'No love lost' - Leeds United set for promotion reunion as Carabao Cupopponents are revealed

Leeds, ball number 19 in the Northern Section of the cup draw, will take on Boro and former Elland Road favourite Luke Ayling at Elland Road. Ex-Whites hero Gary McAllister performed the draw alongside former Chelsea man Frank Sinclair.

“Leeds United at home, really pleased they got a nice home tie there but that’s going to be a cracker,” said McAllister. “No love lost between those two teams, both sets of fans don’t really get on with each other so that’ll be a lively game as well.” Last season Daniel Farke’s men overcame Shrewsbury Town in the first round at Elland Road but exited in the second round after an epic penalty shoot-out that ended 9-8 to League Two hosts Salford City. The game finished 1-1 after ex-Leeds striker Matt Smith’s powerful header opened the scoring and Pascal Struijk levelled. Crysencio Summerville and Sam Greenwood were denied by the woodwork, before the Ammies won on spot-kicks. Speaking at full-time Daniel Farke said: “First of all we are disappointed, because we wanted to go into the next round. I feel for the lads, when you judge the game, normally you need to win this game. It was an incredible amount of chances that we have created, it’s so difficult to create big chances against a side who is sitting that deep and defends for their lives and for them, it is the game of the season. We created so much, it felt like we had enough chances to score five by half time, but the reality is we just scored one in 90 minutes.” It was a third penalty loss in five seasons in the competition for Leeds.

Liverpool were the 2023/24 season Carabao Cup winners, beating Chelsea deep in extra-time at Wembley thanks to Virgil van Dijk's header. Leeds have won the competition once in their history, in the 1967/68 campaign thanks to a 1-0 win over Arsenal. They were beaten by Aston Villa in the 1995/96 final and last reached the quarter-finals in 2016/17, when they were ousted by Liverpool.