Nottingham Forest will miss out on the Championship’s top six, according to former Aston Villa and Celtic forward Alan McInally.
Sabri Lamouchi’s Reds restart their season on Saturday with a testing trip to Hillsborough to face Sheffield Wednesday, knowing they have nine games remaining to secure their place inside the top six.
Having lost 3-0 at home to Millwall prior to the stoppage for Covid-19 back in March, Forest have a five point cushion to Bristol City in seventh, with Gary Rowett’s Lions a point further back on 54.
Preston find themselves occupying the final play-off berth, four points adrift of Forest with Blackburn Rovers just three points behind North End, and the Sky Sports pundit believes both Lancashire clubs will join Fulham and Brentford in the top six, at the expense of Lamouchi’s men.
"I remember I was at Sunderland under Roy Keane when we won seven or eight games out of utterly nowhere," said McInally.
"You need to look at the likes of Derby, Swansea, Cardiff, Millwall and Blackburn potentially doing the same.
"I'm going to go for Fulham in the play-offs, Brentford, who are a good football team to definitely be in the play-offs.
"And then I'm going to go for Blackburn Rovers and Preston North End to get in the play-offs.
"I've seen Preston a couple of times and they've got some really good players in the middle of the park that I quite like, so I'm going to go for Fulham, Brentford, Blackburn and Preston to make it."
