Dames

To be fair he did that when Sturrigde was the best striker in the league behind Suarez and you can only say this with the benefit of hindsight. If Sturridge kept up that level of form and didnt get injured then it would have been a blinder of a decision.

I agree with you and I think i'm playing a bit of devils advocate in this instance. I think he should be thrown straight in as his confidence is going to be high and he's been in good form this season. Lets hope the lad develops into the top class replacement we've been crying out for.

Believe me I hope i'm wrong. I think Barnes is good enough and has been good enough for a while now - he should have been in our team since the start of this season at the very least.

Very similar actually he was performing to a very similar level albiet in a worse team in Barnsley. His statistics for both seasons are similar, arguably you can say he scored more goals this season because he's playing in a better team. I have extremely high hopes for the lad but if Puel didn't fancy him at the start of the season whats changed? Only thing for me is Diabate going on loan and needing cover. I hope i'm wrong on all counts in this instance.

It happened last season and Puel was in charge so there is a bit of a precedent to go on. I'm hoping the lad comes back and steps up but there is every chance he's been brought back as cover after Diabate has gone on loan. The good news in that is at least he's ahead of Diabate in the order of things now hopefully.

Puel clearly rates him and he scored against Newport so that gives Puel ammo to keep giving him chances.

Slightly concerned that this has only happened because Diabate has left the club leaving us short of cover out wide. I'm slightly pessimistic and think the club have told Claude that nobody will be coming in this window and he has to make do with what he has/clear deadwood. Hence Barnes will be coming back and will probably only feature sporadically throughout the rest of the campaign as he will be back up to Ghezzal. Hopefully i'm wrong and the lad kicks on but if its another half season of sitting around it will hamper his development and appetite to remain at Leicester.

Tidy player but has never looked up to the pace of the prem. Getting £9 million for him is as good as we are ever going to get. If we can get £15 million for Silva we might be able to actually buy a decent CM that can move the ball forwards.

Agree with this. He doesn't deserve the name calling. The bloke is just one of these players thats too lightweight and too inconsistent. When he's on form he looks just above average with a few nice touches here and there otherwise he's one of these players that when he's not on form he goes missing and looks awful, probably because he's too lightweight to impose himself on a Premier league game. At least with Albrighton if he's having a bad game you'll know he's there as he'll be throwing himself about, Ghezzal - not so much. As mentioned in another post which I agree with - he's a panic buy because the manager knew he would be available and there might be some chance he could come good. However we appear to have made too many of these signings hence why Ghezzal gets the stick he gets.

He’s rolling the dice each time hoping Ghezzal comes good so he doesn’t look bad for recommending him as a signing.

With the engine he has i’d be tempted to convert him into a CM. He’s very similar to James Milner and I think he would adapt very well. Would help solve a few problems we have as well.

Great game which means Puel will drop him for the next game. Should be starting ahead of Mendy based on that performance.

You’ve said what i’m trying to say better than I have myself. We should be going all out agaist teams like Fulham because if we do theres a high chance of 3 points. Fielding a weakened side increases the risk of dropping points especially if it doesnt pay of and we lose on Saturday. I hope i’m wrong and we beat Spurs but if we don’t it will make this result and the decisions around it look even worse. If we do beat Spurs however i’ll hold my hands up and say I was wrong.

I'm not saying throw the games away but if you're looking to get points on board it makes more sense to accumulate them against the teams you know you can beat. We didn't do that against Fulham last night and theres been a few other games this season where we've not kicked on when we should have. If you have to rest players, rest them for the games you stand less of a chance in so you have an even better chance in the games you have a good chance in. Players coming in from the fringe will feel better and have more to prove coming in against teams like Tottenham rather than knowing they are a temporary measure against a team like Fulham. How are you supposed to motivate players that way? Would you be motivated coming into a game against a team at the bottom of the league knowing that when its time to play the team thats 4th/5th you wont be starting? Or would you be more motivated playing against the team thats 4th/5th showing what you can do? One of those choices seems like a dead end where as the other choice seems like it has more opportunity.

I'm 'moaning' about the fact that its not settled. If there is an injury then leave Vardy out - let him recover and give someone else a chance to come in and get a run of games to build some form. Instead we are pulling in Vardy for a game when he's half fit then having to leave him out. There is no consistency. You're blindly sticking to one point (injuries) and not acknowledging anything else and then inferring name calling. You overlooked the fact I said the 3 behind the striker are not injured but are constantly rotated thats what i'm mostly 'moaning' about.

The bigger teams have quality players in every position so swapping Bernardo Silva for Mahrez at Man City isn't going to be the same as swapping Maddison for Ghezzal or Gray for Diabate. The smaller teams actually go full strength for teams in and around them and rotate against the bigger teams because they have common sense and are not arrogant. We are not a big enough club to be fielding a weakened side against Fulham its pure arrogance.

Did you forget that we won the league with barely any rotation? The same players busting a gut over 90 minutes week in week out even in busy periods? These are professional atheletes they should be able to perform every 3 days for a short period of time. That arguement is null and void i'm afraid.

Sorry but common sense dictates that if you have a run of games coming up especially with a few tricky fixtures in there you go full strength for the winnable games and then maybe rest players for the not so winnable ones. Also there is motivation factor as well - the players drafted in last night know they are in purely because its deemed as inferior opposition and probably know they will be out when we play the good team. That doesn't really motivate you does it? Only playing against 'crap' teams. I think the opposite would have had a better effect - play the 'cup squad' against a 'bigger' team and give them a bigger platform to show what they can do. In the end going with a 'weakend' team for a winnable fixture has sort of backfired. A point is better than none but really we should have got all 3.

If i'm Puel and sticking stubbornly to 4-2-3-1 i'd stick with Nacho and give him a run of games to build his confidence. But its not just the Striker position thats constantly changing (Even if it is due to injury) the 3 behind are rarely ever the same 2 games in a row wether thats due to injury or not. Personally with Vardy out i'd go 2 up top but thats a whole other debate.

So you're saying that we can't play our best players ever because of risk to injury? Besides that their 'replacements' could just as easily get injured and they'd be drafted back in playing and 'at risk'.

He wasn't forced to take out Gray and Ricardo last night but he did. I've mentioned before but if you look back through his lineups especially in regards to our attack its constantly changing. You see either an out of form Diabate or Ghezzal appearing in one game and not the next and the players that performed well in the previous game are dropped to the bench. One minute Ricardo is a winger and next he's a right back. Another Maddison is central and the next he's on the left. There is no consistency and thats why we are really struggling to score from open play at the minute. Yes there have been injuries but a lot of the changes really are unforced.

Last night for example he took out Vardy, Gray and Ricardo. Okay Vardy was injured but the other two weren't? And its not uncommon if trawl back through the starting lineups regularly to see players like Ghezzal and Diabate constantly coming in for one game and then disappearing for a few weeks again - our attack is extremely unsettled and lacking in confidence and the consistent changes are not helping. They are no good for anybody because these players don't know if they are coming or going and it adds unneeded pressure to them to perform and it doesnt give them a chance to build any form because they don't know when they'll be back in the team again.. Another example is one minute Ricardo is a right back the next he's an attacking right winger. How is the team able to build any consistency? You can tell the decisions in the attacking sense are majority Puels choice because the players he's dropped are on the bench and come on and play fine.

I think the position in the league really skews things. As someone has mentioned outside the top 6 most teams have been inconsistent and there was a big opportunity for us to capitalise on that and build some momentum and put a good run together. My main criticisms are the same as yours, the strange changes from game to game, the lack of quality up front, the fact is every CM we have is a CDM type player, very unbalanced squad that doesn't fit the formation he's trying to play. If there was just a little consistency to his decisions we really could have built some momentum but at the minute the team changes game to game and it shows, we've looked disjointed for many games now. The league position papers over the cracks a little I don't think anybody can come away and say they've really enjoyed the football we've played this season. He's stubborn in the way he has to constantly tinkers with the lineups but not the formation. We don't have the players for this 4-2-3-1 formation at the moment but he's trying to shoehorn everybody in instead of picking a settled team.

I know this drum has been banged a few times but as an interim solution 3-5-2 as a formation would solve that problem at least until January.

I can see your point and the problem is these facts are pretty much unknown to us. The official twitter account tweeted Vardy to say ‘more again tonight’. There is also no other news on injuries so from my perspective those players are fit to play right? If it was communicated that they were injured I wouldnt be saying that.