Noel Whelan feels that while Sheffield United fight and scrap for every point when the odds are against them, too often Leeds United bring the white flag out.
Defeats to Wigan Athletic and Brentford in a span of three days have seriously dented Leeds’ hopes of earning automatic promotion to the Premier League this season, giving the advantage to Sheffield United.
With two games left in the season, Leeds will need to win their next two games and hope Sheffield United drop points in order to earn a top-two spot in the Championship.
Whelan has been left disappointed by Leeds in the last two games and believes when it truly came to the crunch time, the Whites players failed to stand up and collapsed under the weight of expectations.
He believes the Leeds team lack the character to fight hard when things do not go according to plan and believes the Sheffield United players would have shown more gumption on the pitch.
Whelan said on BBC Radio Leeds following the loss in London: “We've fallen flat on our faces when the time [was] to fight and come good, and we haven't.
“It's about finishing and putting the ball in the back of the net and we didn't even look like we believed we could [against Brentford].
“That's the only way to win games, doing that at that end, and if you can't do that then defend properly, and we did neither.
“It's like a surrender comes out [during the game].
"I'm not being funny but if it was Sheffield United down there [on the Griffin Park pitch] they'd be kicking people, fighting, scrapping.
“We've got nice players, we can play when it's nice, but when something's against us every now and again, we need someone absolutely horrible in that side to get us going.
“I'm not sure who that person is, or if we have that person.”
Leeds will host Aston Villa at Elland Road on Sunday before visiting Ipswich Town on the final day of the season, as they hope for a turnaround in their automatic promotion hopes.
