It seems like an age ago when Jonny Howson was lining up for Leeds United.

Indeed, the midfielder turned defender left Leeds almost eight years ago, and he’s still doing a decent job in the Championship.

A lot has changed for both parties since they went their separate ways, Howson has played over 100 Premier League games, and Leeds are finally pushing for a return to the top-flight after years of struggling to make any steps forward.

Marcelo Bielsa has Leeds playing some of the best football in the EFL, topping the Championship xG rankings by some way, and sitting in second in the Championship table.

Earlier this week Howson came up against his former side, and of course, that sparked a conversation on social media.

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Another former United player, Ben Parker, commented that Howson would have thrived under Marcelo Bielsa, so we’re comparing him to what the Argentine already has in his squad.

Now, Howson isn’t the player he was at Leeds, he spends a lot of his time in defence these days, playing 12 times at centre-back and nine times at right-back this term.

We’re comparing him to Liam Cooper and Luke Ayling, and the stats tell a very interesting story.

The first thing to note is that Howson actually makes more tackles per game than each United defender, and he’s also on a par with them when it comes to interceptions per game.

Interestingly, the Boro man actually has more assists than Ayling and Cooper combined, despite the pair playing in a side that averages 12.6% more possession than Boro do.

The only thing that’s slightly concerning is his pass success rate. In that regard, it seemingly isn’t up to scratch despite picking out teammates for a goal on a regular basis.

However, that is seemingly a bi-product of Jonathan Woodgate’s tactical set-up as Boro have a significantly lower pass success rate than Leeds on the whole.

Howson’s passing has actually proven to be good throughout his career, he was a midfielder, after all. The 31-year-old actually averaged a pass success rate of over 80% for three consecutive seasons at Norwich while they were in the Premier League.

It’s certainly interesting to think how Howson would get on under Bielsa, and the stats show that Parker’s prediction that he’d thrive under the Argentine may be spot on.

In other news, Leeds’ chances of selling one player may have just taken a hit.