Former Leeds United defender Richard Naylor believes that automatic promotion is the way to go in the Championship because the playoffs are nothing but a lottery.
Naylor was part of the Leeds United squad that reached the playoff semi finals in League One during the 2008/09 season, but the side eventually lost out to Millwall 2-1 on aggregate to see their dreams of playing in the Championship broken.
The 40-year-old reflects on those memories with regret as he believes that going that far and then returning empty handed was a big blow.
Garry Monk's team are in a similar situation, contesting a playoff place in the Championship and looking set to have to enter the lottery to earn promotion.
The former Ipswich Town star insists that it is better for Leeds to put themselves in an automatic promotion spot because of the unpredictable nature of the playoffs.
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“That’s basically why they call the playoffs a lottery, ,Naylor told the Yorkshire Evening Post.
“All those results you’ve had beforehand – they don’t count for much when it’s all or nothing.
"A season like that teaches you that automatic promotion’s the way to go.
“History tells you that someone usually sneaks into the playoffs.
“When I first moved up from Ipswich, the club were a little way off. They’d had the situation with Gary McAllister and the results were a bit patchy.
“I’d gone through the playoffs before at Ipswich and at the back of my head I wanted to have the impact of going into Leeds and taking them up.
"They’re my club, it’s where I was born and I put a lot of weight on my shoulders in that respect.”
