Doing a Leeds

The fall of Leeds United

As champions of the final First Division season, Leeds United were one of the inaugural 22 clubs of the Premier League, the breakaway top division league competition formed in 1992. Leeds had sustained success in the league in late 1990s, and ultimately reached the semi-finals of the 2000–01 Champions League. Their level of spending to do so however had exceeded all other clubs, and the club's debt level rose annually from £9m to £21m, £39m, £82m and peaked at around £119m, much of the money having been spent on transfer fees and players' wages. After the club failed to qualify for the 2002–03 Champions League by only finishing fifth in the Premier League, it had to make drastic savings by selling players as it could no longer sustain the debt repayments, which relied on the ticket sales and television income from the European competition.

At the end of the 2003–04 FA Premier League season, Leeds United were relegated to the Football League Championship. The financial effects continued, and with one game to go in the 2006–07 season, the club voluntarily entered administration, incurring a 10-point league penalty, resulting in relegation to League One, the first time the club had ever been in the third tier of English football. Subsequent breaches of financial rules in the summer nearly resulted in the club being expelled from the Football League altogether (a fate which coincidentally had befallen the club's predecessors, Leeds City), but they were ultimately re-admitted with a 15-point penalty to apply to the 2007–08 season. Despite further appeals, the penalty stood and ultimately cost the club promotion that season. At the end of the 2009–10 season, the club was promoted back to the Championship after a final day victory.

Leeds United's decline was not entirely without historical precedent, as Wolverhampton Wanderers had suffered a similarly high-profile decline in the 1980s, finishing 6th in the old First Division and winning the Football League Cup in 1980, before eventually dropping into the old Fourth Division by 1986 on the back of three consecutive relegations. Bristol City had become the first league team suffer three successive relegations when they went down to the Fourth Division in 1982, although their decline was less dramatic as that of Wolves, as they had spent just four seasons in the First Division and not been as successful or spent as much money on players.

However, the decline of Wolverhampton Wanderers was widely seen as the culmination of decades of financial mismanagement rather than an extreme amount of short-term spending as was the case with Leeds. Wolves had paid a national record fee of nearly £1.5million to sign striker Andy Gray from Aston Villa in 1979, while spending an even greater sum of money of rebuilding one side of the ground to create a large all-seater stand at around the same time.

Contemporaneous to Leeds, Luton Town, who were relegated from the Championship alongside them in 2007, suffered an even more severe decline and underwent three consecutive relegations, ending up in the Football Conference by 2009; they too had been hit by financial problems. Luton had been in the top tier of English Football as recently as the 1991-92 season. They did not reclaim their league status for five seasons.

Swansea City, who climbed from the Fourth Division to the First Division between 1978 and 1981, finished sixth in the 1981-82 season, having led the league several times that season. However, they were relegated a year later and went down again in 1984, suffering a third relegation in four seasons in 1986 after they had almost gone out of business.

Wimbledon, who matched Swansea's record of climbing three divisions in four seasons in 1986, survived in the top flight of English football for 14 years and won the FA Cup in 1988 before being relegated from the Premier League in 2000. They were relegated from Division One four years later, after which they were renamed Milton Keynes Dons following their relocation to Milton Keynes. The renamed club suffered relegation to the league's fourth tier in 2006; and would have gone down a year earlier had it not been for a 10-point deduction imposed on financially troubled Wrexham.

In 1998, Manchester City's relegation to Division Two made them the second former winners of a European trophy to be relegated to the third tier of their domestic league (after 1974 Cup Winners Cup winnerss Magdeburg in 1991); they had been European Cup Winners' Cup winners in 1970. City had faced constant struggles in the league since heavy spending on players in the late 1970s and early 1980s had failed to translate into silverware; they were relegated from the First Division twice during the 1980s, returning after two seasons on both occasions. Similar heavy spending on players in the early 1990s again failed to deliver silverware, and City went down from the FA Premier League at the end of its fourth season in 1996 after narrowly avoiding relegation in the previous two seasons. A second relegation took them down to Division Two in 1998, but this was followed by two consecutive promotions.

In 2005, Nottingham Forest became the first former winners of the European Cup (which they had won in 1979 and 1980) to be relegated to the third tier of their domestic league. Having also won a league title and four League Cups between 1978 and 1990, they had been relegated at the end of the first Premier League season in 1993, promoted back at the first attempt, gone down again in 1997 and achieved an instant return to the Premier League in 1998, only to be relegated a year later. They have not returned to the Premier League since their 1999 relegation, although they did climb out of the third tier (League Two) after three seasons.

In 2004, Carlisle United became the first former members of the English top flight to be relegated from the Football League; their solitary season in the top flight was in the Football League First Division in the 1974-75 season, and they in fact led the English league after winning their opening three games of that league campaign.

In 2006, the 1986 Football League Cup winners Oxford United became the first former winners of a major trophy to be relegated from the Football League. They returned to the league four years later.

"Doing a Leeds"

The term "doing a Leeds" or to "do a Leeds" has since become synonymous with financial mismanagement of a football club with potential dire consequences. It can refer specifically to any club that fails to plan adequately for the financial impact of either failure to qualify for the Champions League, or of not adequately restructuring following relegation from the Premier League to avoid a further drop, or more generally, to the rapid demise in the relative standing of any club.

Managers and chairmen, although sometimes obliged to "chase the dream" (the inevitable precursor of "doing a Leeds"), are often forced to deny they are "doing a Leeds" in the wake of a large investment that some analysts predict cannot be afforded by their club and may overstretch their budget. Similarly, fans may fear their club will "do a Leeds" if its expensively acquired and maintained team is unable to qualify for the Champions League or is relegated from the Premier League, thereby failing to "live the dream".

Conversely, the avoidance of "doing a Leeds" has been invoked by managers to justify selling their best players in order to raise funds to stave off going into administration, which might lead to a relegation-inducing penalty. Failure to invest at the expected "normal" rate in order to maintain a particular club's league position can even be labelled as "doing a Leeds".

The phrase was notably used during the relegation of Newcastle United in 2009, one of the largest clubs to be relegated from the Premier League. Having bought the club, new owner Mike Ashley stated that his investment had in fact saved the club from "doing a Leeds". In spite of this Newcastle suffered relegation at the end of the 2008-09 season, sparking fears both before and after that the club could "do a Leeds" and drop further, into League One, without restructuring. However, the club avoided this and bounced back the following season with automatic first place promotion.

The 2010 announcement of Manchester United's need to refinance their large debt as a bond issue following their purchase by Malcolm Glazer led to questions in the media whether even Manchester United, as the most successful Premier League-era club, could be in danger of "doing a Leeds".

Shelbourne were referred to as the "Irish version of Leeds United" after winning the League of Ireland Premier Division in 2006 but being automatically demoted into the League of Ireland First Division for financial reasons.

The term has been applied to Portsmouth, who amassed debts which eventually saw them become the first Premier League club to enter administration in February of the 2009-10 season, leading to relegation in the same season after the subsequent nine-point penalty. Portsmouth were relegated to League One after the 2011-12 season of the Football League Championship, due to a 10-point deduction for entering administration; a near-identical scenario to what occurred to Leeds five years previously. They were again relegated after a 10-point deduction due to failing to pay footballing creditors, this time to League Two, in the 2012-13 season.

Bolton Wanderers are another team guilty of "Doing a Leeds", after enjoying a successful stint in the Premier League under Sam Allardyce, which culminated in qualifying for both the 2006-2007 and 2007-08 UEFA Cup, reaching the last 16 in the latter, which included a victory against Atlético Madrid, and draws against Bayern Munich, Athletico Madrid, and Sporting Lisbon. After Allardyce's departure, the club began a steady decline, with relegation battles being a regular feature. Owen Coyle lead Bolton on a successful cup campaign of the 2010-2011 FA Cup, reaching the semi-final stage where Stoke City despatched The Trotters 5-0. This began a rapid decline that ultimately lead to relegation on the last day of the 2011-12 season. The club mounted a late charge for the play-off's in 2012-13 season, falling just short after a final day 2-2 draw to Blackpool at home. Since then, the club announced debts of £172.9m in 2015 and were relegated to League One in 2016.

A similar phrase, "Doing a Bradford" was coined by former Blackburn Rovers player Simon Garner in 2012, a scenario that he was worried could befall his former club. Garner was referring to Leeds's neighbours Bradford City, who were a Premier League club in 2001, but had fallen three divisions to League Two in 2007 and were not promoted back to League One until the end of the 2012-2013 season; the only other former Premier League clubs to have fallen to League Two are Swindon Town (in 2006 and then 2011, and unlike Bradford they immediately gained promotion back to League One on both occasions), Portsmouth, and Blackpool.