Leicester City Previews: ‘Nothing but the Huth’ – Can Puel’s men put a stop to Guardiola and co?

Manchester City vs Leicester City

10/02/18

Kick off: 5:30pm

Preview:

Riyad Mahrez, where are you when we need you? Who remembers our title-winning season, where Riyad Mahrez stole the show in our 3-1 victory at the Etihad? I certainly do. However, Mr Mahrez isn’t currently playing ball with Leicester and Claude Puel has confirmed that he won’t be travelling with the squad for this Saturday’s match.

Leicester’s striking options for this match are quite bare to say the least, with Okazaki ruled out through injury, with another three of our strikers on loan at various clubs. I suppose another way of looking at this game is that if Vardy doesn’t get on the scoresheet, we as Leicester fans will have to hope that the likes of Demarai Gray, Marc Albrighton and co. turn up and produce the goods.

Man City as we all know are romping the league this season, making it look so incredibly easy. I’ve not come across a team this good since Leicester City’s 2008-2009 season, where Matty Fryatt was partnering Paul Dickov, with legendary striker Barry Hayles sitting on the bench. You all thought I’d say the Arsenal invincibles team…that’s not the way it works on ‘Nothing but the Huth’.

In all seriousness though, Pep Guardiola has seriously changed the whole dynamic of his side and some of the football they’ve played at times has been frighteningly good. Speed, skill, intricate passing, you name it, it’s all been there to witness. So all told, I’m not feeling overly positive about picking up any points come Saturday evening, but you never know in football.

Stats:

In the Premier League, Leicester have only lost two of their last five against City, winning two and drawing the one. Leicester’s victories came back to back, winning 3-1 away followed by winning 4-2 in the first game between the sides the season after.

On the flip side of that stat, broadening it out slightly, Man City in all competitions have won seven of eleven against the Foxes since 2011, winning their last three. The last game between the sides was in the League Cup, a game I happened to be at, where Man City won on penalties (1-1 AET).

I mean, Manchester City’s form this season is remarkably good. They’ve only lost one match all season, which was a 4-3 defeat away at Liverpool almost a month ago. They’ve won 22 out of 26 games, and sit pretty at the top of the league by 13 points, ahead of bitter rivals Manchester United.

Man City are also one of the top teams in the league to have won the most points in the final ten minutes of matches. This would make sense considering how high a tempo they will week in week out, with opposing teams tiring out by that point.

Leicester haven’t won in two games and if they’re not careful, they could quite easily make that no wins in three.

Prediction:

The Sky Sports cameras will be there this weekend, so this would be the perfect time to upset the odds and bring back some points back down the motorway to the East Midlands.

City’s squad looks set to be relatively unchanged, so Sergio Aguero looks set to lead the line, with Sterling and Sane either side of him and De Bruyne/Silva looking to make things happen in the final third.

Leicester will need to start strong, it’s that simple. Keep it simple, don’t give silly fouls away in positions of danger and try and silence the crowd. The back five for the Foxes will need to be at their very best to stop the home side from scoring; they’ve scored over 100 goals already this season…

I think that Man City will be too strong unfortunately and will extend their lead at the top of the Premier League table. I do however think that we will score, potentially from a set-piece with most of Man City’s team being relatively small compared to our side.

We can always hope though can’t we, Leicester fans?

Score Prediction:

Manchester City 3-1 Leicester City