One way traffic in the first half hour was nobody’s idea of a great game, and it took a response from Leeds to make this a match that had Alex Ferguson happy, at the end, just to be watching. “That was what it’s about,” he said. “There isn’t another league in the world that could produce a match like that.”

The manager in the other dugout, David O’Leary, had arrived at Old Trafford that morning amid a flurry of headlines suggesting he should have a quiet word with the Manchester United board about replacing their retiring boss; alongside him was Ferguson’s old assistant, Brian Kidd, coming back to his old club for the first time.

Perhaps the subplots were what inspired a creaking Manchester United team. They had lost at home to Bolton a week earlier, and at home to Deportivo La Coruna a few days before that. Old Trafford was not the fortress Ferguson wanted it to be, and he was worried about the influence from Leeds. “The Leeds fans, as we know, have this reputation. It’s a volatile atmosphere and we can’t afford a tinderbox.”

He didn’t get one in the first half but he did get most of the play. Nigel Martyn started his day by tipping David Beckham’s free-kick around the post; the other post intervened later when Beckham jabbed at the ball and sent it bouncing through the six yard box. But for all Manchester’s dominance, that and a near post cross to Ruud van Nistelrooy were all they got out of Leeds. The Peacocks were unbeaten in their opening nine Premier League games, and a win over Arsenal and draws with Liverpool and Chelsea had lifted them above their title rivals to the top of the league. Only Arsenal, Ipswich and Liverpool had scored past Leeds, once each, and Rio Ferdinand’s anticipation matched with Dominic Matteo’s aggression meant Manchester United’s pressure was taking them to the edge of the Leeds United box but rarely any further. Paul Scholes tried a snapshot volley, but he was a long way out.

Leeds eased their way into the match near the end of the first half and Mark Viduka had the best chance, put through the offside trap by Harry Kewell, but his first time shot missed the gap Fabien Barthez had left inside his near post. That was the other side of Leeds United’s start to the season; they were only 10th in the goalscoring table, with twelve, less than half the 26 their opponents had scored. In those nine unbeaten games were three 0-0 draws.

Both sides returned for the second half with the idea that this was their game. The temperature rose a little before the break, when a fifty-fifty challenge involved Lee Bowyer kicking Nicky Butt while Butt’s hands were giving Bowyer a bloody nose that leaked persistently through the second half. Three seconds after the restart Scholes scythed down Olivier Dacourt and got a yellow card. Leeds were changing formation, using Dacourt, Bowyer and Eirik Bakke together in central midfield, moving Harry Kewell from left midfield to a front three with Viduka and Robbie Keane. More numbers in the middle meant more challenges, and a flashpoint was inevitable.

It came from an odd source. Robbie Keane took the ball off Beckham when his control was loose, and as he turned infield, Beckham dived swinging, his boot chopping Keane down at the knee. Both players got straight up but Beckham was put straight down again, Keane shoving him over by the throat, then showing Laurent Blanc the reason why, miming the way Beckham had taken him down. Beckham’s foul could have earned a red card; Keane’s reaction should have. If the two incidents had happened separately that’s what might have happened. But referee Dermot Gallagher elected to soothe things over with a yellow each.

The game had been end to end but now Keane seemed determined to finish it himself. He fired a quick free-kick into Barthez’s top corner, but Gallagher had told Ian Harte to wait for the whistle and now pointed out that applied to all of them. Keane revelled in dribbling the ball around Beckham and crossing; then taking a pass from Bowyer, cutting inside, and shooting at Barthez. Neither team was on top but one pattern had continued from the first half: Manchester United couldn’t get into the Leeds box, but Leeds were making chances.

Keane looked ready to win the game, but O’Leary thought otherwise, replacing him with David Batty. You can’t say the change didn’t work. With a quarter of an hour left, Kewell threatened down the left and teed Harte to cross; Viduka had the advantage of being inches offside but seemed to have missed the chance even so, the ball bouncing across the six yard box, until he extended his leg and hooked a shot through Barthez. Leeds had a rare lead at a ground where they hadn’t won since 1981, against the team they wanted to beat above all others.

Ferguson had also made a change, although Ole Gunnar Solksjaer’s involvement so far had been a tangle with Batty that, as the Yorkshireman ignored the ref’s whistle, seemed like it might never end. Leeds dropped deeper and deeper, trying to use Kewell as an outlet, but succumbed with two minutes left. Manchester United had Beckham, Scholes, van Nistelrooy, Juan Veron and Ryan Giggs, of them it was Giggs who crossed to the back post, where Solksjaer rose above Harte, heading across goal and into the net beyond any goalkeeper’s saving.

The equaliser came late but with time to play on, and with Danny Mills unable to stop more crosses, time for Martyn to demonstrate that if he couldn’t get that one, he still had abilities beyond other keepers. Dom Matteo tested him first, trying to defend a Scholes cross, and Martyn sat on the ball, trapping it between his legs on the line. Then it was a cross from Beckham and a superb header from van Nistelrooy, as good as Solksjaer’s, but tipped away this time by the ends of Martyn’s fingers, stretching far, far from his diving, flying body.

“A great save,” said Ferguson, happy with the game, happy with the point, unhappy that Robbie Keane stayed on the pitch. Keane himself said someone must have been looking down on him. “I don’t think it is even a debate,” Ferguson said. “It was a silly, spur of the moment thing and it was strange because I don’t think Robbie is that kind of player. But I wonder how the game would have turned out had Leeds been down to ten men.”

If he was content, you’d think his heir apparent would be pleased to be leaving Old Trafford unbeaten. But he would barely let Sky Sports’ Claire Tomlinson finish her questions before jumping down his players’ throats.

“David, there aren’t too many managers would be disappoin—”

“Yeah, I am, I’m disappointed. I’m not having a go at my players now, but when we got the goal we sat back, and I wanted us to go on from there. We defended the lead and we invited them on to us. That’s not having a go because I’m proud of them all, but I felt we should have won the game … I want to be positive, I want to score more goals.”

Some might wonder how much attacking O’Leary was expecting after replacing Keane with Batty at 0-0, rather than Alan Smith, or why he felt the need to qualify his assessment of Martyn’s late save: “A very good save, or a lucky very good save.” He seemed oddly affected by the result. “In general I thought it was a good, tough game,” he said. “I’m disappointed that we’ve lost. We drew, I mean.”

It might not have been the win O’Leary crossed the Pennines dreaming of, but he did list some of the advantages of being unbeaten after ten games. “With the tough programme we’ve had, I’m delighted. I’m pleased, the chairman is pleased with me at the moment I think, but I’m delighted for the players because they deserve everything they’ve got.”

O’Leary couldn’t help thinking, though, that he was leaving Old Trafford deserving more. ◉