Alex Cairns

Cairns built his reputation a long way from the Premier League, in Fleetwood and Salford, where being dropped by his boyhood club could easily have ended a career that instead just took longer to arrive. Years of regular football there gave him experience a young academy keeper cannot get sitting on a bench, learning how to organise a defence under real pressure rather than in training. That grounding is exactly why Leeds trust him as cover now.

The job of a backup goalkeeper is a strange one, staying sharp enough to play well on short notice while accepting that most weekends pass without a single minute on the pitch. Cairns has done that job at a smaller club before, which suggests he understands the patience it requires. Whether he gets a real chance to show it is mostly out of his hands.