Aston Villa manager John Gregory says he is interested in bringing Manchester United striker Dwight Yorke back to Villa Park.
"You've got to be interested in people like Yorke if they ever become available," said Gregory, who sold Yorke to United for stg£12.6 million in August 1998.
"He's done exceptionally well at Manchester United but he was always regarded here as our best player whilst he was here," Gregory told Sky Sports.
"He did exceptionally well for the club - and for himself for that matter."
Trinidad and Tobago international Yorke joined Villa as a teenager in 1989 and developed into the club's top forward before his acrimonious move to United in 1998.
Gregory did not want to lose his best player and when Yorke told of his desire to join United the manager famously admitted: "If I'd had a gun at the time, I think I would have shot him."
This season, though, Yorke has suffered from inconsistency and the 29-year-old's place in the United team, already uncertain, has been put under further threat by the arrival of Ruud van Nistelrooy from PSV Eindhoven.
Including Teddy Sheringham, Andy Cole and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, United have five international strikers in their squad.