With a welcome return to a full King Power Stadium, an adoring faithful willed their team onto 3 points to start the 2021/2022 season off to a flyer. But beyond the result what 3 things did we learn from the game for Leicester City.
Wolverhampton Wanderers must hate visiting King Power Stadium
In the 4 years since Wolverhampton Wanderers have returned to the Premier League they have had to put up with some horrendous days on Filbert way. In 2018 They smashed the woodwork twice before succumbing to an own goal and a deflected James Maddison goal in a 2-0 defeat.
In 2019, a drab goalless draw was only memorable for a Wolves goal that was chalked off for a dubious handball decision. During the pandemic, they lost to a Jamie Vardy penalty that was given due to a nearly impossible to get out of the way handball call. This opening day defeat probably won’t be remembered for much in the way of controversy but more due to the poor finishing of their forward players and most notably Adama Traore. How he transpired to poke wide a clear one-on-one chance is hard to know and how he struggled to score second half with several openings and opportunities is a mystery.
There were some desperate last-minute blocks by Foxes defenders that helped keep Wolves frustrated, but in truth, this was a game in which the Foxes can thank the Wolves players for missing their opportunities, Wolves can’t blame poor luck today, just poor finishing.
A clean sheet won’t mask poor Leicester City defending
Although some of the Leicester blocks were exceptional, the fact that they were allowing so many opportunities was a huge concern. With a patchwork defence that is to be expected. Daniel Amartey has been tasked with the centre back role in the absence of Jonny Evans and Wesley Fofana but it is uncertain as to whether he did enough in this game to guarantee a start in the West Ham game on the 23rd August.
Too often he was giving the ball away in cheap areas, with one lapse leading to Traore’s skewed one-on-one effort. This again happened in the second half leading to more chances, as well as being caught the wrong side of Traore too often to be rolled and leave huge gaps in behind.
Against better finishers, Amartey would have been punished more severely. The big question is whether the new signing of Jannik Vestergaard can be the answer. He was brought on for 30 minutes as Rodgers shuffled his pack to go 3 at the back. In truth, Vestergaard didn’t add much steel to this defence with the 3 including Caglar Soyuncu struggling to assert their authority on an energetic Wolves frontline.
Soyuncu was probably the best of the three, but the cohesion with his fellow defenders wasn’t quite there. With Evans still at least a month away from full fitness, these three centre backs will need to improve immensely in the coming weeks.
The three behind Vardy might not be the future
Whilst Jamie Vardy rolled back the years with an immense finish from Ricardo’s excellent work and cross, the three behind had a more modest day of efforts. Ayoze Perez (the player that splits the social media contingent) did okay feeding Vardy with a few key openings. James Maddison again had a quiet afternoon possibly feeling the effects of a twinge in his hip before his exit on the hour.
Perhaps most disappointing was Harvey Barnes who struggled to shake the attention of some robust Wolves challenges. When Barnes managed to get in the right positions his decision making just eluded him. It can’t be forgotten that Barnes has only just returned from a long injury layoff and is still building back his confidence.
The three behind the main striker doesn’t seem to be as balanced in a 4-2-3-1 with Perez not quite the same type of wide man as Harvey Barnes. Whereas the team that finished the game in a 3-5-2 were able to find space between the lines more comfortably. Iheanacho offers far more these days and arguably he should start ahead of two of the three behind Vardy with his current form.