The first time ive liked the whole squad

[Lambert09]

I was thinking to myself the other day, that this has to be the first time in my history that Ive actually liked every player in our squad. No matter how good we've been in the past, there has always been at least one player that I would dread coming on, but not this year. 

 

Even in the title season, there were a few. The thought of Inler or Dyer (after his strong start) coming on genuinely terrified me. There's always been at least a few negative players that we cant get off the books but this year the only issues have been shipped out, or loaned.  

 

This is the most balanced squad ive ever seen and we appear to have real depth and while many might disagree.... I actually still have some faith in Iheanacho. He's clearly a player who has ability just needs a confidence boost and this season he has done well in the cups. I think he might surprise a few people the next time we need him. Having no negative players around, really does help the squad togetherness and the standard of training. 

 

Anyone else have the same feeling? Or can argue of another time when weve had such a nice group of lads?  (Hoping Ive not accidentally started a bash Kel thread)

Edited 25 November 2019 by Lambert09

[Izzy]

19 minutes ago, Lambert09 said:

I was sitting here thinking to myself the other day, that this has to be the first time in my history that Ive actually liked every player in our squad.

Alright Charlie Nicolas 

[urban.spaceman]

Generic Iheanacho bashing comment.

[rachhere]

We are in such a better place this year in that we have players on the bench who can come on and make a genuine impact. I keep on seeing pundits making comments about how we don't have depth which is frustrating. We have obvious vulnerabilities (but how many teams don't - even Man City are massively struggling in terms of the depth in defense at the moment), but I can't help thinking that they have failed to notice that we now have players like Praet at our disposal. 

[AKCJ]

Wait, what? Really?

[urban fox]

1 minute ago, rachhere said:

We are in such a better place this year in that we have players on the bench who can come on and make a genuine impact. I keep on seeing pundits making comments about how we don't have depth which is frustrating. We have obvious vulnerabilities (but how many teams don't - even Man City are massively struggling in terms of the depth in defense at the moment), but I can't help thinking that they have failed to notice that we now have players like Praet at our disposal. 

Yeah I would love to know exactly where this supposed lack of depth is too. Just because some players are not getting a lot of pitch time at the minute that does not make them substandard, it just means that those in possession are playing great stuff at the minute. We have the likes of Praet, Albrighton, Gray and Choudhary as "first reserves" for the midfield, Justin, (ok so unproven at PL level but a promising prospect) Fuchs, and Morgan as defensive cover and Nacho up front. We also have versatility in that even if we lost both Vardy and Nacho, Perez, or even Gray at a pinch could do a job with one of the other wingers slotting in. All of our wide men can play on either side also.

A premier league squad is restricted to 25 players, not including under 21s and so any team would struggle if they lost more than one or two in the same position so I think we are actually in a better place than many with what we have at our disposal. Most of our "reserves" would walk into many premier league sides.

[rachhere]

4 minutes ago, urban fox said:

Yeah I would love to know exactly where this supposed lack of depth is too. Just because some players are not getting a lot of pitch time at the minute that does not make them substandard, it just means that those in possession are playing great stuff at the minute. We have the likes of Praet, Albrighton, Gray and Choudhary as "first reserves" for the midfield, Justin, (ok so unproven at PL level but a promising prospect) Fuchs, and Morgan as defensive cover and Nacho up front. We also have versatility in that even if we lost both Vardy and Nacho, Perez, or even Gray at a pinch could do a job with one of the other wingers slotting in. All of our wide men can play on either side also.

A premier league squad is restricted to 25 players, not including under 21s and so any team would struggle if they lost more than one or two in the same position so I think we are actually in a better place than many with what we have at our disposal. Most of our "reserves" would walk into many premier league sides.

Exactly this. I honestly think it's more a case of lazy journalism and they don't realise the quality of the players we do have because they haven't done their research. Especially considering we aren't competing in Europe at the moment (yet!). 

[Guest]

Guess it depends what you mean by like/dislike. If you mean a genuine, fundamental dislike of a player then I don't think I've ever actually felt that towards any of our players, with the disclaimer that Dennis Wise was marginally before my time. If you mean it's the first time where you'd rate every player in the squad as being good enough for us at this moment in time, I might agree, though reading some of the player and match threads there's plenty who'd disagree and would happily see the back of Morgan, Perez, Chilwell and so on.

 

I get what you mean though in that we're fortunate to have a squad that is both very talented and (seemingly) devoid of complete tools. They all seem to really enjoy working with one another and hopefully that helps us keep them together.

[Brooksy]

Championship winning season under Pearson?

[Manwell Pablo]

44 minutes ago, urban fox said:

Yeah I would love to know exactly where this supposed lack of depth is too. Just because some players are not getting a lot of pitch time at the minute that does not make them substandard, it just means that those in possession are playing great stuff at the minute. We have the likes of Praet, Albrighton, Gray and Choudhary as "first reserves" for the midfield, Justin, (ok so unproven at PL level but a promising prospect) Fuchs, and Morgan as defensive cover and Nacho up front. We also have versatility in that even if we lost both Vardy and Nacho, Perez, or even Gray at a pinch could do a job with one of the other wingers slotting in. All of our wide men can play on either side also.

A premier league squad is restricted to 25 players, not including under 21s and so any team would struggle if they lost more than one or two in the same position so I think we are actually in a better place than many with what we have at our disposal. Most of our "reserves" would walk into many premier league sides.

 

Yes and no, and it's not  a case of can the lads coming in can walk into other Prem sides, it's are they good enough to contribute in a side chasing a top four finish

 

Praet I think could come in with a minimal impact to the first team, and Fuchs has shown he is still capable of filling in for Chillwell and we are reasonably well covered on the flanks.

 

Wes is nowhere near the same level as the two starting anymore, If we lost last seasons player of the season and replaced him with a young right back with no Premier League experience we'd be rolling the dice completely, Ndidi is a much better option to Hamza, and that's nothing against him that's just how good Ndidi is, I actually personally think he's growing into one of the best at what he does in the world and dread something happening to him, and obviously an injury to Vardy would be catastrophic. So we have area's of concern.

 

That said who doesn't  if Liverpool lost Virgil and Mane I'm sure they'd find life much harder and City have looked significantly weaker without Laporte and it'll be interesting to see how they deal without Augero. 

Edited 25 November 2019 by Manwell Pablo

[urban fox]

14 minutes ago, Manwell Pablo said:

 

Yes and no, and it's not  a case of can the lads coming in can walk into other Prem sides, it's are they good enough to contribute in a side chasing a top four finish

 

Praet I think could come in with a minimal impact to the first team, and Fuchs has shown he is still capable of filling in for Chillwell and we are reasonably well covered on the flanks.

 

Wes is nowhere near the same level as the two starting anymore, If we lost last seasons player of the season and replaced him with a young right back with no Premier League experience we'd be rolling the dice completely, Ndidi is a much better option to Hamza, and that's nothing against him that's just how good Ndidi is, I actually personally think he's growing into one of the best at what he does in the world and dread something happening to him, and obviously an injury to Vardy would be catastrophic. So we have area's of concern.

 

That said who doesn't  if Liverpool lost Virgil and Mane I'm sure they'd find life much harder and City have looked significantly weaker without Laporte and it'll be interesting to see how they deal without Augero. 

2015/16 MCFC lost Kompany for a large chunk of the season and at times looked very disorganised at the back. That same season they were missing Augero for a significant stretch early in the season and barely managed to finish fourth. Every team, no matter how good their squad is will struggle, comparatively, if they suddenly lose 2 or more key players for any length of time.

[Manwell Pablo]

6 minutes ago, urban fox said:

2015/16 MCFC lost Kompany for a large chunk of the season and at times looked very disorganised at the back. That same season they were missing Augero for a significant stretch early in the season and barely managed to finish fourth. Every team, no matter how good their squad is will struggle, comparatively, if they suddenly lose 2 or more key players for any length of time.

 

Well again, yes or no, as while that is true it sort of proves the opposite as well as City have had to deal with Kompany getting injured for pretty much his entire career and their strength and depth at the time was the difference between them managing at certain points in time and not managing at others.

 

I'd personally prefer a bit more depth in certain area's, but it's not really easy to get top class players to come and agree to sit on Leicester City's bench most weeks so it's difficult. I think the lack of European football point is very true as well, we perhaps don't really need as much as some people perceive this year.

[Oxfordfox83]

41 minutes ago, Manwell Pablo said:

If we lost last seasons player of the season and replaced him with a young right back with no Premier League experience we'd be rolling the dice completely, Ndidi is a much better option to Hamza, and that's nothing against him that's just how good Ndidi is, I actually personally think he's growing into one of the best at what he does in the world and dread something happening to him, and obviously an injury to Vardy would be catastrophic. So we have areas of concern.

I think the thing with Ndidi, Ricardo and Vardy is not that our cover is especially weak (though it’s fair to observe that Justin is unproven), but that our first choices are on another plane. It’s difficult to think of any player in the league performing at their level (maybe Kante, TAA, Fabinho, Mane?).

 

I think you’d go a long way to find a holding midfielder of Hamza’s quality on someone else’s bench...

[Manwell Pablo]

15 minutes ago, Oxfordfox83 said:

I think the thing with Ndidi, Ricardo and Vardy is not that our cover is especially weak (though it’s fair to observe that Justin is unproven), but that our first choices are on another plane. It’s difficult to think of any player in the league performing at their level (maybe Kante, TAA, Fabinho, Mane?).

 

I think you’d go a long way to find a holding midfielder of Hamza’s quality on someone else’s bench...

 

Perhaps in that case.

 

Justin (at this moment in time) and the total lack of any real alternative to Vardy is more concerning.

[Lambert09]

3 hours ago, Brooksy said:

Championship winning season under Pearson?

I personally wasnt a fan of Dean Hammond on the pitch and I wasnt a fan of Wood off of it. But other than that I liked the rest of the squad really. 

 

*Edit- Got to add in that we probably would have lost every game that Logan had to play. 

Edited 25 November 2019 by Lambert09

[Nicolo Barella]

17 hours ago, rachhere said:

We are in such a better place this year in that we have players on the bench who can come on and make a genuine impact. I keep on seeing pundits making comments about how we don't have depth which is frustrating. We have obvious vulnerabilities (but how many teams don't - even Man City are massively struggling in terms of the depth in defense at the moment), but I can't help thinking that they have failed to notice that we now have players like Praet at our disposal. 

I mean, we have more depth than we're used to, but it's still a lot less than other clubs at the highest echelon. We have Praet, Fuchs and maybe Gray and Hamza who can come in and be at roughly the same level of footballing capability as the rest of the team. That's not that much (enough for a club with no European football and expecting to finish upper midtable, but for CL football, that's not the case).

 

Forget Man City and Liverpool, who have obvious depth, contrast us with Spurs. If you say the 11 they picked last game is their first 11 (it's not, but to make things simpler). You have players like Ndombele, Lo Celso, Vertonghen, Rose, Lamela, Sissoko, and Eriksen (although he's downed tools) all basically at the same or a similar level of quality to the first team. Not to mention Lloris who is injured.

 

So it's excusable imo when pundits say we don't have depth, even though they probably don't realise how good Praet is, because these are the teams they're comparing us to.