Team V Wolves

Its back! Football is back. No injurys or suspension to start the season unless someone has picked something up in training. Wilfred Ndidi isnt expected to start the season due to only returning this week. So here is what I would go with

Schmeichel

Ricardo
Soyuncu
Evans
Chilwell

Tielemans
Choudhury

Perez
Maddison
Albrighton

Vardy

Subs- Ward, Justin, Morgan, Mendy, Praet, Barnes, Iheanacho

 

Shows we have abit of depth this year. Even not mention who we would call deadwood there is still no Fuchs, Benkovic, Amartey, Ndidi or Gray in that squad

Plus Slimani, James, King, Silva, Ghezzal, Diabate,

 

Schmeichel
Ricardo Evans Soyuncu Chilwell
Tielemans Choudhury
Perez Maddison Albrighton/Barnes
Vardy
​

I'd assume we'd start with Albrighton if pre-season is anything to go by.

Will be interesting to see what happens if Chillwell gets injured (not that i want him to tho!), will Justin or Fuchs cover him?

Think having Soyuncu last year will help him settle in a bit faster, as hes already had a few wobbles trying to impress, time to give him a decent run of games.

 

Agree entirely, though I would be tempted to try and fit Gray onto there... maybe instead of Ihenacho on the basis Perez can play up top or in place of Morgan on the basis Choudhury could maybe do a stop-gap in there

 

No need for stop gaps now. We have depth in every position

Theres a real challenge for Gray and Barnes now to try and force Rodgers to play with wingers. Barnes can play as a 10 so he has an easy route into the team

Gray is an out and out winger imo so has the hardest job. He needs to make an impact whenever he comes off the bench and when he gets his chance he needs to take it. Make or break season for Gray

 

Only stop gap I mean in terms of the bench. I’d be tempted to only have 1 defended on there in order to get both Barnes and Gray on the bench

 

Rodgers has said Ndidi is in the squad bur Benkovic isnt as he is still working on his fitness

 

With N’didi, I suppose pre season is irrelevant as he is playing with the same midfield so really comes down to fitness. Choudhury was played well though.

 

Schmeichel
Ricardo Evans Soyuncu Chilwell
Maddison Choudhury Tielemans
Albrighton Vardy Perez

Ward Morgan Justin/Fuchs Praet Ndidi Iheanacho Barnes

Barnes to come on (Id start him but I think the above is more likely) and other two subs unless situations dictate for me would be to get Ndidi on for some minutes and build up and a home debut for Praet as he’ll have had a few days since signing. Maybe Iheanacho to get some minutes instead of one of those

 

Disappointing performance and result. Soyuncu was a big positive. Strange choices by Rodgers to go with Ndidi and Choudhury and experimenting with a diamond? Barnes looked bright when he came on. Stick to 433 with Maddison and Tielemans either side of Ndidi (or Choudhury) and Perez and Barnes/Albrighton either side of Vardy

 

Soyuncu’s best game for us. Bossed and bullied Jiminez. Something I feared would happen the other way around

My only fear with him remains he is too aggressive in trying to win the ball back all the time and will get turned and spun alot. If he calms down and becomes more composed he will make some defender

 

Easy man of the match decision with Soyuncu outstanding. Chilwell didn't commit to the tackle on more than one occasion, hope he hasn't been reading too much press. Everyone can see we were a bit ponderous and the build up too slow but on another day will find ways through. Thankful for VAR at this stage and that Jota had a mare even to the point of falling over his own feet in our area.

 

I’m on holiday so missed it but seemed a strangely negative line up?

 

Choudhury was dropping far too deep at times.

You can tell Chilwell doesn't have enough confidence yet in Soyuncu yet, as there was plenty of space for him to run into down the wing, but opted to stay back for the easy sideways pass.

Vardy needs to get this whole centre forward thing Puel taught him out of his head, if we are playing Perez and Vardy higher up, he needs to start moving into spaces on the wing and letting Perez move in for any cross he can provide.
There were giant gaps on the wings (especially on the left wing with Maddison moving central and Chilwell not confident enough to push up) that could have really used Vardy getting into, think it happened once that lead to a corner, but it needed to happen more often.
No idea why he was staying so central and not pulling CBs apart, was far too easy for them to block all routes through the middle when we had very little width.

Will go down as a cagey opener though i guess, with 2 teams that are expected to finish in roughly the same area of the league.

 

Weekend possesion stats

Leicester: 70.16
Tottenham: 70.09
Arsenal: 61.86
Man City: 57.08

We also attempted and completed the most passes

 

These are the sort of stats that Man U and the like were touting when we won the league with about 33% possession.

Another stat to consider,

Shots on target
Leicester 1 - 2 Wolves

 

How many of those passes started in Wolves half but then ended in ours or began and ended in our half. Im sure the back four passing stats look very impressive.

 

Means nothing with 1 shot on target. Negative tactics from Rodgers. Must do better

 

Wasnt negative. Wolves defending well and we lacking the killer touch. Not the managers fault. We had alot of attacking options on the pitch just none of them could make something happen on the day

 

I'd loved to have heard your review on the game if Puel was still in charge, especially playing 2 defensive midfielders at home!