. “I can’t say it was an unbelievable advertisement.”

And yet there was an accuracy to it. This is the Championship, a division where ambition and attrition collide. The biggest game of the Football League season staked its claim to be the dullest, the number of goals matching the number of shots on target until Dan James’ 89th-minute half-volley was tipped over by James Trafford. At its end, Leeds had marched a little closer to the Premier League, Burnley nudged closer to a place in the record books.

They are statistical marvels; the wow factor lies in the numbers, not the football. But there are different ways to go up. The eventual verdict may be that these are pragmatic promotions. Leeds are league leaders, shorn of the youthful stardust of the sold Crysencio Summerville and Archie Gray but imbued with solidity, injected with high-calibre Championship players; if few of Farke’s squad have the combination of finesse and physicality to prosper in the Premier League, such issues can be postponed until they get there.

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Leeds and Daniel Farke took an unsexy step towards promotion (Getty Images)

Burnley are the team testing the theory that the road to the promised land is paved with clean sheets. They must hope so. They have seven in a row in the league, their defence unbreached in the Championship since Christmas. They have 20 in the season; the problem is that nine have come in 0-0 draws. Stalemates could prove checkmate for their hopes of automatic promotion.

Burnley have taken puritanism to a new level; buccaneers in their previous season in the Championship, they stand accused of being bores now. They have a mere 36 goals at the right end, putting them level with 21st-placed Portsmouth, and on course to score a mere 57. They scored nine in their first two matches of the season; after 29, they have only conceded nine. At this rate, they will let in just 14 all season. “I get people want to highlight the fact we haven’t scored many goals but what we have done defensively is nothing short of remarkable,” said manager Scott Parker.

He shrugged off his latest 0-0. “I think it was always going to pan out that way,” he said, unhappy with his side’s return of no shots on target, happy with the point. Farke provided a backhanded compliment. “Burnley have a special approach,” he said. “They take pretty little risk with the ball. They can’t be hurt on the counter-attack.”

But Farke and Parker bring rhyme and reason. They are underpinned by logic. So were their clubs in appointing them. Include Sheffield United’s Chris Wilder and the top three all have promotion specialists, each looking to take a team up to the top flight for the third time. If the elite clubs can look for the next big thing, the Ruben Amorim factor is less apparent in the clubs best positioned to join them. They have gone for the tried and trusted.

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Burnley and Leeds were both happy enough with a draw at Turf Moor (Getty Images)

It is a method that looks like working for Leeds, two points clear at the top. It might for Burnley, one point behind Sheffield United. Leeds can argue they are on course to score more goals than last season, seven more than when they won the division in 2019-20 but these could eventually be deemed two pragmatic promotions.

These clubs have had more iconic managers, teams built with more idealism. This is not Marcelo Bielsa’s Leeds or Vincent Kompany's Burnley. The German will never be as beloved as the Argentinian in the West Riding, but his last three Championship campaigns have yielded 94, 97 and 90 points. At their current rate of progress, Leeds will get 95. Farke has more experience of the nineties than a Britpop tribute band.

Meanwhile, Parker may not follow in the path of his predecessor, swapping Burnley for Bayern Munich as the Belgian did. He may be pigeonholed as a Championship specialist these days, though his time at Club Brugge helped him outwit Miron Muslic - who he encountered when the Bosnian managed Cercle Brugge and walloped 5-0 - when Burnley beat Plymouth last week. Muslic’s tactics had not changed and Parker came prepared.

Yet that scoreline was the anomaly, this more familiar. Even a crowd who spent the best part of a decade watching Sean Dyche’s football may have found it uneventful. If Parker has out-Dyched Dyche, it is still a compliment. He had to forge a team on the hoof after an August fire sale. There is a togetherness. “It is a group of men who run out there every time and give absolutely everything,” said Parker.

Burnley have had a trio of games at Turf Moor in January. They have finished 0-0, 0-0 and 0-0. But they are undefeated in 16 games, Leeds in 11. This was hard to watch but each is hard to beat. And for Leeds it was, Farke felt, “a good point on the road”. Unsexy could be good for Farke.