{"id":619861,"date":"2025-12-08T10:39:22","date_gmt":"2025-12-08T10:39:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/619861\/"},"modified":"2025-12-08T10:39:22","modified_gmt":"2025-12-08T10:39:22","slug":"gaizka-mendieta-explains-why-he-still-treasures-special-leeds-united-experience-with-valencia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/619861\/","title":{"rendered":"Gaizka Mendieta explains why he still treasures ‘special’ Leeds United experience with Valencia"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Former Valencia star Gaizka Mendieta has revealed why he still treasures his experience of playing at Elland Road against Leeds United with Valencia. <\/strong><\/p>\n

25 years ago, in the 2000\/01 season, Leeds United embarked on a famous run to the Champions League semi-final with their young side under David O\u2019Leary<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Leeds secured special wins over AC Milan, Besiktas, Anderlecht and Lazio in the group stages, before a 3-0 home win over Deportivo La Coruna, which featured a classic Ian Harte free-kick<\/a>, helped book their place in the last four of the competition. <\/p>\n

O\u2019Leary\u2019s side faced eventual finalists Valencia and held them to a 0-0 draw at Elland Road before losing 3-0 at the Mestalla as the club reached the high-water mark of the Peter Ridsdale era<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Now, Valencia legend Mendieta has explained why he still thinks so fondly of his trip to Elland Road<\/a>, as the 25th anniversary of the game approaches. <\/p>\n

Leeds United find themselves right in the thick of it\u2026 <\/p>\n

\"DominicPhoto by Richard Sellers\/Sportsphoto\/Allstar via Getty Images <\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc47 Join the debate; share your insight. Use the comment button on the bottom left to have your say <\/p>\n

Gaizka Mendieta reflects on \u2018special game\u2019 against Leeds United<\/p>\n

Mendieta would eventually go on to play in the Premier League, spending several seasons with Middlesbrough before ending his career. <\/p>\n

Speaking to Diario AS<\/a>, Mendieta explained why his trip to Elland Road made such a big impression on him as he helped his Valencia side qualify for the Champions League final, where they would go on to lose to Bayern Munich. <\/p>\n

MORE LEEDS UNITED STORIES<\/p>\n

Mendieta said: \u201cAt the time, Leeds were one of the best teams in the Premier League. You look at the players they had at the time. Unfortunately for them, they obviously left the next season, most of them. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut in those games, playing at Elland Road was amazing. The atmosphere, I remember it being cold, raining. And again, the atmosphere.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before adding: \u201cI meet and find a lot of Leeds fans around the world in many places. And they\u2019re still obviously not happy, but they still remember it as a special moment. And I think it was not only for Leeds and Valencia, it was a special game for football fans in general.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Gaizka8 May 2001: Gaizka Mendieta of Valencia scores the third goal during the match between Valencia and Leeds United in the UEFA Champions League semi-final, second leg at Mestalla, Camp Del Valencia, Valencia, Spain. Digital Image. Mandatory Credit: Laurence Griffiths\/ALLSPORTValencia hero Gaizka Mendieta played a key role in ending Leeds\u2019 Champions League dream<\/p>\n

Having seen a 3-0 aggregate lead almost disappear in front of their eyes against Deportivo, as the home side scored twice in the return leg to give Leeds a 3-2 aggregate win, the Whites knew they needed to take an advantage to the Mestalla. <\/p>\n

However, despite Lee Bowyer, Dominic Matteo<\/a> and Alan Smith all going close at Elland Road, Valencia held out for a goalless draw in West Yorkshire to hold the advantage ahead of the second leg. <\/p>\n

What are your favourite memories from Leeds\u2019 Champions League semi-final run? \ud83e\udd9a <\/p>\n

David O’Leary’s side stormed Europe 25 years ago this season<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc47 Join the debate; share your insight. Use the comment button on the bottom left to have your say <\/p>\n

Sadly for O\u2019Leary\u2019s side, Valencia were too strong for Leeds on home turf, as they secured a comfortable 3-0 victory to end Leeds\u2019 European adventure. <\/p>\n

Mendieta played a decisive role, swinging in a brilliant right-footed cross for Juan Sanchez to score the opening goal, despite the protests of the Leeds defence, who wanted the goal ruled out for offside. <\/p>\n

Mendieta then ended Leeds\u2019 misery by firing home from long range before Smith received a red card for a late tackle on Vicente. <\/p>\n

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Receive a digest of our best Leeds content each week direct to your mailbox<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Valencia star Gaizka Mendieta has revealed why he still treasures his experience of playing at Elland Road…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":619862,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8814],"tags":[748,80043,393,4884,1860,101,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-619861","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-leeds","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-david-oleary","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-leeds","13":"tag-premier-league","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115683523092820346","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=619861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619861\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/619862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=619861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=619861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=619861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}