With less than a fortnight remaining in the Premier League season, Leeds United's top-flight fate remains in the balance. Southampton's demotion to the Championship was confirmed in the latest round of fixtures, with Leicester City still to play against in-form Liverpool on Monday night.
The Whites closed the gap to safety to a point as it stands, with a hard-fought 2-2 home draw with Newcastle United. Luke Ayling gave Sam Allardyce's side the perfect start, but the hosts required a late deflected Ramus Kristensen strike to end a six-match losing run.
Nottingham Forest picked up a point on the road, with a Taiwo Awoniyi brace earning a 2-2 draw at Chelsea. Everton were unable to build upon their shock emphatic victory at Brighton, with defending champions Manchester City recording a comfortable 3-0 victory at Goodison Park the following day.
READ MORE: Five days to shape the run in: Key dates for Leeds United and relegation rivals
Following the latest results and the shifting landscape at the bottom of the table, here's what the managers had to say on the relegation battle at this stage:
Sam Allardyce - Leeds United
Remaining fixtures: West Ham (A - May 21), Tottenham (H - May 28)
He told LeedsLive: "I hope it goes to the wire. All I've said is that when we play Tottenham I hope there's something in it for us.
"We have to keep our fingers crossed a little bit today or tomorrow that the others don't win. We are near that position of let's hope they slip up, but we have to wait to see.
"It’s not in our hands. It's in theirs. So all we can do is what we did today and next week do it better."
Steve Cooper - Nottingham Forest
Remaining fixtures: Arsenal (H - May 20), Crystal Palace (A - May 28)
He told the club's website: “If we end up where we want to be, I think we’ll look back at today and be more than satisfied with it.
“You see the team Chelsea have and the subs they can make changes with, and away from home, it was always going to be a really tough game, so for the players to commit to the plan we put in place, to show desire, attitude and togetherness they did were real positives.
“I think there’s also disappointment in the dressing room about what could have been, which I like. That’s the culture we are trying to create here. It’s mixed feelings of working really hard to get something out of the game and being satisfied with that, but then at the same time knowing that it could have been different.
“The goals probably sum up what I’m saying with how hard we’ve had to work for ours through strategies and set-pieces, but although they were two good finishes from Raheem Sterling, we’ll look at it and think about how we let them in too easily.
“We don’t blame anyone, we do everything together, which has been a big strength of ours this season. You can see it on the pitch, the culture and togetherness of the group is at a maximum which we’ll need for the final two games.”
Sean Dyche - Everton
Remaining fixtures: Wolves (A - May 20), Bournemouth (H - May 28)
He told the BBC via Liverpool World: "It's the same as when I came in - we just need to get it over the line, that's the priority, not Manchester City. Losing our left-back (Vitalii Mykolenko) the day before the game affected the balance of the team but we showed effort.
"We were trying to get the team to play with confidence and there was an element of that. The mentality stood firm.”
Dean Smith - Leicester City
Remaining fixtures: Liverpool (H - May 15), Newcastle United (A - May 22), West Ham (H - May 28)
Asked in his pre-match press conference if the Foxes can still survive, he told Leicestershire Live: “We can. We were written off six games ago and all of a sudden it’s Leeds and Everton who are written off, now not Everton.
"Monday was our Boomtown Rats day, hopefully it will be for someone else this time.”
Asked on the challenge of facing in-form Liverpool, he added: “Six wins on the spin, and it seems like a difficult time to face them. But they’ve only taken 10 points from 30 on the road.
"We have to produce a Brighton or a Brentford performance against them.”
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