Reuters:
Leeds United were all but relegated to the third tier of English soccer for the first time in their 88-year-history when they drew 1-1 with Ipswich Town in astonishing circumstances at Elland Road on Saturday.
The match finally finished after being halted for more than 30 minutes when players and officials ran off following a pitch invasion by Leeds fans just before the end of stoppage time.
Leeds, who needed a win to retain any real chance of staying up, took the lead after 12 minutes when Richard Cresswell headed home and held on until the 88th minute when Alan Lee equalised for Ipswich.
Scuffles were later reported to have broken out between Leeds fans who had stayed in their seats and the pitch invaders. Play eventually re-started with a Leeds corner and the match soon ended in the 1-1 draw.
A Football League spokesman was quoted as telling the BBC: "These actions by a minority of Leeds supporters could have serious consequences for the club.
"Clearly, passions will run high at this stage of the season. However, it is deplorable for supporters to enter the field of play at any time."
Ipswich manager Jim Magilton said: "It was a shambolic but brave decision...The players were worried about going back out.
"If any of them had got hurt, I would have been knocking on the referee's door."
Leeds, a dominant force in English football in the 1970s under the late Don Revie, are three points behind Hull City with a nine-goal inferior goal difference and one match to play.
It means Leeds will almost certainly be playing in the third division in 2007-08, just seven years after their 2000-01 Champions League campaign which took them all the way to the semi-finals.
From beating AC Milan and drawing with Barcelona at Elland Road in the first group stage of Europe's flagship competition, they will be hosting the likes of Cheltenham and Gillingham.
The Times:
Anticipating the fall of a footballing institution is one thing. Watching it disappear into the abyss, with scarcely a shred of dignity, quite another. The scare stories that have multiplied with Leeds' every step closer to the trap door became horrible reality at Elland Road yesterday when the club were all but relegated to the country's third tier, and the behaviour of some of their supporters compounded the humiliation.
During a dramatic finale, in which Ipswich's late equaliser combined with Hull's win at Cardiff to effectively seal the club's fate, thousands of Leeds fans spilled on to the pitch in stoppage time, forcing officials to consider an abandonment. While the majority of home fans chanted "scum" and "you're not fit to wear the shirt," it was at least 15 minutes before the pitch was cleared. Eventually, the players returned to complete the match, but it made no difference.
It all means that Leeds have 46 points and Hull 49, but the latter's far superior goal difference makes a turnaround in next weekend's final fixtures all but impossible. Agonisingly, the goal that did for Leeds came in the 89th minute, when Gary Roberts' curling corner was glanced into the net by Alan Lee.
The pity was that this was not the last of Leeds' worries on what had become a black day for the club, on and off the pitch. A huge crowd crammed into Elland Road with a mixture of alarm and sympathy that resembled nothing so much as a state of emergency. While the club have been delivered from European glory to humiliation in the space of six harrowing years, their supporters were not so demoralised that they couldn't rally themselves for one last home game in an effort to prevent the worst.
The match doubled as a farewell to Gary Kelly, who has made 531 appearances in 16 years at the club. Fans were asked not to invade the pitch at full-time, or his retirement ceremony would be abandoned, but they were on it long before that.
After just 11 minutes, in fact, a handful of them had hurdled the perimeter fencing. That was how long it had taken Leeds to relieve the tension with a goal. Alan Thompson collected the ball deep in his own half, turned his man, and sent a long, searching ball beyond the full-back. David Healy dashed on to the opportunity, drove a low shot that the goalkeeper could only parry, and was rewarded when Richard Cresswell stooped to nod it over the line.
While the reaction bordered on hysteria in the stands, Leeds haven't fallen this far without acquiring a keen sense of their own fragility. Despite Cresswell's continued threat there were nerves in the home defence as Ipswich attacked with growing frequency. Rui Marques was required to make a sliding clearance, and Francis Jeffers also tested the goalkeeper from 12 yards.