Leicester City Previews: ‘Nothing but the Huth’ – Can Claude Puel stop inform Burnley?

Leicester City vs Burnley
02/12/17
Kick off 3pm

Preview:

An interesting game lies ahead, which sees an inform Burnley side travel down to the East Midlands to face Claude Puel’s Leicester City, in the first set of fixtures this December.

Burnley are a prime example of a team who work for their manager. What they’re building at Turf Moor, from an outsider looking in, is quite remarkable given their budget, location and fan base.
But whatever Sean Dyche has said and done in recent years seems to be paying off.

‘The ginger Mourinho’ is the most-talked about man in the Premier League as of right now, being linked with every job left, right and centre- and rightly so!

So wouldn’t now be the perfect time to give them a thumping in front of the King Power faithful?!

A win would be the ideal result, but Burnley will make life hard.

Check out my predictions below.

Stats:

Burnley have won four out of their seven away league matches this season, last time out winning 2-1 away at Bournemouth.
They’ve accumulated 14 points away from home this season, which is double their tally from last season already.

The Lancashire side have won four of their last five games, their only loss being a 1-0 defeat at Arsenal in November.

The Clarets have the third best defensive record in the league (11), bettered only by both Manchester clubs, which i’ll admit, is quite outstanding even as a Leicester fan.

These teams have only faced each other four times in the Premier League, with the Foxes winning two and drawing one.
The only defeat for the Blues came at Turf Moor, where Sam Vokes scored to give Burnley a 1-0 victory back in January.

Overall however, it’s Sean Dyche’s boys who have the better head-to-head record. In 108 games, they’ve only lost 34, which equals out at just under a third. They’ve won 44 games and 30 have been drawn.

The first game between the sides came back in 1897, with Burnley beating Leicester Fosse by a goal to nil. It took Leicester until the fifth meeting in October 1901 to record a win against them – 2-1.

Since 2011, Leicester have only lost once in 11 against the Clarets, winning eight of those games.
The highest scoreline in that time was a 4-0 hammering at the King Power Stadium back in the SkyBet Championship- a game I happened to be at!

Leicester are favourite for me in this game being the home side, because Burnley haven’t actually won away to Leicester since a 1-0 win 10 years ago.
On that basis, I think Leicester may run out winners.

Prediction:

Burnley are a team high in confidence and high in the league standings as a result.

As they come into this game, they lie 6th, mixing it with the so-called ‘big boys’.
Most Burnley fans would probably agree with me when I say that no one expected Burnley to be up there, especially not coming up to Christmas, where the importance of fitness and squad depth really take a strangle hold.

Leicester come off the back of a solid 2-1 victory at home to Spurs, which will give the Foxes more confidence to try and pick apart one of the best defences in the league.

I mentioned how important Okazaki would be against Tottenham; for once I was right.

Again, against a team who’re hard to break down and like to get the ball down and play, Shinji could be key in forcing Burnley to quicken their game up.

Burnley will look to put balls into the boss and find former Leicester striker Chris Wood, if he starts.
He’s scored four goals this season and will look to add to his goal tally at the King Power Stadium.

I think we will win the game, but it will be a hard fought match which will probably lead to Burnley scoring.
I still remember that Robbie Brady free kick in stoppage time at the KP a couple of seasons ago, snatching a point from us…

All in all, in my opinion, Leicester will win and Jamie Vardy will continue his great form in front of goal.

Score Prediction:
Leicester City 2-1 Burnley