Leeds United moved back to the top of the Championship table on Wednesday night with a comfortable win over Luton Town at Elland Road.
The Whites secured all three points in style, with a 3-0 victory, and kicked it off with an impressive, Paulo Di Canio-esque, volley from full-back Sam Byram.
Joel Piroe made it 2-0 just before half-time with a close-range poacher’s finish, before Dan James wrapped up the win with a terrific lobbed finish off the bench in the second half.
One of the team’s top performers on the night was not directly involved in any of those goals, however, as Ao Tanaka once again impressed in midfield.
Ao Tanaka's performance against Luton
The Japan international was constantly available to his teammates in the middle of the park and ended the 90 minutes with an eye-catching 114 out of 120 passes completed.
Tanaka, who had 135 touches of the ball, was always looking to take responsibility to progress the play for his side and played his passes quickly to put Luton on the back foot.
The former Fortuna Dusseldorf star was also strong out of possession. He won five of his seven ground duels, although lost his only aerial contest, to make three tackles and two interceptions to cut out Luton attacks.
These statistics illustrate how important he was to the side in and out of possession, despite not being directly involved in any major moments.
There was one Leeds player, however, who provided similar qualities on and off the ball and was even better than Tanaka – centre-back Pascal Struijk.
Performance in Numbers
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Pascal Struijk's performance against Luton
The Whites captain was the real hero for Daniel Farke’s side on the night with his terrific showing at the heart of the defence, as he showcased his ability on both sides of the game.
His biggest moment in the match came just after Leeds had taken the lead through Byram, as the defender incredibly cleared a shot that seemed destined for the back of the net off his own goal line, after it had been dinked over Illan Meslier
The Yorkshire Evening Post’s Graham Smyth described it as an “acrobatic” clearance and started his post with “WOW”, which was also the collective response heard from the crowd afterward.
Touches
131
135
Passes completed
116
114
Long passes completed
5/7
5/7
Duels won
8/11
5/8
Dribbled past
0x
1x
As you can see in the table above, Struijk also completed more passes and won more duels than Tanaka, whilst he was not dribbled past a single time by the Luton players.
These statistics show that the Dutch titan dominated the game with his defensive work and helped to control and dictate the match with his use of the ball.
Couple that with his miraculous clearance to prevent the away side from drawing level at 1-0 up and that is why he was Farke’s real hero and even better than Tanaka on Wednesday night.
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