Are We Better than Our 15/16 Season?

[Captain...]

3 hours ago, deanolegend1989 said:

It’s not even in the same universe. Kante was on another planet to any player in any season. He single handedly won us the league, without him we don’t win.

After he came on as a sub when 0-2 down to Villa in the comeback 3-2 win, he missed 1 game(a 2-2 home draw to West Brom). It was quite clear, even in that game, that he was something special and we wernt the same without him.

Mahrez was good but not even close to the importance of Ngolo.

He didn't single handedly win us the league. No one player won us the league it was the perfect balance of the team and staying largely injury free. Kante was very very good, but in a formation and system that played to his strengths, part of that was giving Mahrez the freedom to play a freer role with no defensive responsibility.

 

You look at some of Kante's performances for Chelsea when asked to do a different job he's nowhere near as effective. Ndidi is comparable to Kante in style and performance and influence, look how lost we looked when he was injured earlier this season. If you swapped like for like 15/16 Kante for 19/20 Ndidi you wouldn't notice a huge drop off. 

[Chrysalis]

8 minutes ago, Oxfordfox83 said:

The old Foxestalk would hear us talking about better technical players and more possession meaning we’re a better team and piss themselves that we’ve all turned into Spurs...

Maybe, there is recency bias.

Edited 2 July 2020 by Chrysalis

[Oxfordfox83]

Combined XI

 

Schmeichel 20

 

Ricardo 20

Morgan 16

Huth=Evans, but Huth scored more 16

Fuchs 16

 

Mahrez 16

Kante 16

Maddison 20

Albrighton 16 (edges Barnes though next season I think he’ll have it)

 

Okazaki 16

Vardy 16

——

Ranieri 16

 

[the fox]

Whilst I think this squad is very talented, they just don't have the killer instinct of the champions.

 

Whilst the champions didn't look that impressive on paper, on the pitch it was a different story. When you see a smiling Kante, Vardy with his blue cast, and Riyad wearing gloves when it's not even that cold, you know it's over for the other team. We knew it and the opposing fans knew it too.

 

And IMO, the champs would easily beat the current squad.

 

 

 

[deanolegend1989]

10 hours ago, Captain... said:

He didn't single handedly win us the league. No one player won us the league it was the perfect balance of the team and staying largely injury free. Kante was very very good, but in a formation and system that played to his strengths, part of that was giving Mahrez the freedom to play a freer role with no defensive responsibility.

 

You look at some of Kante's performances for Chelsea when asked to do a different job he's nowhere near as effective. Ndidi is comparable to Kante in style and performance and influence, look how lost we looked when he was injured earlier this season. If you swapped like for like 15/16 Kante for 19/20 Ndidi you wouldn't notice a huge drop off. 

Have to disagree. If we had 19/20 Ndidi in that team, we wouldn’t of been close to winning the league.

And without Ndidi this season we have been poor, but no less poor than when he’s been back recently and we’re still poor.

Hes a good player but he’s not a patch on Kante of that year.

[shailen]

What we had in 15/16 was a well drilled team where the team performed greater than the sum of its parts. Everyone knew their roles and we had one player in Mahrez who was essentially given a free role to go wherever he wanted and create. A back four that was well disciplined and weren't too adventurous, two central midfielders who would take turns in defending and attacking, okazaki running till his legs fell off and Vardy being the clinical striker we needed. It was perfectly orchestrated and the magic of Mahrez gave us the real x factor. 

 

We now have better individual players overall, but we can't work them into a system to get the same results as 15/16. The possession game is far more complex then what we did in 15/16 and sometimes we struggle to break teams down as a result. Man City are the only team that do this effectively as their wingers move all other the place consistently and their ability to play one touch football between the lines makes it work. 

[Crazy Kop Corner]

The first I remember Kante was we played him on the left wing at Bury in the league cup. It was absolutely obvious the lad was world class even that night and he would have walked into any team that year and improved it. At times his performances were absolutely breathtaking. He covered both sides of midfield and both full backs. He was truly incredible.

[deanolegend1989]

1 hour ago, shailen said:

What we had in 15/16 was a well drilled team where the team performed greater than the sum of its parts. Everyone knew their roles and we had one player in Mahrez who was essentially given a free role to go wherever he wanted and create. A back four that was well disciplined and weren't too adventurous, two central midfielders who would take turns in defending and attacking, okazaki running till his legs fell off and Vardy being the clinical striker we needed. It was perfectly orchestrated and the magic of Mahrez gave us the real x factor. 

 

We now have better individual players overall, but we can't work them into a system to get the same results as 15/16. The possession game is far more complex then what we did in 15/16 and sometimes we struggle to break teams down as a result. Man City are the only team that do this effectively as their wingers move all other the place consistently and their ability to play one touch football between the lines makes it work. 

We don’t really have better individuals though. That’s a myth because of it being seen as fashionable to play passing football.

Were not good at being technical and we’re average in ability in reality.

The 15/16 would beat this team every single day of the week and twice on Sunday.

[deanolegend1989]

The only player to get on the combined team would be Ricardo, with the CBs being so close I can’t choose. All 4 of our CBs were class and nothing to separate.

Midfield - only Tielemans is more talented but Drinkwaters prime is above YT prime as of so far.

Mahrez miles better than Maddison

Kante miles better than Ndidi

and Albrighton 15/16 miles above Barnes as of so far.

JV goes from world class to very good but not as raw and young. 15/16 JV would never stop moving and was impossible for any team to deal with.

overall the 15/16 team would control the game and eventually open us up 2-0.

No chance our current team scores with us playing a deep line with 2 monster CBs and Kante buzzing around our current midfield , we’d just about manage to play passing football in front of kasper 😂.

 

[shailen]

43 minutes ago, deanolegend1989 said:

We don’t really have better individuals though. That’s a myth because of it being seen as fashionable to play passing football.

Were not good at being technical and we’re average in ability in reality.

The 15/16 would beat this team every single day of the week and twice on Sunday.

Disagree. When we've been on it this season, (Southampton away, Villa home and away, Newcastle home), its probably the best football I've seen Leicester play. Some of the performances this season have been sensational.

 

What the 15/16 team had was consistency. We never dominated games but we hung in and got results. Does that make that team better, I don't know. But in terms of pure footballing ability, this team when they're on it would challenge any team in the world. 

[NeilLCFC]

We don’t even look as good as the great escape season right now.

[Dan LCFC]

On 01/07/2020 at 10:53, pmcla26 said:

Not entirely true tho, is it. (Knowing how to win comment, not the sole goal of football - I agree with that)
 

Games like Norwich and Newcastle at home in the 15/16 season, we didn’t play well in those games but obviously it’s gonna be better watching your side grind out a game than lose a close game of similar ilk.
 

Did Villa play well against us in the second leg of the League cup semi final? No, but they won. 
 

Obviously you’ll prefer winning...

I don't think those two were any worse than pretty much anything served up since January.

[Sol thewall Bamba]

23 hours ago, Oxfordfox83 said:

Combined XI

 

Schmeichel 20

 

Ricardo 20

Morgan 16

Huth=Evans, but Huth scored more 16

Fuchs 16

 

Mahrez 16

Kante 16

Maddison 20

Albrighton 16 (edges Barnes though next season I think he’ll have it)

 

Okazaki 16

Vardy 16

——

Ranieri 16

 

Maddison? Drinkwater had as many combined goal contributions in 15/16 as Maddison has this term and didn't go missing for half the season!

[AKCJ]

On 02/07/2020 at 10:18, Oxfordfox83 said:

Combined XI

 

Schmeichel 20

 

Ricardo 20

Morgan 16

Huth=Evans, but Huth scored more 16

Fuchs 16

 

Mahrez 16

Kante 16

Maddison 20

Albrighton 16 (edges Barnes though next season I think he’ll have it)

 

Okazaki 16

Vardy 16

——

Ranieri 16

 

Kasper (20)

Ricardo (20) - Evans (20) - Huth (16) - Fuchs (16)

Mahrez (16) - Ndidi (20) - Kante (16) - Barnes (20)

Maddison (20)

Vardy (16)

 

6 to 2020, 5 to 2016. I would have had Vardy as 2020 had he continued his form.

Edited 3 July 2020 by AKCJ

[Chrysalis]

On 02/07/2020 at 10:08, Captain... said:

He didn't single handedly win us the league. No one player won us the league it was the perfect balance of the team and staying largely injury free. Kante was very very good, but in a formation and system that played to his strengths, part of that was giving Mahrez the freedom to play a freer role with no defensive responsibility.

 

You look at some of Kante's performances for Chelsea when asked to do a different job he's nowhere near as effective. Ndidi is comparable to Kante in style and performance and influence, look how lost we looked when he was injured earlier this season. If you swapped like for like 15/16 Kante for 19/20 Ndidi you wouldn't notice a huge drop off. 

Each player plays best in a certain way and I agree Chelsea havent got the best out of Kante.

 

But if we had Ndidi instead of Kante our balance would have been wrong.

 

Kante wasnt just good at intercepting, but when he won the ball, he often drove forward with it, and setup a lot of attacks.  That was crucial for our counter attack play.

Edited 3 July 2020 by Chrysalis

[Captain...]

5 hours ago, Chrysalis said:

Each player plays best in a certain way and I agree Chelsea havent got the best out of Kante.

 

But if we had Ndidi instead of Kante our balance would have been wrong.

 

Kante wasnt just good at intercepting, but when he won the ball, he often drove forward with it, and setup a lot of attacks.  That was crucial for our counter attack play.

That's a fair point, but I don't think that's something Ndidi can't do but it feels like he's been told to keep position win the ball and lay it off.

 

Maybe that's what Rodgers needs to do let Ndidi loose. 

[deanolegend1989]

18 hours ago, shailen said:

Disagree. When we've been on it this season, (Southampton away, Villa home and away, Newcastle home), its probably the best football I've seen Leicester play. Some of the performances this season have been sensational.

 

What the 15/16 team had was consistency. We never dominated games but we hung in and got results. Does that make that team better, I don't know. But in terms of pure footballing ability, this team when they're on it would challenge any team in the world. 

Villa at home? 😂. You obviously watched a different game to me if you think that’s ‘some of the best football you’ve ever seen Leicester play’

We were awful first half until Reina gave us a start. 2nd half decent but nothing spectacular, Villa were poor and we just got a lucky pen and hit a poor team when they were down.

 

The others you mention, 2 of them were down to 10 men for a long time and 1 had about 3 injury’s and were down to 10 men also because of lack of substitutes! I think you have just proved it yourself by mentioning those games that we have a flaw in this team. 

15/16 we dominated loads of games! Just because you don’t win 3-0+ don’t mean we didn’t dominate.

I used to nearly every game feel comfortable. We might not have passed it around as much in the midfield but we were a much better team. 

I’m constantly scared we will concede this season, I mean since the restart. Watford has like 3 1 on 1s, Brighton dominated us first half and had a pen, and Everton battered us until they knew the game was won, were a shambles. 15/16 we were nearly always safe it was unbelievable, watch the games back. Every game after we changed the full backs we never really looked liked losing, the games we ‘knicked’ were so convincing it’s irreverent if we scored 3 or 4 because we were unbreakable.

Only games I remember feeling vulnerable were West Ham and West Brom at home, both because of Kante not playing and going down to 10 men respectively.

 

The 15/16 team was head and shoulders above this team. It’s not even close. Better in every department.

Defensively, 15/16 was miles better and that’s the huge difference, we were much more solid and compact.

Attacking we were much better because,

We had 28/29 year old Vardy and top peak Mahrez compared to 32/33 Vardy and Maddison.

Its chalk and cheese. despite Vardy still being a great striker and clinical, he needs more help now as he’s older , as 2015/16 he was absolutely mental good. He scored goals out of nothing. Mahrez was a freak too, scored 16 goals from midfield including some outrageous goals. Comparing Maddison to him is laughable(his shooting is awful from open play).

 

If 19/20 played in 15/16 we finish about 7-10th.

If 15/16 played this season we finished 2nd.

 

This team are spineless and can’t adapt to any other way. The 15/16 team was feared by any team.

In fact if our 2 teams played each other 19/20 would get absolutely slammed. Our 15/16 team was absolutely the perfect nightmare for our current team, we’d sit a low block with Huth and Morgan and Kante would buzz around and we’d struggle like vs all these teams doing it to us recently, the only difference is unlike the average teams we are struggling against now, we’d counter with insane box to box Kante, Mahrez and Vardy. We had a perfect mix of a tight defence but world class ability to hurt too.

[ronnup]

This aged horribly 

[deanolegend1989]

9 hours ago, pmcla26 said:

I didn’t say they were.

 

In fact, in my post that you quoted I said of course any LCFC fan would prefer those games because we won.
 

The point I was making was that that 15/16 side could grind out games that they weren’t playing well in and get points on the board, whereas I can’t think of many times this season where we’ve played poorly and still won. 
 

That side didn’t have to play well to win because tactically and mentally they were always switched on, but to get success from our intricate passing game and high press requires a lot of technical skill and concentration, so if we aren’t on it, it often doesn’t come off or produce points. 

Because playing ‘well’ doesn’t mean passing the ball side to side or slamming a few teams who have 10 men.

Playing well means defending, it means making it hard to beat us and it means having the pace and skill to frighten the opposition.

We had it all that it didn’t mean we needed to waste time passing side to side so opposition gets back into shape.

 

I think the difference is because this current team is quite weak and poor at defending at times, teams know they can keep a low block and knick something, then it’s hard to get back into it for us.

In 15/16, our defence and then Kante In front, was impossible to break unless they really attack us, and that In turn gave us all the time to damage teams with our brutal 2 Worldies.
 

Teams couldn’t sit as deep because we were better in the defending both in the midfield and as a unit so unless teams go for us then 0-0 is the best they can hope for. So they knew they needed to commit more forward which worked into our hands. We were just better all round, football us more than just tika taka, you can only win that way if you have world class technical players and great movement off the ball, too many teams try and do it now with the wrong tools.

 

We’d go unbeaten all season in 15/16 if teams sat a low block every game like they do now. Only team that beat us in a pinch for punch game was Arsenal, which wouldn’t of happened if we had our full backs not over committing.

[deanolegend1989]

2 hours ago, Captain... said:

That's a fair point, but I don't think that's something Ndidi can't do but it feels like he's been told to keep position win the ball and lay it off.

 

Maybe that's what Rodgers needs to do let Ndidi loose. 

Course Ndidi can’t do that. Did you watch 15/16? Kante box to boxed it so often, I’ve never once seen Ndidi have the fast feet and ball control to carry balls.

Ndidi is a great intercepted and tackler but he hasn’t got the engine or ball control or pace to be anywhere near Kante. That’s no offence to Ndidi, he’s a very good player but Kante was a freak of nature.

[deanolegend1989]

19 hours ago, shailen said:

Disagree. When we've been on it this season, (Southampton away, Villa home and away, Newcastle home), its probably the best football I've seen Leicester play. Some of the performances this season have been sensational.

 

What the 15/16 team had was consistency. We never dominated games but we hung in and got results. Does that make that team better, I don't know. But in terms of pure footballing ability, this team when they're on it would challenge any team in the world. 

Swansea H and A

Sunderland H

Newcastle A

Everton H

Stoke H

Liverpool H

oh and remember, was it Man City A?

We could quite easily of won 5-0 that day if it wernt for some lazy finishing and then Aguero scoring an offside goal vs us.

 

this season we’ve not dominated any game except if the team has 10 men.

 

 

[Blue-fox]

Everything about 15/16 team is better than this team. More pace, strength, defending as a team, attacking as a team, individual class and team work ethic. 

[Steve_Guppy_Left_Foot]

Player for player is one thing but the 15/16 team would dismantle this team which is all that really counts, our current team is the perfect side for our title winning team to play. 

[deanolegend1989]

16 minutes ago, pmcla26 said:

My opinion is simply that the individuals in the 19/20 side are more talented footballers but the 15/16 side are a better team together. 
 

Every title winning team has average games as well, we don’t need to pretend games like Norwich or Newcastle at home were outstanding defensive displays in 2016, but we had the tenacity to grind the games out. I can appreciate the mental strength of that side but also appreciate that we’ve got players who are better technically now than 4 years ago. Hence why we now play a more progressive style. 
 

That 15/16 team played how it did because it suited our best players to play that way. We were effective, but that’s the whole point of the fairy tale - the players we had weren’t supposed to be able to do what they did. It was amazing what we done but it’s only natural that the quality of the playing staff has progressed. 

No I disagree that the players were more talented.

Let’s take the defence out because talent in defenders in reading the game and positioning , which 15/16 was far better.

So we go to middle:

YT is the only one I’d argue is more talented but it remains to be seen, Drinkwater in his prime was more talented than people give him credit for.

Mahrez and Kante are far more talented than Maddison and Ndidi.

Albrighton and Barnes is debatable, I’d prefer albrighton, Barnes flatters to decieve to often.

 

We are not ‘more talented’ now, we just have a different style . The reason we play a different style is because we arnt very good at defending, we’re not very good at moving off the ball, we’re not very agile and mobile and these are more important things than being able to pass 5 yards.

YT Ndidi and Maddison can’t really run and dribble with the ball, Kante , Mahrez and Vardy could we’re soo so dynamic.

The reality is, both teams had decent/good players but only 5 players in both teams I’d class as truly world class and only 1 is in the 19/20 team:

Ricardo 19/20

Kasper(Both)

Vardy 15/16

Mahrez 15/16

Kante 15/16

 

Both teams were good teams but good teams need world class players to make them elite, 19/20 don’t have that, 15/16 did.

[Dr The Singh]

Player for player NO

 

But Pearson found a formula and with the key individuals,.it was consistent and awesome.

 

Brendan has over complicated the way we play, if components are not right, the whole things fail.