It was like a scene from the movie Reservoir Dogs.

As the nervous players of Galatasary flew into Leeds Bradford airport, there in close attendance was an 11-strong team of anti-terrorist officers, who wouldn't have looked out of place in a Quentin Tarantino movie.

Anxiously watching the expectant crowd - made up mainly of journalists and airport staff - the protection squad officers wore the obligatory dark sunglasses and listened intently into their earpieces for news of any potential trouble at Yeadon.

But trouble did not come.

In fact, the greeting for the Turkish football team members was warm and welcoming - at least from some quarters.

As they descended the steps from their Turkish Airlines jet, they were presented with brimming bouquets of flowers from staff of the Turkish airline who had travelled over from Manchester Airport.

The players - clad in claret and gold tracksuits - arrived amid unusually tight security because of fears of reprisals from emotional Leeds fans after the murder of two Leeds supporters before the match's first leg in Istanbul.

Dozens of police officers kept hoards of Press, both English and Turkish, at a distance from the Galatasaray players and dignitaries as they arrived.

The Galatasaray plane was kept waiting on the runway for several minutes as immigration formalities were completed. The players and club officials were then quickly ushered to two waiting Leeds-Bradford Airport buses which were due to take them to Elland Road so they could inspect the stadium.

The players have promised to wear black armbands at tonight's match at Elland Road after being criticised for not doing so in the first leg.

Leeds fan Kevin Speight, a Farsley landlord, was buried on Monday and the funeral of the second victim, Chris Loftus, from Leeds, was held on Tuesday.

Today Leeds United issued an impassioned plea - in both English and Turkish - against the "futility of violence" in full-page adverts in national newspapers.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.