Friday 3 April 2015 16:10, UK
Tom Cairney always heads to Elland Road hoping to prove a point, and he might enlist the help of Blackburn team-mate Chris Taylor to do it again this weekend.
The 24-year-old Rovers midfielder was released by Leeds as a 16-year-old but made a name for himself at Hull before moving to east Lancashire with Blackburn, where he has enjoyed another good campaign.
Cairney marked his first start as an opposition player at Elland Road last year with arguably his finest performance of the season in a 2-1 success for Rovers on New Year's Day.
His pre-match preparations had not been helped by Taylor's reluctance to go to sleep on New Year's Eve but, based on how will he fared on his West Yorkshire return last time, Cairney joked he may replicate the arrangement this time around.
"I felt like I had a point to prove as it was the first time I went back there in my career, my first start," he explained.
"It was New Year's Day and Chris Taylor kept me up a bit late New Year's Eve and wouldn't get out of my room for some reason!
"So I wasn't very happy but I might keep him in my room again Friday night, hopefully a bit of superstition."
Cairney might not have been deemed good enough by Leeds but he has gone on to have a fruitful career like many of the former Whites academy graduates.
Neil Redfearn's current crop of youngsters have followed the likes of Cairney's former colleagues Aaron Lennon, James Milner and Fabian Delph and the left-footed midfielder thinks Leeds should have held on to their prized assets for longer.
He added: "If the players would have stayed at Leeds who came through the academy - like Aaron Lennon, Milner, Delph - they would have made even more money than they would have done selling them when they were 17 or 18.
"It is a shame really, especially for the fans, because as an academy they are one of the best."
