Leeds United eyeing Montu again ahead of unique and unpredictable 'blind bend'

“Do you want to go round again?”

It was mid morning on July 4, 2001 and Busch Gardens’ 150-foot Montu roller coaster had no queue to speak of, so four times the operative asked the question, a silly one really, and four more times we kept the seatbelts on, staying in place as the cart jolted off up the inclined track.

Legs dangling, crawling to great heights only to plummet down the steepest of drops, hurtling along a clanking metal frame at breakneck pace at 60mph, flipping upside down, screaming involuntarily, stomach contents just about staying put. Self terrorism of the paid variety.

It’s difficult to explain why roller coasters are so popular, so appealing to so many. Richard Stephens, senior lecturer in Psychology at Keele University, said: “Perhaps the draw of roller coasters is the enjoyment of the visceral sensation of fear itself, much like watching a horror movie.” Malcolm Burt, a researcher at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Australia, added: “The biology of the thrill you get from a scary coaster and that of the peak experience when climbing a mountain is almost identical.”

When Leeds United staggered off the coaster ride on May 22 and celebrated with their fans, it was elation of Mount Everest proportions. Relief, joy, pride, mental exhaustion. The works.

Less than four weeks later the Premier League have put out their fixtures and asked if Leeds want to go round again. Silly question, really.

The customary first day, first trans-Pennines game, Boxing Day and last day check complete, a proper look at the schedule doesn’t look too scary compared with last season and its hat-trick of three-game runs against Champions League seekers. Cup draws not withstanding, the closest Leeds will come to back-to-back action against the ‘elite’ will be the match week 16 and 17 games against Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City and an entire World Cup will take place between them.

That break from November 12 to December 26 is undoubtedly the most noteworthy and unique feature of this fixture list, a period of time in which to lick wounds and reset after a bumpy first half of the season or to send players off to the World Cup with a spring in their step after a promising opening stanza. It will come at a good juncture for some, with players not involved in the tournament able to heal up, and a bad one for others who hit November on a roll and there's no real way of knowing how it will impact the course of the season for individual teams.

Before they reach that blind bend, Leeds have been presented with what you might consider a kind first month in which they will play four fixtures against sides with whom they should be competing. Of the opening quintet only the visit to Elland Road of Chelsea doesn’t hold a reasonable expectation of victory if you’re a club expecting to stay in the league with a degree of comfort.

That’s how Leeds will be viewing it, given the head start Jesse Marsch has been afforded on his initially-planned summer arrival and the recruitment both done and to be done in this window.

Survival is the ultimate aim but as ambitions go, it’s only base camp and their gaze will be set higher than 17th.

Using the fixtures to try and work out if Leeds will go into the mid-season break having climbed high enough to look forward with excitement or nervously glancing over their shoulders is impossible. Recruitment possibilities across the division aside, any attempt at analysis of where points might come from founders on the rocks of an unquestionable Premier League reality - every game is difficult.

Take Nottingham Forest, for example, as a newly-promoted club and another, like Leeds and over half the league, trying to survive the drop. When they pay their visit to Elland Road on September 10 to rekindle an historic rivalry with another big, old club, no matter how each squad has taken shape during the summer, they and their fans will be bang up for it. The atmosphere will come into play in the way it does when form doesn’t tend to matter.

But while you can’t pinpoint exactly where the highs will come - few last summer would have predicted Norwich City at home or Wolves away as such adrenaline rides - you can see where the peaks could be and where joy could be found.

Manchester United away on September 17, for obvious reasons. Everton at home on August 30, with the sun going down and the floodlights on, because Elland Road can be a special place at night. Boxing Day at home to Manchester City, because beating the champions would be a highlight of most seasons for most teams and it’s not only possible that it will be a homecoming for World Cup heroes, it’s very possible that it will be a homecoming for Kalvin Phillips, in sky blue. Bournemouth on April 29. Beach weather, if we’re lucky, and nostalgia, for what happened on the pitch at least.

If, come May, Leeds still have something important to achieve then it holds fear in abundance in the form of trips to Manchester City and West Ham along with home games against Newcastle United and Tottenam Hotspur. It could also hold all the biological thrills you can handle.

Everyone will have their own favourite but one fixture is unique and unbeatable in its own way. Wolves, at home, on the opening day. The start, in earnest, of a new era. Debuts for new players. Players and fans alike bedecked in a shiny, new home kit. The sun out, if we’re lucky. Football back again with its endless possibilities, Elland Road full to the brim and roaring.

At 3pm on that day, for at least a few seconds, everyone will be up, ready to go around again. After that, ups and downs.