Norwich 0-2 Leicester: 3 Foxes who impressed
Leicester City continued their exceptional start to the 2023/24 Championship season with a 2-0 win against Norwich City at Carrow Road. A first half penalty from Kelechi Iheanacho and fourth goal of the season for Kasey McAteer in the closing minutes of the contest, was enough to give the Foxes all three points and send them to second in the table. There were many standout performers in Wednesday night’s imposing victory, here are three players who FoL thinks impressed the most.
Mads Hermansen of Leicester City
The Danish goalkeeper continues to impress in a LCFC shirt and was by far the standout out performer against Norwich. Many people may raise their eyebrows when a keeper wins the man of the match award, as it suggests that he is the sole reason why a side achieved a result i.e made bundles of saves. However this was not the case Wednesday night.
Yes Hermansen made a sensational point blank save off the header of Shane Duffy at 1-0. But the way in which 23-year-old disabled the Norwich’s man-to-man press, was at times masterful. He never panicked, kept his composure and even created scenarios where he would hold onto the ball, in order to draw the pressure onto him personally thus creating a free man to start building an attack.
It was the kind of performance you see from elite goalkeepers at the elite clubs. The majority of their duty will be in possession creating the extra man. But when called upon, they deliver. It could be argued he is the most integral part of this new system Enzo Maresca is imparting on the squad. As his ball playing ability coupled with his line-breaking passing is extremely translatable to the next level. A place in which this squad will end up in the coming season, should they continue this trajectory.
Harry Winks
A 100 percent pass accuracy on 80 plus passes is never something to snuff at in a game of professional football. But this individual performance from Winks was more than just wall passes back to his centre-halves, or short passes to his accompanying “six”, which have less of a consequence and impact on the state of the game. But on multiple occasions, especially in the first period where City had the majority of control, he broke lines with ball carrying and with neat and tidy turns under pressure. His switches of play out to McAteer were superb and had the young winger’s touch been better at times, those balls may have been much more impactful.
Simply put you could not have asked more from the profile of player that Winks is, in a sense of keeping the side ticking and negating the oppositions aggressive man-to-man press. It undoubtably helped winks to have Hamza Choudhury playing in the role Ricardo Pereira usually adopts. As it left the Foxes much less exposed in transitions due to Choudhury’s superior physical attributes. It was another performance by Winks, which shows how important he is to this side.
Callum Doyle
The Manchester City loanee has had a somewhat up and down start to his Leicester career. As although it was clear from the off the quality he possess on the ball, for example his passing ranges and line-breaking passing ability. It has been defensively where he has been very suspect. However, on Wednesday night, this was far from the case. He was fantastic in one-on-one duals, closing down crosses -which were the host’s main threat in the second half- as well as knowing when to step up to engage with his man and drop off said man. An aspect that cost his side a goal in the win against Southampton.
Next. Norwich 0-2 Leicester City: Foxes player ratings. dark
Doyle is not blessed with much mobility, so his body position when defending is vital as he does not have the get-out-jail-free-card that some defenders have of being simply quicker than their attacker. His body position when he defended throughout the tie was spot on and was a key component in Leicester City recording their second clean sheet of the season.