Pontus Jansson claims his competitive instincts made him disobey Marcelo Bielsa’s order to let Aston Villa walk the ball into the net.
Jansson reacted furiously when Bielsa told Leeds to allow Villa to score from the restart because Mateusz Klich had netted while Jonathan Kodjia lay hurt.
The centre-half tried to tackle Albert Adomah as he scored, while the rest of his team-mates stood still.
Jansson’s team-mates remonstrated with him and Bielsa felt he had tried to undermine his authority by publicly defying him.
Jansson tried to play down the row, claiming he found it hard to allow the other team to score when his job is keeping clean sheets.
What Dean Smith said to Leeds boss Marcelo Bielsa over controversial Aston Villa goal
Marcelo Bielsa and John Terry involved in touchline bust-up before Leeds allow Aston Villa to score
Speaking at Leeds’ awards night at Elland Road on Sunday, the Swede was cheered by the audience when he said: “I’m a defender, I want to have a clean sheet.
“I work hard for 90 minutes to keep a clean sheet and so to let another team score, for me that’s hard.”
Klich has also defended his role in the furore, which sparked an angry confrontation between the rival dug-outs and a 21-man melee on the pitch.
He claims he carried on playing because he did not see Kodjia down injured in the centre circle from a challenge by Jansson.
“To be fair I didn’t see him lying on the ground and I just carried on playing,” said the Polish midfielder.
“I was focused on the goal and if I’d seen him, I wouldn’t have done it. But I didn’t see anything and it went crazy after that.
“I scored, they told us we should have kicked the ball out and it all kicked off.
“We let them score and fair enough, it finished 1-1.”
Although disappointed not to win, Klich felt Leeds responded positively to their back-to-back losses to Wigan and Brentford, which cost them automatic promotion.
“We came back to good fitness,” he said. “Everyone felt well, we were sharp and we won the ball back several times from Aston Villa.
“Hopefully we can win against Ipswich and build some momentum to take into the play-offs.”
