JORDAN Rhodes will make his 150th appearance for Blackburn Rovers at Hull City today (3pm) on the back of glowing tributes from the manager who was delighted to keep him – and the one who desperately wanted to sign him.

This afternoon’s KC Stadium clash will be the first time that Rhodes has faced Hull since they made a club record bid for his services in August 2014.

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Rovers owners Venky’s rejected the £10m-plus offer from Steve Bruce’s side and since then the Scotland international has continued to strengthen his reputation as the best goalscorer outside of the Premier League.

Rhodes made it four goals in three games with a predatory double strike in last Saturday’s 3-0 success at home to Charlton which means he has now netted 78 times in 149 appearances for the club.

Rovers boss Gary Bowyer said: “Steve Bruce knows all about Jordan and what he would have brought to his team.

“I’m sure they’ll be planning to stop the lad, who is in unbelievable form. I think in the last three games he’s had 13 or 14 shots, eight of them have been on target, and he’s scored four.

“So we’ve got to make sure the responsibility of the others is to keep setting him up and keep providing him with chances because his conversion rate is fantastic.

“The amount of goals he has scored for us is phenomenal. It’s finishing of the highest quality.”

Championship rivals Middlesbrough also saw a big money bid for Rhodes turned down in the summer.

But the closest he came to leaving Rovers was when Hull, who were in Premier League at the time, came calling.

Bowyer, however, said: “I fear every time the window is open, not just that time, because you don’t want to lose someone as prolific as that.

“And I think this season his game’s gone on to another level in terms of his link-up play. He’s becoming more and more involved in it, getting better at it, and seeing the importance of it.”

When asked yesterday whether Rhodes would have kept newly relegated Hull in the top flight last season, Bruce said that was ‘the million dollar question’.

But the Tigers manager went on record to express his admiration for the 25-year-old, who has scored more goals in the Championship than any other player in the past three seasons.

Bruce said: “Whatever level he’s at, he’ll score. People will say he’s not that particularly quick or he’s not great in the air, but if you pick up a paper on a Sunday morning and Blackburn have scored, then inevitably it’s him that’s scored.

“In a team that’s not been at the top end of the league for a while, to have scored 80 odd goals in 140 games is remarkable. He’s got that knack, whatever it is, where he becomes class in the penalty area. He takes the chances.”

Bruce added: “There have been a number of times where he must have thought he was close (to a move). We thought we were close to getting him but in the end the owners said he wasn’t for sale at any price.

“He just gets his head down and gets on with it.”