Sam Allardyce won’t allow what’s happening elsewhere on Sunday to shape proceedings at Elland Road as Leeds United battle to save their Premier League skins. Recent results have left Leeds sitting two points adrift of survival as they head into the final weekend of top flight fixtures.
They know that only a win will do on home soil against Ryan Mason’s out of sorts Tottenham Hotspur, but there’s a strong chance that even three points wouldn’t be enough to see Leeds move out of the bottom three. United’s fate is dependent on results elsewhere going their way too, with Everton and Leicester City in the mix as well.
Everton’s final game of the season comes against Bournemouth at Goodison Park, while Leicester host the same West Ham United side that thumped Leeds 3-1 at the London Stadium last week. Both teams need to falter for the Whites to have any chance of jumping above them and climbing out of the Premier League’s bottom three and fans will be keeping a close eye on both games.
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All 10 top flight games will kick off at the same time tomorrow and there is guaranteed to plenty of twists and turns over the course of the afternoon. Allardyce is prepared for the tension and drama that comes with the relegation battle and while he’s yet to decide if he wants score updates from elsewhere, he won’t be taking his thoughts off the game in front of him.
“The fans will tell us,” Allardyce said when asked how he plans to deal with the final pressure and the potential permutations. ”They won’t need me to tell them, they’ll tell by the mood of the crowd.
“It happens everywhere, or every one I’ve been involved with. Of course for my escape, which last game of the season only has happened once, the second season at Bolton. Not only were we winning, we knew that West Ham weren’t at Birmingham because the fans told us.
“The only focus for the players is to win the game and they can’t do any more than that.”
Asked if he wanted updates, he added: “Not for me personally, because I'll be adjusting to what's happening on the field. Somebody else will have that distraction and I'll tell them on the day whether I want to be hear it or I don't.
“I don't want to hear that somebody's done something there and I change something here on the basis of that and it makes the team worse. On the view of the game and what's happening in the game and what we're doing, I want to decide on my substitutions is on what we're doing and not what others are doing elsewhere.”
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