To be fair to Leicester City and new head coach Marti Cifuentes, the team has started the season fairly well. Now that they have drawn at home with Coventry City 0-0, LCFC have endured one loss and two draws, while winning three. The East Midlanders still sit fourth in the Championship table; outcomes this weekend could, however, push the Foxes further down the division in the wrong direction.
But the campaign really is at an infancy. Whilst Cifuentes is definitely doing an OK job at the very least. With what he has to work with and considering the club's problems which are seemingly being pushed under the carpet, forgtten about or concealed in general, I'd say the former Queens Park Rangers manager is doing pretty well.
Although one aspect of defending, which the King Power outfit has suffered with before now, has returned. Unfortunately Leicester are the worst team in one particular department: allowing shots from set-pieces. This was a massive problem under many old Leicester bosses and has obviously rears its head once again. Yet training ground efforts clearly worked, somewhat, as the side managed to avoid a repeat of the issue against the Sky Blues.
Training ground efforts clearly work as Leicester City hitch comes back to bite
I used to lose sleep over LCFC's defending of corners and attacking free-kicks. Remember Brendan Rodgers' zonal marking? I just shuddered at the memory!
"After five games, Opta stats say they’ve conceded 32 shots from set-pieces, the most in the Championship."Leicester Mercury
In all seriousness, the problem had returned. Although I'm happy to report that Cifuentes is aware of it. That he doesn't appear to be a stubborn gaffer unwilling to change even ridiculous approaches. And, amazingly, we didn't concede in that style against Coventry!
Specialist coaches Lars Knudsen and Andrew Hughes appeared to lessen the danger. So how does the current boss plan to deal with not being first to the ball? Leicester midfielders and defenders appeared more committed and competent versus Cov:
"Even before the Oxford game, Marti Cifuentes should have realised it was something to address, with City giving up a host of chances from set-pieces at Charlton.
Asked if it was something to work on after that game at the Valley, Cifuentes said: “100 per cent. Even though our identity will be trying to have the ball and trying to play high up the pitch, we need to be good in all areas of the game. So that’s how we counter, how we defend low.
“Today we defended excellently in a low block but at set-pieces Charlton is a good team and they created more than what we should have allowed them.”"