What Are Leicester Playing At?

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My feeling on the ‘discovery’ of players through injuries to others is that it is quite a normal occurrence – the difference is that we notice every single thing nowadays because absolutely everything is reported in the press. I think it is just as common for a player to get his chance off the back of someone else’s injury as it is for them just to get a shot at the first team purely on merit. One footballers success can typically be correlated to someone else’s bad luck. One example I heard recently was the Eastleigh keeper, who at one time was the back-up to Edvin van der Sar at Fulham and now finds himself down in the non-league. These sort of things happen all the time, good and bad, so I think the fact that we have knowledge about how Coquelin or Bellerin came into the first team shouldn’t be used as another stick to beat Wenger with. The most important thing is he gave them a chance at all, so his belief in the players had to be there for that to happen. If Le Coq was seen as a waste of space out on loan at Charlton, Wenger would never have recalled him in the first place. We’ve heard many more stories of players going out on loan and never coming back. That he and Bellerin have gone on to become so good is the luck element – but that’s the same for any player.

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You have to question what's going on when a player like Flamini is getting game after game. And that's not a reference to this year. That's last year when we had Coquelin out on loan. Bellerin is understandable because Debuchy was playing well but got injured.

This season, it shouldn't take an injury to Flamini for Wenger to play Coquelin or Elneny.

you just to look at a spine of a team that includes Merts, Flamini & Giroud, its unbeleivabe. The fact that we have players like this is our team with the finances we have & the draw of living in London is way beyond explaination. When you think how many points we are better off from finally buying a top class keeper - why does he not think that a class striker would also add seriously to the points tally. I think someone posted earlier - we have missed 52 clear chances this year in the P.L. with City in 2nd place but 20 chances behind us - come on Wenger, if you think hard enough I honestly reckon you could work it out.

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Originally Posted by Dein-machine

Along with the age issue - the other interesting thing about Leicester is that they give the ball away more than any other team in the league & yet there top. Sort of puts a bit of a shitter on the possession theory. But, because they get the ball forward quicker & dont fuck about tippy tappying everywhere - they are surrendering the ball in less dangerous areas. It would be interesting to know the stat of how many goals are conceeded by teams overplaying in their own halves.
The other thing I like about Leicester which frustrates the hell out of me with us & as has done for a while was highlighted at the weekend. Leicester took the lead at City but still attacked as much as they had done at 0-0. They went 3-0 up because of this. With City always likely to score it shows the importance of not sitting back & defending leads. Look at Utd, as soon as they took the lead yesterday, they defended deeper & sat back. Chelsea had 90% of the ball after Utd scored!! & look what happened. Exactly the same as what the wonder of Wenger did for us against Liverpool. Exactly what we have done all season & did again at the weekend. Sit back & shut up shop. Bournemouth created enough chances 2nd half to get back level - ALL because we had dropped off, defended deeper & let them have more of the ball in our half. We need to attack Leicester on Sunday like we did against Utd - no questions, just get at them & let them worry about defending agaisnt players like Ozil & Sanchez. If we score 1st we get straight down the other end in search of the second & then the 3rd etc etc - thats what builds team confidence & wins titles.

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Totally agree with this, especially the bit about the game on Sunday. We need to be fired up & angry on Sunday like we were against United.

Need big performances from everyone, I don't just want to win on Sunday, I want us to put doubts into the minds of those Leicester players, they are everyone's 2nd team, we need to put a stop to that and firmly remind them that they won't be walking their way to the title and that we'll be breathing down their necks.

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Originally Posted by selassie

Totally agree with this, especially the bit about the game on Sunday. We need to be fired up & angry on Sunday like we were against United.

Need big performances from everyone, I don't just want to win on Sunday, I want us to put doubts into the minds of those Leicester players, they are everyone's 2nd team, we need to put a stop to that and firmly remind them that they won't be walking their way to the title and that we'll be breathing down their necks.

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What has to be remembered about the Utd game alongside our energetic start was that their team was set-up perfectly for us to exploit. LVG's talk beforehand was arrogantly about they had better attacking options and he set his team up accordingly. As much as the onus is on one team to be better than their opponents, the other side of the coin rarely discussed is how the opposition allow that to happen. Or vice versa of course. The ebb and flow of a football game is an intangible thing, something that even players can't put into context. There are so many factors in play at any given moment, with so many individuals emotions on the football pitch, all it takes is one to have a positive or negative impact on his team mates for a certain period or even the rest of the game. I can't remember where I heard his but I recall hearing that athletes first reflex is instinctual, rather than anything thought through, which can throw the best laid plans straight out the window. Which means of course getting inside your players head before a match is of the upmost importance.