Clever alterations from Brendan Rodgers ensure victory for Leicester City over Huddersfield Town

It’s perfectly fine to think that Leicester City’s 4-1 drubbing of Huddersfield Town – their biggest win of the season- was because of Brendan Rodgers’ tactical setup.

The result was definitely an accurate representation of the team’s performance and was down to Rodgers’ tactics; however, it wasn’t entirely because of Leicester’s attacking style but was more heavily based on defensive solidity and overall dominance.

Using Burnley and AFC Bournemouth as the examples, Leicester have primarily played as a 4-3-3 attacking unit under Rodgers. This allows for a very aggressive and highly intense frontline of Harvey Barnes, Jamie Vardy and Demarai Gray. They’re told to press high up the pitch and to use their speed to pressure defenders into forced passing situations.

The midfield is composed of two attack-minded playmakers in James Maddison and Youri Tielemans, with one of them always offering defensive support to Wilfred Ndidi.

When either of the two pushes to help in attack, the other will adapt a more quarter-back-esque role and look to influence the game from deep, meaning when possession changes into the opponent’s favour, they can support Ndidi to stop counter-attacks and other threats.

Specifically against Bournemouth – as the ten-man performance against Burnley was of a completely different nature – Leicester aimed to suffocate and restrict a team capable of building from the back and causing problems.

By having two aggressive wingers alongside a hard-working, high-pressing Vardy, Leicester were able to neutralise and stop the Cherries from playing their natural game.

Pair that with the added support of either Tielemans or Maddison pushing from midfield and there was even further depth to the suffocation. However, this style isn’t plausible against, say, Huddersfield, who aim to play long, especially through Aaron Mooy, as the high-press can easily be beaten by a well targeted long ball. Leicester therefore opted for a more defensively sound 4-5-1.

It may sound ridiculous that Leicester set up defensively against a relegated team but it’s what Rodgers did and did very well. The difference in the 4-5-1 is that Barnes and Gray operate as extra midfielders.

They position themselves deeper and remain further adrift from Vardy. Rodgers also asked Ben Chilwell and Ricardo Pereira to offer more defensive solidity than offensive threat – which they would normally do in the 4-3-3.

Tielemans and Maddison also sat deeper. They operated more as a midfield three with Ndidi, with the emphasis being on retaining possession and creating chances to use Leicester’s superior quality in the final third.

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But the question still is: why respect Huddersfield enough to adjust your primary concern to defending, rather than punishing them with attacking force? In truth, the style Rodgers adapted was more a statement on the Terriers’ lack of quality – that Leicester didn’t need to ‘play’ as much to pick apart a team destined for Championship football.

Ensuring they didn’t concede easy goals (somewhat a theme of this season, especially early on and through errors), Leicester were able to slowly dominate the game and eventually run away as easy victors.

The goal tally looks impressive and in many ways it is. It outlines a different side to Leicester that’s been missing this season: a clinical edge to their play. There wasn’t a need for excessive shots on goal. The game required small moments of real quality and the Foxes provided that incredibly well.

There’s an idea that a team has to play with purely attacking intentions to achieve a score line like 4-1 but this is fundamentally wrong. Rodgers showed maturity and experience to approach the game the way he did, as other previous managers wouldn’t respect the dangers of playing in their more natural style.

Had Rodgers stuck to his natural 4-3-3, the dimension of the game could have easily been altered and Leicester could have thrown away two or three valuable points in their race for seventh place.