Ward honest about his and Leicester’s awful start to season
Leicester City’s No.1 Danny Ward has commented on the terrible start to the season which saw the Foxes rock bottom of the league. Here is what he said.
The King Power club had a horrible start to life in this campaign. First of all, they conceded 22 goals in the opening seven matches. They lost six out of those despite scoring 10 goals. These were dismal defensive performances in a back line no longer with Wesley Fofana and only just getting Wout Faes involved.
All the attention fell on one player primarily: the Welsh international. Our goalkeeper had all the pressure of replacing a club legend and long standing stalwart, while simultaneously having to protect a shattered and disorganised back line.
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Leicester City No.1 comments
In the moment, supporters demanded a new goalkeeper: Alban Lafont and the like. I was one of them in the moment. Plenty longed to blame someone, and to be fair Ward’s performances were not up to scratch. As per LeicestershireLive, Ward did offer an explanation.
"“it’s been a case of readjusting to be honest. It had been a long time being the number two and not having to deal with the pressure”"
Pressure is everything. The No.1 was in new territory after many years of being in the sidelines supporting Kasper Schmeichel. However, when he had his opportunity, it was all pressure and no love: football can be cruel. Yet, in the weeks that followed everything changed.
"“I’m comfortable in that environment again now. Hopefully as a team we can kick on now and get ourselves up the table to where we think we should be and ultimately where we want to be. (The run of clean sheets) was sort of validation, not just for myself, but for all of us”"
The Foxes went on a much better run prior to the FIFA World Cup in Qatar, with clean sheets and wins propelling Brendan Rodgers’ team out of the relegation zone and back in contention for safety. Now add to that Viktor Kristiansen, Harry Souttar, and the returning Ricardo Pereira and they look like a completely different side defensively.
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They can create and score goals through the likes of Harvey Barnes, James Maddison, Kelechi Iheanacho and new signing Tete. It has always been defending. Now City look better than ever.