Mick McCarthy says today’s opponents Leeds seem a happier ship than they have for some while under Brian McDermott’s management. The Blues boss has a lot of time for McDermott, who he feels was unlucky to lose his job at former club Reading.

McCarthy, a Leeds fan as a boy, said: “They seem to have a bit more unity than they’ve had for years.

“They were all fighting with Ken Bates, fighting with players, fighting with managers. It just didn’t seem to be a happy place.

“Brian, for whatever reason, seems to have settled down there, they had 30-odd thousand there at the start of the season.

“It is Leeds after all, the club carries a bit of an aura around it and with Brian McDermott I think they’ve got a chance of competing to get promoted.”

He says he’s not sure how they’ll do this year, particularly if they lose one of their key men: “I keep hearing that Middlesbrough are bidding for Ross McCormack, he’d be a loss if he goes because the way they’re playing at the moment, with him playing in behind two strikers, suits him and he’s good at it.

“They’ve made a couple of signings, they’ve signed Scott Wootton from Manchester United and Luke Murphy from Crewe, so they’ve added."

McCarthy is looking for a repeat of the victory in Town's only other home game so far this season: “We beat Millwall, we’ll have to play as well again as we did against QPR, Millwall and Reading.

“It’s the performances. We’ve performed well and that’s the yardstick for us, to play as well as that against Leeds.”

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