Leeds under fire after tweet directed at Amazon pundit Karen Carney

Leeds United has come under fire for targeting a female football pundit on social media, and the backlash has been scathing.

Leeds United has come under fire for their tweet.

Leeds United have fired back at Karen Carney after the Amazon Prime pundit claimed they only won promotion to the Premier League because of the coronavirus.

Leeds put down a marker by smashing West Brom 5-0 on Tuesday to make it three wins from their last four games.

Strikes from Ezgjan Alioski, Jack Harrison, Rodrigo and Raphinha followed an unbelievable own-goal from Romaine Sawyers.

But Carney, 33, questioned whether Marcelo Bielsa’s all-action Leeds will be able to keep up their manic style of play for the rest of the season.

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The former England international, who won 144 caps for the Lionesses, also claimed Leeds only won promotion from the Championship last term after getting a rest when coronavirus halted the football season.

Karen Carney of England.

Carney, who played for both Arsenal and Chelsea, said: “They outrun everyone and credit to them. My only concern would be, will they blow up at the end of the season like the last couple of seasons?

“I actually think they got promoted because of COVID in terms of it giving them a bit of respite.

“I don’t know if they’d have got up if they didn’t have that break.”

However, Leeds fired back at Carney with a post on Twitter, with the post drawing some criticism for inviting a “pile-on” of sexist abuse aimed at the ex-footballer.

This isn't cool. Shouldn't be outing pundits with a snapshot of their analysis. Kaz is one of the best around and always backs up her argument. This is just inviting unwarranted abuse on a platform which is already too toxic. https://t.co/77KODcLLNA

— Emma Sanders (@em_sandy) December 29, 2020

As Leeds themselves pointed out, they finished last season on 93 points — ten ahead of nearest rivals West Brom.

Marcelo Bielsa’s side also won their last five games before lockdown came in without conceding once.

However, the season before — the last full season played — Leeds had dominated in the opening months of the season before running out of steam and failing to advance in the play-offs.

Jesus. The person tweeting on behalf of huge club, @LUFC, can’t have had to choose their exact wording perfectly on a freezing cold night on live TV, neither can they have been on the end of a Twitter pile on and experienced the consequences of abuse on mass scale.

— Jacqui Oatley (@JacquiOatley) December 29, 2020

People have pointed out the tweets about Agbonlahor. The platform Leeds have means there will be abuse, but the difference is that the abuse directed at Karen Carney will be exacerbated because she’s female

— Amitai Winehouse (@awinehouse1) December 29, 2020

I take the responsibility of the Club tweet. I consider that comment completely unnecessary and disrespectful to our Club and particularly to the fantastic hard work of our players and coaches whom were understanding on the pitch for the last two championship seasons by all stats

— Andrea Radrizzani (@andrearadri) December 29, 2020

Carney did have kind words for Leeds’ brilliant performance against the Baggies on the night.

“Two newly promoted teams and the difference between them in terms of class, quality and also fitness and intensity,” Carney said.

“Leeds were outstanding, we’ve criticised them in the last couple of weeks about clean sheets and how much they’ve conceded.

“That’s two back-to-back clean sheets now. I know we said about Meslier earlier, he’s unorthodox in what he does, but again two clean sheets.

“Fabulous performance and attacking-wise as clinical as ever.”

This article originally appeared on The Sun and was reproduced with permission