Yellow peril: Wood pilfered two goals against Reading

Chris Wood retweets message comparing him to Leeds great

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Published on:

15 Aug 2016, 11:31 am

By Tom Blackburn

Leeds striker Chris Wood has retweeted a message from a fan comparing him to club great Mark Viduka.

Wood has come under heavy criticism in the last week after Leeds opened their Championship campaign with defeats against QPR and Birmingham.

The New Zealand international, 24, was hauled off by manager Garry Monk at the hour mark in Saturday's 2-1 defeat to Birmingham and replaced by Kemar Roofe.

Spearhead Wood, who formed a two-pronged attack with summer signing Marcus Antonsson, failed to find the net for a second consecutive Championship match.

Fan James McDonald was one of the few to offer support to Wood and reminded the fellow Elland Road faithful that Viduka also started slowly at the club.

The striker subsequently re-tweeted the message from his personal Twitter account:

Viduka is regarded as one of Leeds' greatest strikers of the modern era, scoring 67 goals in 156 appearances for the club between 2000 and 2004.

He left the club when they were relegated from the Premier League amid financial turmoil and joined Middlesborough.

Wood moved to Leeds from Leicester City in the summer of 2015 and last month said he can be an important player for the club as he targets a big goal tally for Garry Monk's side.

"All things considered it was a good return... I can do better, though, and I know I can be the leading striker here. I’m looking forward to proving that this season," Wood told the Yorkshire Evening Post.

"You need both, goals and a defence which keeps clean sheets, but everyone knows that goals are important in this league. Everyone wants one (a 20-goal striker) and that’s what I think I’m capable of."

A succession of hamstring injuries meant the Leeds forward missed up to three months of action last season, but despite this he finished as the club's top scorer with 13 goals.

The former Leicester player notched up 22 goals for his former side in the Championship.

Wood was recently on international duty with New Zealand at the OFC Nations Cup where he guided his home country to the finals of the tournament.

In other Leeds news, club legend Noel Whelan urges the club to sign five players in this mould.

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