How would you improve the team in January?

[Guest SO1]

2 hours ago, Bluearmyfox28 said:

I watched Ajax this weekend, I personally hope we have a scout watching them every week. That side is full of talent.

Always have time for the Eredivisie. Was a Feyenoord / Koeman fan when I first started watching football. Great matches and support. Always wondered why so many great players never made it to England and the money.

 

Ajax are the gold standard when it comes to clubs punching above their financial weight. Something that I hope we're aiming for but with the ability to spend when we need to. We play in a much tougher league so its harder for us. Never any downtime in the PL as Norwich showed.

Really hope this club has the fortitude, persistence and patience to make it happen. Years of work ahead.

Edited 23 December 2019 by SO1

[AKCJ]

Deulofeu is absolutely doggo.

 

If he was half as good as he thinks he is he'd have about 9 Balon d'Ors.

 

Bin. Wouldn't fit in here whatsoever.

[Gerard]

9 hours ago, Dan LCFC said:

Cannot believe people genuinely want us to drop 75mil+ on Zaha.

 

3 goals and 1 assist this season.

 

Imagine if we dropped £75m and he gave us that return. 

 

I actually like him as a player and remember going Palace away in our title winning year when we were linked with Bolassie as he was considered the main man at Palace at the time. Zaha was much more impressive and if we were going to go for a winger it should have been him but even though I think Zaha would improve us that ship has now sailed. We can't be spending huge money on a player at his peak with no resale value and won't make a huge difference.

 

I made the same point when people were clamoring for Sigurdsson as a 28yo for £45m. This is not our modus operandi to spend huge money on 27/28yo players who aren't of interest to the elite clubs. We need to be buying players in their early 20's with great potential preferably from the Championship, abroad or relegated PL clubs. It's pointless trying to buy the best player in other PL clubs as they'll just have your eyes out. 

 

 

Edited 23 December 2019 by Gerard

[Bryn]

Another centreback. 

Another winger. 

 

I'd concentrate on that to be honest. I think there's more to come from the likes of Justin, Choudhury, Gray and Iheanacho in the second half of the season, we need to use the squad if we're going to finish top 4. 

[Heymister2015]

Dries Meertens !!!!! £8.5m! Experienced and quality 

[Mark 'expert' Lawrenson]

8 hours ago, Bluearmyfox28 said:

I watched Ajax this weekend, I personally hope we have a scout watching them every week. That side is full of talent.

Most of the top teams in Europe will be watching them unfortunately, it’s no secret that they have some extremely talented players.

[Reginaldo]

Probably been said before but Benrahma does it for me

 

Edited 23 December 2019 by Reginaldo

[Finnegan]

34 minutes ago, Heymister2015 said:

Dries Meertens !!!!! £8.5m! Experienced and quality 

 

Dries Mertens is no longer a Leicester City type of transfer. 

 

The current main requirement for a Leicester signing is a player whose value will increase, so that after a period here we can sell them on and make a profit to buy another player. 

 

Mertens has been class but he's 32, he's going to be looking for a two or even three year contract somewhere. 

 

We've already got to nurse Vardy through his twilight years, Mertens is going to have an equally depreciating athleticism. 

 

He's exactly the sort of player United or Arsenal are going to buy on reputation alone, sign for three years on hundred and fifty odd thousand a week and never really play. 

[Nick]

14 minutes ago, Finnegan said:

 

Dries Mertens is no longer a Leicester City type of transfer. 

 

The current main requirement for a Leicester signing is a player whose value will increase, so that after a period here we can sell them on and make a profit to buy another player. 

 

Mertens has been class but he's 32, he's going to be looking for a two or even three year contract somewhere. 

 

We've already got to nurse Vardy through his twilight years, Mertens is going to have an equally depreciating athleticism. 

 

He's exactly the sort of player United or Arsenal are going to buy on reputation alone, sign for three years on hundred and fifty odd thousand a week and never really play. 

It’s interesting isn’t it. Consistent top four means instant impact really so we may now and again have to balance the blueprint against some proven players? 🤷‍♂️

[Pliskin]

I’d love us to actually go for a Ziyech type of player... however we all know we will be scrambling around with Hull to try and sign Bowen on deadline day. 

[Finnegan]

14 minutes ago, Swan Lesta said:

It’s interesting isn’t it. Consistent top four means instant impact really so we may now and again have to balance the blueprint against some proven players? 🤷‍♂️

 

I think you can sign instant impact and still get a player who will get better with time though. 

 

Ndidi, Ricardo, Maddison, Tielemans, when we sign "the Leicester Way" we always bring in players that go straight in to the first team. 

 

When we've tried to reinforce with "finished articles" we've often gotten it wrong, guys like Slimani and Silva were always going to be losses for us. 

 

I think the club learned from that process and probably doesn't want to repeat it. I think we were badly prepared for finishing in the CL places last time. It surprised even us, we hadn't done our homework and we panic bought because we were sort on unexplored ground. 

 

I think we'll be much more prepared this time if we finish top four. I imagine we'll have marked out targets with that in mind that still meet our current transfer philosophy. 

Edited 23 December 2019 by Finnegan

[Nick]

9 hours ago, Pliskin said:

I’d love us to actually go for a Ziyech type of player... however we all know we will be scrambling around with Hull to try and sign Bowen on deadline day. 

Yeah, I do feel a sadness about this. 

[Pliskin]

1 hour ago, Swan Lesta said:

Yeah, I do feel a sadness about this. 

I think Bowen is a good player but we need to take advantage of our current situation. What we’re desperate for is two fast wingers with a trick or two and can contribute with goals...... Bergwijn, Stengs, Ziyech to name a few. There are loads of quality young players out there that would suit us and not cost the Earth...... it’s time we started acting like a top club if we want to be one.

[North Leeds Fox]

One of Olmo, stengs, rashica, fraser, kulusevski, politano, osihmen, under, brahim diaz, malcom and bergwijn are all available for a reasonable fee you would think. We play a way of football that needs a good finisher even if they dont contribute lots of build up play (even though that would help for games like saturday) as we always create chances for our wingers. All of the above do know where the goal is and can play both sides of the forward. I would love a ziyech or bailey type but not sure we have the pulling power to get a player like that unless we consistently get CL. Its exciting that we would have a chance, however small, with most of the above. 

 

One of them and a cb would be a brilliant window for us. We have still been unreal but just feel we need to start planning for europe and 2 now and 2 or 3 in the summer would give us a squad to compete on multiple fronts.  

Edited 24 December 2019 by North Leeds Fox

[pazzerfox]

13 hours ago, Finnegan said:

 

Dries Mertens is no longer a Leicester City type of transfer. 

 

The current main requirement for a Leicester signing is a player whose value will increase, so that after a period here we can sell them on and make a profit to buy another player. 

 

Mertens has been class but he's 32, he's going to be looking for a two or even three year contract somewhere. 

 

We've already got to nurse Vardy through his twilight years, Mertens is going to have an equally depreciating athleticism. 

 

He's exactly the sort of player United or Arsenal are going to buy on reputation alone, sign for three years on hundred and fifty odd thousand a week and never really play. 

Not sure that's strictly true.  Every team needs experience, hence why we bought Cambiasso, Evans and Silva (admittedly Silva didn't work out).

[Guest Cujek]

13 hours ago, Reginaldo said:

Probably been said before but Benrahma does it for me

 

i would stay away from Algerians, their fans are just weirdos with no actual idea about football, i could not cope with them again.

[Guest Cujek]

13 hours ago, Finnegan said:

 

Dries Mertens is no longer a Leicester City type of transfer. 

 

The current main requirement for a Leicester signing is a player whose value will increase, so that after a period here we can sell them on and make a profit to buy another player. 

 

Mertens has been class but he's 32, he's going to be looking for a two or even three year contract somewhere. 

 

We've already got to nurse Vardy through his twilight years, Mertens is going to have an equally depreciating athleticism. 

 

He's exactly the sort of player United or Arsenal are going to buy on reputation alone, sign for three years on hundred and fifty odd thousand a week and never really play. 

Vardy is arguably the best he has ever been, with no real sign of slowing down.

 

all teams need a mix of experience and youth.

[Strokes]

On 21/12/2019 at 20:23, Pliskin said:

And Pérez is worth every penny.

 

On 21/12/2019 at 20:06, Pliskin said:

I’ll say it again, £80mill on Zaha...

[Finnegan]

43 minutes ago, pazzerfox said:

Not sure that's strictly true.  Every team needs experience, hence why we bought Cambiasso, Evans and Silva (admittedly Silva didn't work out).

 

I'll give you Evans, but we signed him for near literal peanuts at the same time as signing a couple of kids in the same position to transition in to the squad. 

 

Cambiasso, Wasyl, Nugent, Slimani, Silva, I'm not arguing we've not made plenty of signings in that ilk, players whose value is trending down not up, I'm saying that our transfer policy is quite clearly heading in the opposite direction now. 

 

I don't see us spending a great amount on stars on the way out. Evans was 30 and still had a fair few years left as a player not overly reliant on his pace. Mertens is characterised by his pace, is 32 already and is only heading one way. 

 

38 minutes ago, Cujek said:

Vardy is arguably the best he has ever been, with no real sign of slowing down.

 

all teams need a mix of experience and youth.

 

Vardy's doing great at the moment but if you don't think we're going to have to come to a point of managing him extremely carefully through the duration of his current contract then I'd say you're probably in a bit of denial. 

[Ric Flair]

12 minutes ago, Finnegan said:

 

I'll give you Evans, but we signed him for near literal peanuts at the same time as signing a couple of kids in the same position to transition in to the squad. 

 

Cambiasso, Wasyl, Nugent, Slimani, Silva, I'm not arguing we've not made plenty of signings in that ilk, players whose value is trending down not up, I'm saying that our transfer policy is quite clearly heading in the opposite direction now. 

 

I don't see us spending a great amount on stars on the way out. Evans was 30 and still had a fair few years left as a player not overly reliant on his pace. Mertens is characterised by his pace, is 32 already and is only heading one way. 

 

 

Vardy's doing great at the moment but if you don't think we're going to have to come to a point of managing him extremely carefully through the duration of his current contract then I'd say you're probably in a bit of denial. 

Vardy's a freak of nature, although it would be very sensible to do that it wouldnt surprise me if he's still playing 40 games a season when he's north of 35/36.

[Muzzy_Larsson]

1 hour ago, pazzerfox said:

Not sure that's strictly true.  Every team needs experience, hence why we bought Cambiasso, Evans and Silva (admittedly Silva didn't work out).

This is it, it's about balance.  I think the fortunate thing for Leicester in recent years is the core of the title winning team is still there, in squad terms at least, so there's not been much requirement to add to that experience, guys like Schmeichel. Fuchs, Vardy, Albrighton, etc all have bundles of experience then clever experienced additions like Evans have supplemented that.

 

There's nothing wrong with buying an off the shelf experienced player, needs must at certain times and by the time all the aforementioned start to decline it may be the case then to look more to experience than youth for a couple of windows.  If you then manage to hang on to some of what are now your promising young players then it becomes even easier as these guys transition to the senior members of the squad.

[Xen]

Zaha is massively overrated and I think a lot of fans would be dissappointed in him after only a handful of games. If he was <£30m then he may be worth it (similar to Perez) but at £70m its absolutely extortionate. No way we pay that kind of fee for a player like him - not when our transfer record is half that for Tielemans after we'd already seen him work wonders in our squad. 

 

Bowen is underwhelming. Cant see him improving our squad at all - he'd just be another average PL winger, and we already have that in abundance right now. He'll probably go a similar way to Knockaert and find himself at a lower-half PL side.

 

We need another CB to replace Morgan as first-sub, especially if Benkovic goes out on loan. Demiral would be great, but might be a tough ask to prise him away from Juve. On the wing we need someone who can come in and hit the ground running, and who is likely to be a marked improvement on our existing players (or at least, show some consistency). Ziyech is the obvious name but we might not have the draw to bring him here, especially if other big sides put their name in the ring. 

 

 

Buying from within the PL is a mugs game, especially in January. Can't think of anyone who we might want who'd also be a reasonable price. Avoid. Same goes for the Championship.

[Chrysalis]

On 19/12/2019 at 12:35, Gerard said:

 

Reminds me of when people were clamoring for Sigurdsson at £45m when he was 28 with a similar profile. 

 

I feel we need more 26+ players, too many young players leads to the team been too affected by nervousness and confidence.  Older players seem more resistant to that.  

[Gerard]

9 minutes ago, Chrysalis said:

 

I feel we need more 26+ players, too many young players leads to the team been too affected by nervousness and confidence.  Older players seem more resistant to that.  

 

I don't want to see us splashing out huge money for players in their late 20's who have already reached their level. The odd 30 something is fine but I like the model of buying a young player with potential to be better than what we could normally attract.

 

As a club I would prefer it that we are savvy enough to know we can't buy ready made players and compete with the elite clubs but if we buy well and nurture young talent we may have a chance. 

[coolhandfox]

1 hour ago, Finnegan said:

I don't see us spending a great amount on stars on the way out. Evans was 30 and still had a fair few years left as a player not overly reliant on his pace. Mertens is characterised by his pace, is 32 already and is only heading one way. 

Not disagreeing with you, but he has a wealth of experience, especially in the CL, he could be a useful signing. Rodgers isn't opposed to buying older players, Milner at Liverpool springs to mind. 

 

Evident for me in the Man U, Liverpool, Man City, performance is a lack of experience of how to cope with a big game environment, I think we still need a blend of youth and experience.