Match Preview: Brentford v Leeds United | OneFootball

Brentford welcome Leeds United to Gtech Community Stadium on Sunday. Kick-off is at 4.30pm and the game will be broadcast live on Sky Sports.

Keith Andrews’ side have lost just one of their seven home games in the Premier League this season, while Leeds have lifted themselves out of the relegation zone with impressive results against Chelsea and Liverpool.

Analysis, team news, match officials and more. Here's everything you need to know ahead of the Bees’ latest test.

Pre-match Analysis

Stephen Gillett, Playmaker Stats: Set-piece battle could spark Brentford’s meeting with Leeds into life

Brentford and Leeds United's numbers suggest a dead ball might be what sparks this game into life.

Only the Premier League’s top three sides have earned more home points than Brentford (16) in 2025/26, but the Bees face a resurgent Leeds outfit buoyed by an impressive 3-1 victory over Chelsea and a 3-3 draw with Liverpool at Elland Road over the past week.

Ao Tanaka’s dramatic late equaliser against the reigning champions came from a corner, and Daniel Farke’s men have been one of the league’s standout set-piece sides this season - with only Arsenal (10) and Chelsea (9) having scored more goals from corners, free-kicks and throws than the Whites (8).

Add in Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s spot-kick against Arne Slot’s Reds and Lukas Nmecha’s penalty versus Everton on the opening day, and more than half (53 per cent) of Leeds’ 19 Premier League goals this term have come from dead balls.

Brentford have scored three set-piece goals of their own, but their main source of dead-ball joy has been from the spot. The Bees have been awarded more penalties (7) than any other top-flight side this season and converted five of them — and there’s arguably no player in Europe you’d prefer charging into the box right now than Dango Ouattara.

Set to join up with Burkina Faso for the Africa Cup of Nations in Morocco shortly, Ouattara has won more penalties (4) than any player across UEFA’s top five leagues this season - and Brentford are making the most of the 23-year-old’s elusive dribbling ability.

Leeds will be pleased with their set-piece return, but Brentford head coach Keith Andrews will still want his side to boost their own output.

The underlying numbers suggest chance creation isn’t the problem, though: only Arsenal (8.41 xG), Crystal Palace (7.56 xG) and Manchester United (7.23 xG) have generated more expected goals from set-pieces than Brentford (6.80 xG), with 42 per cent of their set-pieces ending in a shot.

How each team scores their goals is revealing, but so is the timing of them. Leeds (5) rank joint-first for goals scored in the opening 15 minutes of Premier League matches in 2025/26, while only Sunderland can match Brentford’s tally of five goals in second-half stoppage time.

Dominic Calvert-Lewin is featured in our matchday programme this Sunday, and his aerial battle with the Bees’ backline promises to be a highlight. Only Everton’s Thierno Barry and Liverpool’s Virgil van Dijk have contested more aerial duels than DCL (100) so far this season, but the 28-year-old now faces Brentford’s Sepp van den Berg - who ranks third in the division for aerials won.

There is a case to be made, however, that Brentford’s Class of 25/26 are even more dominant in the air at the sharp end of the pitch. Igor Thiago (3rd), Kevin Schade (4th) and Dango Ouattara (7th) all rank inside the Premier League’s top 10 forwards for aerial duels won this season, forming what is arguably the most formidable aerial trio in the division.

With two sides this dangerous from dead balls and in the air, one moment — one well-timed leap, one pinpoint delivery — may be all it takes.

Scout Report

Dan Long, Sky Sports: Upturn in form lifts Leeds out of the Premier League relegation zone

Leeds United had two excellent seasons back in the Championship after they were relegated from the Premier League in 2022/23.

In 2023/24 - Daniel Farke’s first at the club - they stormed into title contention with a run of 13 wins in 15 games between 1 January and 1 April.

They finally reached the summit on 17 March, but then stage fright took hold. Eight points from the final eight allowed Leicester and Ipswich to pull away and pip them to automatic promotion by seven and six points respectively.

Farke’s former employers Norwich were put to the sword in the play-off semi-finals, but Adam Armstrong’s strike after 24 minutes for Southampton at Wembley sent Saints up at Leeds’ expense. Farke called for his players to “rest and use the disappointment as motivation for next season.”

And that’s exactly what they did. This time Leeds were top of the pile from Boxing Day until the end of the season, bar two weeks at the end of March and beginning of April, owing to draws with Swansea and Luton.

They finished with a flourish, too, winning each of the last six with 16 goals scored and just two conceded.

Farke had wrapped up his third Championship title in style and Leeds became one of the select few to reach a century of points in the division.

Leeds invested in the summer, keen to add the depth and quality that would help them to avoid another relegation. Strangely, though, after 15 games, they have the same record as they did in 2022/23: won four, drawn three, lost eight.

But with the table being as tight as it is right now, they were 12th at the same point in 2022/23 and are 16th in 2025/26.

Farke looked to be under pressure recently, most likely due to the run of six losses in seven between 4 October and 29 November. But, as The Athletic's Beren Cross explained to us this week, he tweaked his formation to 5-3-2 in the second half of the 3-2 defeat at Man City, which has gone some way to breathing new life into this Leeds side.

In that game, they pulled it back to 2-2 from 2-0 down, before Phil Foden’s 91st-minute winner.

Leeds won 3-1 at home to Chelsea, then came back from 2-0 down again, this time at home to Liverpool, and ended up drawing 3-3.

Those four points have moved them out of the relegation zone and fired a warning shot to those currently both above and below them.

In the Dugout

Daniel Farke

Before venturing into coaching, Daniel Farke forged a career as a striker in Germany’s lower leagues.

A prolific frontman in his day, he had three spells at SV Lippstadt, who are based in western Germany, close to his hometown Steinhausen.

After hanging his boots up, Farke became Lippstadt manager in 2009 and guided his team to back-to-back promotions from the sixth tier to the fourth.

Farke stayed at Stadion Am Bruchbaum for six years in all until, in November 2015, he took the job at Borussia Dortmund II, who were also in the fourth tier of German football.

In his first season, they finished fourth and in his second, they finished second, nine points behind champions Viktoria Köln.

When his contract was not renewed, Farke took the opportunity to move abroad for the first time and sign a two-year deal at Norwich.

He remained at Carrow Road for just shy of four-and-a-half years, managing 208 games in all competitions and leading the Canaries to the Championship title in both 2018/19 and 2020/21.

Norwich took just five points from their opening 11 Premier League games in 2021/22, however, and he was dismissed in November 2021, less than four months after signing a new four-year contract.

Two months later, in January 2022, Farke signed a two-and-a-half-year deal at Russian side Krasnodar, but he never managed a game and left in March, less than a fortnight after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

He subsequently returned to Germany to take over at Borussia Mönchengladbach but was sacked just one season into a three-year contract with Die Fohlen.

Farke was appointed at Leeds in July 2023 and took charge of his 100th game in April.

The Gameplan

With Beren Cross, Leeds United writer for The Athletic

Beren Cross, Leeds United writer for The Athletic, has explained how manager Daniel Farke is likely to set up his side for Sunday’s Premier League game against Brentford

“Barring something bizarre happening, I would say it will be 5-3-2, especially away from home," Cross told us this week.

“I think, going away to Brentford, a 5-3-2 would certainly suit that, especially with Joe Rodon, Jaka Bijol and Pascal Struijk as the three centre-backs, and I think they will probably quite enjoy the battle with Igor Thiago, assuming he plays.

“There will be the two wing-backs and three in the middle with Ethan Ampadu, who will generally be a bit more of a sitter, and depending on who is fit, I think it will most likely be Anton Stach and Ao Tanaka either side.

“Stach and Tanaka will be the players that have a bit more licence to go and hunt for the ball and step out of that compact shape, if necessary.

“Then there are the two up top in Lukas Nmecha and Dominic Calvert-Lewin.”

Last starting XI v Liverpool (5-3-2): Perri; Bogle, Rodon, Bijol, Struijk, Gudmundsson; Stach, Ampadu, Gruev; Calvert-Lewin, Okafor

Match Officials

Brooks to referee his second Brentford game of the season

Referee: John Brooks

Assistants: Simon Bennett and Dan Cook

Fourth official: Tony Harrington

Video assistant referee: Michael Salisbury

John Brooks will referee Sunday’s game at Gtech Community Stadium.

Brooks has taken charge of seven fixtures this season, including the Bees’ Carabao Cup victory over Aston Villa in September.

This term, Brooks has shown 28 yellow cards and one red.

Memorable Meeting

Brentford 5 Leeds United 2 (Premier League, 3 September 2022)

Ivan Toney’s stunning hat-trick was the catalyst for Brentford’s 5-2 victory over Leeds United on a record-breaking afternoon at Gtech Community Stadium.

It was the first time the Bees had scored five in a Premier League game and the first time the club had hit that mark in the top flight since April 1938.

Toney’s first, from the penalty spot after he was fouled, was his 50th for the club, making him the fifth-fastest player in history to that mark.

After adding two more, both excellent finishes from range, it was left to Bryan Mbeumo and Yoane Wissa to complete the home side’s scoring.