What’s going on at Leicester City as 9 senior players injured
By Will Kennedy
Leicester City are experiencing a serious injury crisis. After losing both Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall and Boubakary Soumare to muscle injuries within the first eight minutes of Tuesday’s loss to Fulham, the Foxes now have nine senior players out of action.
Not only this, but the lack of confidence and belief that Brendan Rodgers has in the rest of his team, as well as the poor form of key attacking players such as Harvey Barnes and Jamie Vardy, has seen Leicester fall back into a dangerous relegation scrap.
It’s left many scratching their heads wondering what is going on at the club. In their last three games, LCFC have lost four players to injury. After a lengthy World Cup break, the players should be fully fit. Instead, the squad are going down like flies.
Before we break down each of Leicester’s injuries, it’s important mention the big changes that have occurred behind-the-scenes to the club’s medical staff.
In 2020, Brendan Rodgers revealed that City were the only Premier League club ‘that didn’t have a full-time doctor‘, with the manager saying he was looking to ‘revamp the medical team and bring in a Head of Medicine.’ The first step of his shape-up was to sack Head Physio Dave Rennie after more than 20 years’ service to the club.
City then welcomed in their new Head of Medicine, Dr Bryan English. English’s time at the club, however, was to be a short stint and he left at the end of the 2021-22 season. In his place, Rodgers oversaw the recruitment of Mark Waller. Waller had previously spent four years at Rangers and brought a raft of experience with him.
Behind Waller is Matt Reeves, the Foxes’ longstanding Fitness and Conditioning Coach who has been at the club since 2011; Glen Driscoll, First Team Fitness Coach; Mitch Willis, First Team Strength and Power Coach; and Dr Ian Patchett, officially credited as the Club Doctor – Patchett’s commitments to the club are impacted by him also working as a GP.
Perhaps it’s too simple to say that the recent restructure could be impacting the fitness of the players, but it is telling that the revamp has coincided with a series of dreadful injurys within the squad.