Steve Evans warns Leeds United squad as '˜massive' Ipswich date dawns

Leeds visit Ipswich Town tonight, a game that Evans has described as “massive”.

The Tractor Boys currently occupy the last play-off place in the Championship and are nine points ahead of the Whites.

United then face Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday, another tough encounter against one of the division’s play-off contenders.

Evans believes heading into a run of three home games after this week in a strong position is integral to his side’s hopes.

He said: “Our results have been good but they could easily have been better.

“The gap’s still there and I’m not hiding from the fact that this is a massive game for us, in a massive week. As an absolute minimum we have to come out of this week no further back. We’ll have three homes games in a row after that and our form is picking up at home. I’d back us to take a good number of points of those.

“This is about as tough as it gets, Tuesday night away to an Ipswich side who are in form, but a result would make the division sit up. We’ve not really made anyone do that yet.”

In terms of a target, Evans is eyeing up at least three points from the two games. The quick turnaround from Saturday’s FA Cup game against Rotherham meant he had to consider his selection carefully, something that paid off as Leeds triumphed 2-0.

“I obviously had an eye on this week because I had to prioritise the league games, but I was never going to make eight or nine changes,” Evans said.

“It’s my job to win matches and last thing I wanted was for us to lose 3-0 to Rotherham and the crowd to go home feeling disillusioned. We got another good result, we’re going along nicely and we’ve come into this week in good shape.

“Six points would be outstanding, four would be great and three I’d settle for. I’d like us to close in but the main thing, the first priority, is to make sure we don’t fall further behind.”


 Last six games: Ipswich Town WLWWDD, Leeds United WWDDDW.



 Referee: F Graham (Essex).



 Last time: Ipswich Town 4 Leeds United 1; December 6, 2014; Championship.