Leeds United U21

When Leeds United entered the Football League in 1920, the reserves took over from the old Leeds City Reserves.

The academy's biggest export in recent years came in 2022, when Kalvin Phillips left for Manchester City in a deal worth around £42 million. Two years later Archie Gray went the other way to Tottenham Hotspur for £40 million.

Trophies from the youth and reserve teams stretch back to the 1930s Central League, but the FA Youth Cup wins of 1993 and 1997 still carry the most weight among supporters who remember them, and the National League Cup won in 2024–25 showed the pathway is still delivering silverware as well as players. Fixtures against Sheffield Wednesday, Barnsley and Huddersfield Town are billed locally as the Yorkshire Derby, and Manchester United remains the name that matters most whenever the two academies meet.

None of it happens at Elland Road. The under-21s, known like the first team as The Whites, play in white shirts and black shorts at the LNER Community Stadium in Huntington, York, a ground with room for 8,500 that puts the next generation of the club a good distance from the stadium they are aiming to reach.