Ipswich Town v Leeds United: Wounded Whites face tough assignment at Tractor Boys - YEP jury
MATTHEW EVANS
Our next three scheduled away games are at Ipswich Town, Sheffield United and Derby County, three venues where we’ve had more pain than pleasure over the years.
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Hide AdI don’t think I’ve ever seen an entertaining game at Portman Road, they usually either descend into a drab draw or we are well beaten.
The bad news that Luke Ayling is out for the season and Samuel Saiz has a six-game ban was only very slightly cushioned by the arrival of a new left-back in the guise of Laurens De Bock and he will have to hit the ground running if we are to keep up with the play-off pace setters.
There’s a lot of angst around the club at the moment and we should take time out to realise that whatever happens this transfer window and for the rest of the season we are in a far better situation than we have been for a long time.
Let’s just try to enjoy the chase for the top six.
Prediction: Ipswich Town 1 Leeds United 1.
DAVID WATKINS
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Hide AdThe dire performance at Newport should have no relevance to our trip to Portman Road this weekend.
Very few of the players who so let us down at Rodney Parade will start against Ipswich and neither should they be allowed to! It will still be difficult though as Ipswich under Mick McCarthy are always resolute.
At first glance, Ipswich had a poor Christmas, losing three from four, but on closer inspection they lost to the three form teams of the moment: Wolves, Derby and Fulham. Next in the six-game form table come Leeds who’ve taken 13 points from their last six compared to those top three who have each taken 14.
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Hide AdBut then there is the absence of Samuel Saiz to factor in and we have to get used to a defence without Luke Ayling too although it looks like Laurens De Bock has arrived in the nick of time to allow 2018’s top scorer Gaetano Berardi to move to right-back.
I very much hope I’m wrong, but I can’t see past an Ipswich victory in this one.
Prediction: Ipswich Town 2 Leeds United 0.
KEITH INGHAM
New signing Laurens De Bock, a left-back will probably be in the squad for the game with Ipswich Town, with Luke Ayling sidelined, Leeds’ top scorer in 2018, Gaetano Berardi, will swap to the right-back position.
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Hide AdStuart Dallas is back training but may start on the substitutes’ bench. Pierre-Michel Lasogga and Jay-Roy Grot were disappointing, to say the least in the FA Cup, so Kemar Roofe hopefully will start up front against Ipswich Town. Whatever Thomas Christiansen says, the squad is desperate for another striker to be brought in.
You know you will be up against a team that will be in ‘your face’ from the first minute – you cannot expect anything different from a team managed by Leeds fan Mick McCarthy. It will be a hard game, but not many games, if any, are easy in the Championship.
I’m not confident this weekend and the ramifications of last weekend’s debacle could rumble on for a week or so. Christiansen’s decision to rest key players could come back and bite him on the rear, it did with Garry Monk!
Prediction: Ipswich Town 2 Leeds United 0.
MIKE GILL
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Hide AdAfter scraping one point out of the last six available and being dumped out of the FA Cup at Newport County, Leeds United head east in search of redemption.
None of the fringe players including Pierre-Michel Lasogga did enough at Newport to enhance their selection prospects.
Thomas Christiansen’s task is made more difficult by the awful news about Luke Ayling’s season-ending injury and the self imposed absence of the talented but wayward Samuel Saiz.
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Hide AdAssuming that the new signing Laurens De Bock is available it will be tempting to throw him straight into the team.
The rest of the side virtually picks itself and it is to be hoped that the key men who were rested against Newport will return energised.
Mick McCarthy’s Ipswich Town are in their usual position of slugging it out in the top half of the table without quite making the play-off positions.
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Hide AdThis will be a tough challenge as it always is at Portman Road.
Prediction: Ipswich Town 1 Leeds United 1.
****
IT is with great sadness that we have to announce that long-time juror Gary Newbould passed away suddenly on Wednesday.
Gary’s contributions were popular, well researched and full of insight and good humour about the club he loved. He will be sorely missed.
His family have asked that we include his prediction for the Ipswich game as Gary would have wanted that.
Prediction: Ipswich Town 1 Leeds United 2.