The Whites face Forest at the City Ground this afternoon.
Leeds United legend Eddie Gray has told LUTV that the club’s supporters will see a top-six finish and resultant qualification for the play-offs as a realistic proposition if they can beat Nottingham Forest this afternoon.
The Whites started their first season under Garry Monk in poor fashion, being comprehensively beaten 3-0 by QPR in their opening match, scraping past Fleetwood Town in the EFL Cup and losing their first home game 2-1 to Birmingham City.
However, since then they have put together a three-match unbeaten run, drawing 1-1 with Fulham – albeit only thanks to a last-gasp equaliser, and winning at Yorkshire rivals Sheffield Wednesday before seeing off Luton Town in the EFL Cup.
Gray, who played 577 times for the Whites across two decades from the mid-1960s onwards and served as assistant manager to Monk’s predecessor Steve Evans, believes that an away win against Forest in the same vein as that at Hillsborough will have supporters believing this can finally be their year for the play-offs.
He told LUTV: “If we get a win at Nottingham Forest, everybody will be talking about top six, that’s how football is.
“To me, that’s what you want everybody talking about. You want the fans to talk about it, you know why? Because when you go to Elland Road, they will get right behind the team in numbers.
“If we win at Forest, our supporters will think ‘this is the year’.”
Gray’s suggestion may seem a very bold one with only four Championship matches out of 46 played, but there was certainly a great deal of optimism in pre-season about how Leeds could fare under Monk.
That was tempered somewhat by the poor early-season results, but now that the side finally seem to be settling into life under the former Swansea City boss, a win at the City Ground would be another big sign of promise.
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