Gifted and laudable chap though he is, David O'Leary tends to see enemies everywhere.

The Leeds manager's insistence on lobbing missiles at presumed assailants actually did him a great disservice here, for even though this game was abrasive, nasty and instantly forgettable, he was he was right to hail it as a triumph.

Even without David Batty, Stephen McPhail, Lucas Radebe and Michael Bridges, Leeds blended together belligerence and sweet skill so successfully that Tottenham never gained a foothold on an afternoon that yielded nine cautions but, astonishingly, no dismissals.

"It's a man's game," said O'Leary. "It's not my fault that players can't stand on their feet at Tottenham. We are hard-working and we play good football but we are not dirty. You don't win the league by playing beautiful football all the time."

And it wasn't beautiful football, the tone being set after 14 or 15 players had gathered on the halfway line to exchange views, punches and handbags after Lee Bowyer had placed his boot in the chest of Spurs' Stephen Clemence.

Leeds claimed the ugliest of wins midway through the first half when the referee Dermot Gallagher correctly adjudged that Alan Smith was not interfering with play, as he wandered back from the penalty area, thus allowing Harry Kewell to side-foot home after sweeping around first the goalkeeper Ian Walker and then Sol Campbell.

Leeds: Martyn, Kelly, Woodgate, Duberry, Harte, Bowyer, Bakke (Haaland 85), Jones, Wilcox, Smith, Kewell (Huckerby 68). Subs Not Used: Mills, Maybury, Robinson. Booked: Bowyer, Kelly, Jones. Goals: Kewell 23.

Tottenham: Walker, Carr, Perry, Campbell, Taricco, Anderton, Sherwood, Clemence (Nielsen 74), Ginola (Dominguez 78), Korsten, Armstrong. Subs Not Used: Scales, Young, Baardsen. Booked: Clemence, Sherwood, Armstrong, Carr, Anderton.

Referee: D Gallagher (Banbury).