How Leicester should setup to beat Thomas Tuchel’s Chelsea

So, with the key characteristics of the Chelsea system outlined, how should Brendan Rodgers organise his Leicester City side to negate the overbearing positives of Tuchel’s system?

Let’s start with a formation. I’m hesitant to suggest matching Chelsea’s 3-4-3, despite the Foxes showcasing similar systems so far this season. The fluidity of the West London side would ultimately undo a City side attempting to structurally match them — with less understanding or awareness to the aforementioned positional rotations. With this in mind, I would recommend Rodgers attempt to play a brave 4-3-3, and I will explain my logic and tactical deployments to make this work.

Having two wingers, such as Harvey Barnes and Ademola Lookman, would allow the Foxes to pin Chelsea’s wide centre-backs back. This is crucial to negating the building phase for Chelsea, as finding one of the “free” centre-backs is their fundamental way of beating the first line of the press. If they’re never given freedom in possession, they can be neutralised. Of course, this also involves Jamie Vardy putting central-defender, Thiago Silva, under pressure, which I don’t think the forward will struggle with.

You then have a three-man midfield, which simply outnumbers Chelsea’s. This isn’t always true, while Tuchel’s side looks to adjust positions to aid their pivot, but in certain phases of play they will be working with inferior numbers centrally — with central penetrations being another fundamental building block for Tuchel, this is a great way of limiting the frequency of these.

When choosing the 4-3-3, I did have to place the word “brave” before my decision. This bravery is referring to the work of the full-backs, and how they’re in charge of neutralising the effectiveness of the marauding wing-backs of Chelsea. Whilst this sounds dangerous, having the three-man midfield versus The Blues’ two, does allow Wilfred Ndidi to drift into either flank and support these duels in width.

However, this does create a three-vs-two in favour of the visiting side in their attacking line. The two chosen centre-backs for Leicester City — probably Jonny Evans and, on current form, Daniel Amartey, are tasked with defending the entire front-three. The aim of the system is to have as few transitions or scenarios that exploit this numerical inferiority, as possible — instead, looking to take the game to the visitors and pin them back in their own half.

The final consideration is the player replacing Youri Tielemans, as the Belgian seemingly isn’t ready for the game on Saturday. I think the required defensive discipline and nous would make me hesitant to field James Maddison inside this structure. Instead, I would give Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall a chance to showcase his qualities from the start.

This is inherently risky, and the overall system is leaning on that side of caution, but to beat a Chelsea team that’s only conceded four goals all season, you have to take some risks. For me, these are the most logical ones Rodgers can take, and given the level of performance prior to the break, he has to adjust something.