Leeds vs Leicester: Preview of Premier League clash
By Nathan Wong
After four wins on the bounce, it’s been a frustrating week for Leicester City who followed up a 2-0 loss to Arsenal with a 1-1 draw against Spartak on Thursday. In both games, the Foxes created sufficient opportunities to win the game but failed to grasp these.
Despite the disappointment, there’s no time to dwell on poor results, with a clash with Leeds United just around the corner on Sunday. Leicester must now put in a much-improved display to go into the international break with positive momentum. If Brendan Rodgers is to stick with the 3-4-1-2 system, more attacking thrust must come from the wing-backs. This will likely necessitate both Timothy Castagne and Ricardo Pereira starting to avoid a lopsided attack as was the case against Spartak.
Injury News
Leeds have several key personnel out with longer-term injuries. These are right-back Luke Ayling (knee), centre-back Robin Koch (pelvis) and main striker Patrick Bamford (ankle). According to Sky Sports, left-back Junior Firpo and midfielder Jamie Shackleton are also being assessed after picking up injuries in recent fixtures.
The Foxes on the other hand still are missing Wesley Fofana (broken leg) and Marc Albrighton, who will be back at the end of the month. More positively, James Justin is close to a return after restarting contact training but will take time to build up match fitness.
As reported in previous articles, Leicester have had a sickness bug going around the squad preventing Harvey Barnes and James Maddison from playing on Thursday. Whilst the attacking duo have thankfully recovered, Jannik Vestergaard is reported to have caught this bug too. Whether he is fit to feature is yet to be known, although there will be many who won’t be too disheartened at that piece of news.
Leicester squad struck with illness. dark. Next
Predicted Leicester City line-up
Leicester (3-4-2-1):
Kasper Schmeichel, Daniel Amartey, Jonny Evans, Caglar Soyuncu
Ricardo Pereira, Youri Tielemans, Wilfried Ndidi, Timothy Castagne
Ademola Lookman, Harvey Barnes
Jamie Vardy
After the poor performance of Kelechi Iheanacho and the possible nature of Sunday’s game, Brendan Rodgers may wish to utilise the pace and directness of Harvey Barnes and Ademola Lookman. This may prove fruitful in a game that is likely to be extremely open, with both defences struggling to keep out the opposition.
Past meetings
Last season, Leicester and Leeds both won the away fixture between the sides with the Foxes 4-1 winners at Elland Road and Leeds winning 3-1 at the King Power Stadium.
FoL prediction
Going to Elland Road is never an easy place, especially with a full-house of raucous supporters. Nevertheless, Leeds have been in even worse form than Leicester City this season and have failed to recreate their successful high-energy football of last campaign.
Hot. Fofana could return for this run of games. light
Leeds will likely have joy down Leicester’s left side with Raphinha ready to exploit the perceived weaknesses down that flank. It’s difficult to predict Leicester keeping a clean sheet but FoL are expecting big improvements from the past two matches: Leeds United 1-2 Leicester City