IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A MAGICAL day but, for Leeds United, football has long become as romantic as a night spent speed dating the Stepford wives. The only thing left to be written about the club’s sorry implosion is the conclusion. An unpaid tax bill means that administration, relegation and yet more sales remain possibilities.

Michael Duberry is the latest in a long line of scapegoats and played like a man yearning to put Leeds out of their misery. Booed by his team’s fans, he helped to create Birmingham City’s decisive second goal and departed early. It was just another unedifying appendix to football’s longest suicide note.

Birmingham, meanwhile, are making do without Robbie Savage. Having handed in a transfer request, he has been cold-shouldered and was absent from St Andrew’s. Steve Bruce, the manager, says that the Welshman’s wife deserves a medal, while David Sullivan, the owner, went farther, accusing Blackburn Rovers of “tapping up” the midfield player and labelling their manager, Mark Hughes, “naive”, his assistant, Mark Bowen, “bitter” and Savage “greedy”. Savage, he added, “can rot in the reserves”. Another love affair turned sour.

Whatever the outcome, Bruce is blessed with having another high-energy player to replace Savage. Darren Carter may lack the hair, Armani tattoo and banana-coloured car, but he shares Savage’s workrate. His goal after 21 minutes, when he burst into the unguarded area to meet Clinton Morrison’s reverse pass, settled the contest. His second, against the run of play, was again engineered by the selfless Morrison and dispatched with equal assurance.

Leeds had their chances. David Healy was a fleet-footed thorn in the Birmingham hide, while Frazer Richardson, Aaron Lennon and Danny Pugh hinted at a brighter future. Questions still fester, though. How many of that quartet will be offloaded during the transfer window this month? How could Leeds afford to sign Healy when they cannot pay their debts? Will there ever be a takeover while the board wants a return on its own, modest investment? The Leeds players toiled, but Birmingham were in control from the moment Emile Heskey clipped a shot deftly over Neil Sullivan. It was a goal that spoke volumes about the confidence of a forward whose finishing has often been his weakness.

So the form of the Heskey-Morrison axis continues to warm the cockles of Bruce’s heart. As for the lovelorn Leeds fans, they are more likely to encounter romance if they find themselves stuck in a lift with Duberry and Peter Ridsdale.

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