Max Verstappen is smiling as he holds up the new Leeds United shirt at Silverstone.
It is July and the Formula 1 drivers’ championship leader is flanked by Leeds players Dan James, Ethan Ampadu, Glen Kamara and Georginio Rutter, who are holding up Red Bull racing shirts.
The photo represents the start of a new and, both parties hope, mutually successful link between United and energy drink giants Red Bull who had just signed a sponsorship plus equity deal with the club at the time. In principle, the idea is for Red Bull — and by extension its vast sporting empire in football, extreme sports, F1 and more — and Leeds to share ideas as well as the sponsorship presence.
But the photo has become a source of amusement for fans because, since that day, the seemingly unstoppable Verstappen has not won another race.
At the six subsequent Grands Prix, the three-time world champion has finished fifth, fourth, second, sixth, fifth, and second. This has given rise to the idea that he has fallen under a Leeds United curse. In reality, the link between Leeds and Verstappen failing to win races is, of course, purely coincidental but United is a club with a history of curses and superstition.
Most famous of all is former manager Don Revie’s raft of beliefs and rituals. This culminated in him bringing fortune teller Gypsy Rose Lee to Elland Road from Blackpool to ask her to lift a curse on the pitch. It was said to have been laid by a group of travellers who were forced to move off a patch of scrubland in the 1890s to make way for the stadium to be built. A poor string of results in 1971 prompted Revie to ask Gypsy Rose Lee to lift the curse and, after walking to all four corners of the pitch and throwing some seeds down, it was pronounced that it had been lifted.
It is hard to see the same thing working for Verstappen, but he could always take a leaf out of Revie’s book by committing to smaller superstitions for good luck. Revie had plenty of habits to ensure Leeds kept away bad luck — these included wearing a lucky blue suit for important matches and bringing a rabbit’s foot into the dugout. His matchday routines involved making the players run out onto the pitch in a set order, while he also had a fear of birds and got Leeds to drop their existing crest which featured an owl as well as trying to shake off their nickname as ‘The Peacocks’.
One that is unlikely to go down well with Verstappen’s orange army of fans is the old story of Revie asking for a Leeds away kit in the same colour to be burned and never used again after a 2-0 defeat by Stoke City in September 1970. All that effort to preserve good luck and avoid curses worked for Revie with eight trophies in his 13 years as Leeds manager. But United’s cursed history did not stop there.
Leeds’ record as streak-busters when coming up against opponents on losing runs is an ongoing joke. Less funny for fans is their play-off curse — in six attempts in their history, United have never won the play-offs and been promoted.
There have been individual players so unlucky that their time at the club has been cursed by injury or misfortune. The list is long, but it ranges from 1925 with goalkeeper Dick Thornton to the modern-day midfielder Yosuke Ideguchi.
Thornton made just one appearance for the club against Burnley on Boxing Day. It was one to forget as he conceded six first-half goals in a 6-3 defeat and he never played for the club again.
Meanwhile for Japanese midfielder Ideguchi, signed from Gamba Osaka in January 2018, the then 21-year-old’s Leeds career is either a story of caution in modern football or a curse. He joined Leeds as a fully fledged Japan international and a shoo-in for the 2018 World Cup. He was sent out on loan to Leeds’ sister club Cultural Leonesa in Spain on the same day that he arrived from Japan and made just five league appearances in five months. Ideguchi then missed out on a place at the World Cup. Then he returned to Leeds, started three pre-season games under Marcelo Bielsa before being shipped out on loan to Greuther Furth in Germany.
Within two weeks of the loan which had an option for them to buy Ideguchi, he tore his posterior cruciate ligament in his knee and missed most of the rest of the season. Ideguchi re-signed for Gamba Osaka in 2019 without playing a competitive game for Leeds.
Sometimes a shirt number has been enough to curse players at Leeds. In the 1990-91 season, Mike Whitlow, Glynn Snodin and Chris Kamara all wore the No 3 jersey and suffered bad injuries. The curse also came for Ben Parker and Aidy White in 2010 and, later, Barry Douglas. In the eyes of most fans, United have suffered a left-back malaise since the days of Tony Dorigo in the 1990s, with few since then living up to the same standard. The current occupant, Junior Firpo, is having a decent season.
And when a team has played at one stadium for their entire existence like Leeds, history is destined to repeat itself. Revie’s curse-lifting days came back around under former owner Massimo Cellino in 2015 when United were without a home win in eight months. This prompted a request to local priest Monsignor Philip Moger of St. Anne’s Cathedral in Leeds to bless the Elland Road pitch. He obliged, and Leeds ended their cursed run with a 1-0 win against Cardiff City later that night. Given his success, it was no surprise to see him ordained as a bishop in February last year.
Fans have requested similar blessings during bad home form since — presumably Red Bull will be on the phone to Moger soon if their drivers’ fortunes do not improve.
Verstappen’s winless run since Red Bull teamed up with Leeds might just be a coincidence. But Leeds fans know all too well that they will beat most clubs to the title of ‘most cursed’ in English football.
(Top photo: Mark Thompson/Getty Images)
