Blackburn Rovers v Leeds United: Big match preview

Key Battle - Grant Hanley v Souleymane Doukara

Hanley was utterly dominant on the night when these two clubs met at Elland Road in October. He and Shane Duffy won header after header and Leeds made no impact on Blackburn’s defence at all. Chris Wood should be in United’s 18 tomorrow but might start on the bench so Doukara and Mirco Antenucci are likely to be asked to find a way to prise Rovers open. They do not give many goals away.

Key Man - Danny Graham

It did not seem like much of a trade in January: Blackburn selling Jordan Rhodes to Middlesbrough agreeing to take Danny Graham on loan from Sunderland. But while Rhodes has scored only once for Boro since then, Graham has claimed three goals in his last six appearances, helping Rovers to secure three big wins. He’s 30 now and past his peak but the ability to finish has always been there.

Last time at Ewood Park:

Saturday, November 22, 2014

Blackburn Rovers 2 Leeds United 1

Goals: Blackburn - Rhodes 71, 88 pen. Leeds - Doukara 33.

Phil Hay’s view:

Blackburn have quietly crept into form, winning four of their last six matches.

The best of those were victories over Middlesbrough and Birmingham City and Leeds will get nothing for free at Ewood Park. But United have two valuable results behind them and this goes down as a proper 50-50 game - difficult to call and liable to go either way.

Blackburn might deserve slight favouritism but Leeds at 4-1 are a very big price.

Match Odds:

Home win - 6/7

Draw - 13/5

Away win - 4/1