Leeds United skipper admits 'deflated' mood in camp but sends rallying cry as 'create history' goal revealed

The experienced Wales international has been a key part of Leeds' push for promotion to the Premier League this term and was last month named in the Championship's Team of the Season at the EFL Awards. Despite individual honours aplenty for Leeds at the ceremony in London, the club look set to miss out on the two automatic promotion places following defeat in West London last weekend.

"Obviously after the defeat, very deflated as you'd expect," Ampadu told Leeds United's official channel. "Not just by the result but by the standards of our performance, we didn't put our stamp or our authority onto the game at all and the result was deserved. After that night, after the weekend it was time to regroup, it's a big week coming up so the last couple days have actually been good, full of hard work and just preparing for the game coming up on Saturday."

On Saturday afternoon, Leeds have a chance to put things right against fellow promotion hopefuls Southampton, both of whom will be eyeing a spot at Wembley Stadium in the play-off final if results elsewhere mean Leeds are consigned to the play-offs as a secondary route to promotion.

"The boss, the staff, the players, even the physios, everyone's on board. Everyone knows the task ahead, obviously it might be a difficult one but everyone knows the task ahead and what we want to achieve.

"We know what the goal is and to create history would be amazing and would be a massive honour for all of us. I think it's what the club deserves but our focus is for the game and we need to make sure we put Friday night right and do ourselves justice and perform the way we have all season and see what happens after that," Ampadu added.