A moment to savour had arrived. Here we were, back in Elland Road's away corner, proudly on a par with the nemesis team of our lives and emotions, and what's more, we were bloody good against them. For a bit.

The first half of this absorbing, keenly-awaited contest jumped out at you as one of those where the players - none of whom were from Hull in the starting XI - had been told by someone that this fixture was, er, rather important and they shoulder, er, go for it in a manner which would make their supporters proud, even if a rampant, third-placed Leeds United team proved too strong in their own rag and bone yard. What we got was a flowing, vibrant, confident, dominant 40 minutes of football which had us in no doubt that we could revive memories of the Dyer and Parker inspired victory of 1987, when Leeds were taking the high-ground purely on a flukey FA Cup run.

Peter Taylor was even aware that this had something extra to it - the barrage of headlines about tickets and travelling over the last three months might have even reached his oft-buried head - and we suspect our chairman, high on the City side and an ex-Leeds employee, might have even mentioned something in the boot room or the players' mess.

Rarely for an away fixture where our chances were limited, Taylor chose to play two up front (great) but dropped Nicky Barmby (cruel) for Stuart Elliott and also had to make do without the injured Ryan France. Mark Lynch popped back into the ejector-seat slot at right back while furtively observing a sly recall to the bench of Scott Wiseman (who made it two Hull lads picking out the splinters, as at least Barmby made it that far) and Sam Collins was given the armband. Therefore, the team which staked its pride and that of a whole generation of City followers read thus: Myhill; Lynch, Cort, Collins, Dawson; Price, Andrews, Delaney, Elliott; Fagan, Paynter. Stuart Green and Curtis Woodhouse also made the bench with Matt Duke donning those ultra-clean spare gloves again.

City were bright from the off, with Paynter giving Leeds some difficulties with his strong running and willingness to jump at everything, whether the ball was winnable or not. Extremely welcome City pressure resulted in an early corner which Leon Cort naturally rose to with aplomb, but the forehead connection was angled just wide. Paynter then forced plastic Scottish keeper Neil Sullivan into a fingertipper and then Andy Dawson warmed his midriff further with a free kick which was awkward if untroublesome.

Leeds, for all their alleged quality, were struggling to look coherent, as if they had been told not to lose at all costs after all the disgraceful PR chuff aimed Tigerwards over the last few weeks about rivalries and reactions. We're not Cardiff. We can hate and support without being complete neanderthals, although admittedly one or two dismally dissenting voices at Brighton proved that the odd member of the unintelligentia still chooses to don black and amber to peddle a restricted vocabulary of hate and charmlessness. We've no doubt that they were at Elland Road too. We do all hate Leeds, as the chant goes, but there is a reason. Several, in fact. My own main motive for not giving them the time of day was the amount of Hull-based Leeds United shirts wandering round Prospect Street of a weekend at a time when they were winning the league and we were skint, impotent and lacking a city's empathy. That still hurts. Maybe that wasn't so much Leeds United's fault as a club, but football fans can be irrational without necessarily spoiling for a fight.

Anyway, it says it all when their best chance during the first 40 minutes was created entirely by City. Lynch, angrily claiming a foul, was robbed of possession on halfway by Robbie Blake - who has turned the role of third-string lower-division striker into a fine art - and he was given a whole 40 yards to run unchallenged at Boaz Myhill (no pace at all in our defence, even though Blake had a ball and we didn't). Yet it was probably the length of that run - in time and distance - which probably lost Blake the mind battle which awaited. He took too long and made it obvious that the right foot was king, and Myhill's reflexes anticipated accordingly with a breathtaking, heroic save from five yards which might just have whacked an extra half million on to his tag if Wigan or Arsenal do decide to give Mr Taylor a call in the next 28 days.

Lynch was reprieved and City surrounded the ref, wanting a free kick for the challenge, but the incident still epitomised the lack of security which Lynch supplies when he's playing. Admittedly he was in the centre of defence at the time, as the big guys had gone up for a set-piece and left Lynch to cover, but his defensive capabilities have been a real question mark over the campaign, even though it's still only three months in for him after the kneecapping he took in the opening seconds of the season. Lynch is eager, positionally sound and physically fit, and looks a useful overlapper (try Reading away) when Ryan France is ahead of him, but his actual facility to take the ball off opponents or keep hold of it when under pressure has been a real downfall of his campaign. Still, he's been a regular and - at home, at least - there has been a solidity to his game which may be more down to a lack of naturally attacking wingplay in this division (barring the fantastic MacNamee of Watford) to give the full backs a reason to look chaotic.

Leeds, despite Blake's embarrassment, started to grasp some control and there was a crushing inevitability about the goal they eventually scored, deep into first half injury time, especially as City had gone close when Fagan walloped a 25 yard dipper with left foot over Sullivan's head and off the top of the bar. He should have passed, of course, with both Paynter and Jason Price looking spacious in their positions, but the chance was there for a striker willing to have a crack, and we've criticised our centre forwards enough for not having a pop this season. This was Leeds' final straw though, and on-loan Blackburn striker Jonathan Douglas used the space caused by Blake's run and too many diverted Tiger attentions to rifle a low, well-placed shot past the exposed Myhill. This was really cruel on us.

Back at the KC - where, to his credit, Steve Jordan wen through the whole "good afternoon" gubbins to a half-full West Stand prior to the game - the beambackers went to the bars and mumbled about team changes and not taking chances, but in truth City couldn't have done much more. We didn't want to roll over in Leeds - humiliating would not have been half the word we would need. We'd been fantastically unfortunate not to score through chance ratio alone, even more so to go behind when we did. What was concerning now was whether City would become archetypal City on their travels - soulless, guileless, not looking for injuries rather than looking for a way back. We were only one down but there remained an uncomfortable worry that defeat would be accepted too soon.

And when Leeds doubled their lead without breaking sweat, that's what happened.

Myhill was due an error when you look at his goalkeeping portfolio for the season thus far. His manager rightly blamed him - with a tongue-in-cheek element so that the bids wouldn't come in - and it stuck in the craw that our otherwise flawless, magnificent goalkeeper could flap so badly and without judgement at such a crucial point of a game within such a crucial game of the season. The corner left him high and dry, although there followed a hotch-potch of fabulously amateurish proportions, as Leeds' attempts to find the net through miskicks and airshots were matched by City's remarkable inability to get any meat on no less than two headed clearances from under their own bar. Eventually one bounced down from the paintwork and Douglas headed in.

That was a cue for a big singsong from the City supporters in a cemetery-like Elland Road (I think we were louder at the KC, to be truthful) and the catcalls got louder when Leeds had a third by ex-York striker Richard Cresswell (the one Leeds player this author unashamedly likes) disallowed thanks to a flag somewhere. It was also a cue for the predicted tactical capitulation by the management team, taking off the hapless Lynch and bringing on Wiseman, with lots of scratch marks illustrating the query of how replacing a full back like-for-like can help us get back from two down, as welcome as the popular Wiseman's appearance was. Stuart Green also came on - for Fagan, so that was a natural striker we were now down - and duly did another of his turns of promises-so-much, delivers-less-than-nothing schtick which is surely beginning to try his manager's patience. There was no sign of Barmby, yet.

The game ploughed on through a turgid 15 minute spell where Leeds were content to hold on and City were content to let them, irritatingly. Barmby was finally thrown on eight minutes from time for a spectacularly pointless cameo which only consisted of Leeds fans artlessly chanting about how much money was wasted on him (try aiming that broadside at a certain fish-tank fetishist, perhaps?) and City fans duly affording him the iconic status he sometimes deserves, and certainly merits when the opposition want his blood.

The full-time whistle heralded grumblings of missed opportunities and Jekyll-and-Hyde metaphors, but we still have Leeds to visit us, and what a day that will be. Positives? Well, Keith Andrews is now a shoo-in after three games in a way which the willing but uninfluential Woodhouse was never likely to be. Another controlled and adept example of midfield leadership from the ex-Wolves player, aided well by the vitality of Damien Delaney, and suddenly we have to remind ourselves that John Welsh hasn't gone back to Liverpool at all. Also well done to Wiseman, who showed more natural defensive instinct and tenacity in his half hour than Lynch managed most games, though Lynch probably still has the edge going forward. Considering our woeful record of right back recruitment since Taylor let Mike Edwards go without seeing him play, it may be fitting that it takes another local hobbledehoy - and the first since Edwards to rise to the top team from the schoolboy ranks - to finally cure the ailment.

After all the hype, controversy, argument and hand-wringing nonsense over this fixture, the game itself passed by with an absorbing intrigue but without bonafide incident, on or off the field, and there wasn't much to do on the way home in post-mortem other than go on about the missed chances. City may have lost but did emerge with pride from it, and the frustration of not taking opportunities can be eased when Leeds come to us at Easter. Now, who fancies starting the anti-Warnock chants?

Yay, this Championship lark is mint. Happy New Year. (MR)