22 years and counting. The winless streak at Anfield continues for Leicester City as their most notorious bogey ground strikes again, with some truly bizarre moments
Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall leads the charge
Following the boxing day defeat to Newcastle United, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall gave a refreshingly frank interview. He accused the team of being “spineless“, calling the performance “awful” and apologised to the supporters for a performance that made him feel “horrible” and one that he never wanted to experience again.
It would have been interesting to know how those words went down with the rest of the Leicester City playing staff coming from one of the more junior members of the squad. What was clear though, is that words like that need to be backed up with a reaction and a performance. Dewsbury-Hall showed his leadership qualities immediately in this game as he raced through a Liverpool defence that parted like a ‘red sea’ before calmly slotting in past Alisson at the Kop end after a mere four minutes. It was a stark contrast to the slow start that saw Newcastle two goals up after only seven minutes.
Leicester seemed calm in possession and confident of their game plan. Dewsbury-Hall was key to this and consistently found space in key areas, holding the ball up and dictating play. This had a calming influence on the rest of the team, particularly in midfield where Boubakary Soumare and Wilfred Ndidi were proving difficult for Jurgen Klopp’s men to evade.
Despite Dewsbury-Hall only breaking through into the first team a year earlier, it is easy to forget that he is 24 and is keen to make up for lost Premier league time. Performances like this exemplify his desire to do well for the football club and rise him higher in the stakes of future captain material, if Leicester are to follow previous successes they will need more of these types of characters across the pitch.
Wout Farce
Prior to the World Cup break, Leicester City had seemingly cracked their woeful defending problems. They turned around a truly shocking start to the season where they conceded 22 goals in 8 games before then conceding three goals in eight, nine if you include the MK Dons game. This seemed to coincide with the arrival of Belgian fan-favourite Wout Faes whose calming influence across the backline saw the team’s defending finally flourish, these performances were rewarded with a place in his national team’s squad in Qatar.
Perhaps it was the splinters he got in his backside from watching a crumbling and ageing Belgium national team, but Faes has returned looking little like the calm player we have grown accustomed to. This might explain why he will now forever be immortalised as an own-goal specialist following two of the most hilariously catastrophic finishes ever seen.
The first came in the 38th minute where a poor Trent Alexander-Arnold cross was heading into the comfortable arms of Danny Ward. Many eyewitnesses claim Ward shouted to leave the ball for him to collect but Faes had other ideas. He took a wild swing with his left foot that ballooned over the Welsh keeper in off the post much to the joy of the Liverpool faithful. The centreback lay flat on the ground briefly hoping the ground would swallow him up. It was a huge mistake but one that had a huge slice of misfortune attached.
Seven minutes later, with half-time looming, Darwin Nunez raced through the Foxes defence and put a shot in that came back off the post and bounced back toward Faes who seemed nowhere near calm enough, he got his feet all wrong, panicked and put the ball into the roof of his own net. The best guess I can surmise is that he was trying to put the ball over the bar out of harm’s way and he got it horribly wrong. As expected, Leicester never quite recovered and two costly errors gifted the game to Liverpool.
Consistently predictable Leicester City statistics
Although the narrative of City as a Jekyll & Hyde type football team holds credibility, there are also some alarming statistics that continue to call into question the lack of mental strength at the football club. The 26th of April 2021 is not a date that sticks in many Leicester City fans’ memories, but it should going forward, it is the last time the King Power club went in trailing at halftime and finished the game as the winners. It’s not easy to turn around a deficit in any Premier League game but not doing it for so long shows something isn’t quite right.
Liverpool were very poor in this game and won’t know how they somehow escaped with a victory. This game shouldn’t just be swept under the carpet as our annual Anfield defeat. Liverpool were there for the taking and Leicester’s casual attitude in the second half and sleepy finishing throughout contributed greatly.
The last two defeats now mean that Brendan Rodgers’ men have lost to every single team in the top eight of the league and have beaten no team above them (New Year’s Eve results permitting). As things stand with Leicester in 13th place they are at best meandering towards a mid-table finish which would have been welcomed earlier in the season, some key stats will need breaking if this season is to herald any success at all.