With the World Cup fading into the history books, last week felt like the point we all locked back in on the day job.
This madcap encounter was pitched perfectly to ease us back in. Just enough of the summer break to let you down lightly. Drinks breaks in both halves, the defensive solidity of a third-place playoff, and Leicester losing possession because Luke Thomas took too long over a throw-in.
Alongside it was enough positivity to prevent us from firing a P45 straight to your CEO’s digital avatar. A squad of new faces, plenty of young prospects, good football. Goals.
Abdul Fatawu’s departure last Tuesday took the total number of exits so far this summer to 14, so this feels, finally, like something new. The surgeon’s knife has been lopping bits off this squad all summer. This was my first opportunity to see what remains.
Of course, while the names are changing, this isn’t yet a completely new Leicester City. Loyal subjects had to cough up £5 for the privilege of tuning into this game. So I present five takeaways, one for each pound from the TFW piggy bank it took to bring you this report.
1. You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone
How freeing to watch a team that can run. Perhaps it is the vigorous fitness regime Russell Martin has put his new charges on, perhaps it is simply removing Jordan Ayew from the equation. Either way, Leicester’s pressing and energy stood out from the off, as part of a much more cohesive, energetic performance without possession than we’ve become used to.
Most of Leicester’s chances came from winning the ball and springing forward with numbers. The forward line in particular put pressure on the ball regularly and often. Sammy Braybrooke, operating in the old Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall role as part of a front two when Malaga had possession, and Louis Page created all sorts of problems with their closing down. They also combined well, Page’s ability to hold the ball in tight spaces and Braybrooke’s intelligent movement were a real danger in the first half.
Twice they combined to played Will Alves through on the ‘keeper, while the constant harrying of the backline forced the corner from which Page scored the opener. Later on, after a host of substitutions, it was this intensity that forced the third goal when Lorenz Hutchinson stole the ball off a defender and squared for Tommy Neale to score.
One benefit of a young squad is that they have the legs to do this consistently. Another is that they can be trained to do it properly. Leicester’s press has often been terrible in recent years, here there was a coherence to it, so that when one player went for the ball, the team pushed up and blocked off passing lanes.
This worked less well for the period when Bobby De Cordova Reid and Conor Chaplin roamed free up front, especially as Alves was tiring in the near-40° heat by then. The intent, though, was good to see.
2. The winds of change
We have been waiting for the vaunted academy pipeline to produce starter-quality players for a long time. It may have taken consecutive relegations to get there, but the storyline to watch for the first couple of months is how many youth products force their way into the first-team reckoning.
The lack of depth in some positions means there are opportunities there for those who want to grasp them. Braybrooke, in particular, looks like he’s ready to do so. Along with Stephy Mavididi, he looked like Leicester’s best player in the first half. How Martin uses him and Chaplin will be interesting, as on the evidence of this they’re competing for one position.
Of the even newer breed, only just starting to break into the reckoning, Riley Carr showed real confidence on the ball when he came on. With better decision-making, he might have been involved in at least a couple of goals. And Hutchinson looked extremely lively in the few minutes he was granted.
Right now, there are hardly any options in midfield or across the front three. With plenty of games between now and the end of August, there is time for some of these names to lay claim to a spot in the squad.
On the flip side, Kirsten Otchere had some neat touches but failed to further his cause. Alves could have done so by taking one or both of his chances, but he wasn’t very involved in regular play and still seems a little like a player without a position.
3. The creative act
For all the good attacking work in transition, Leicester failed to create much at all when Malaga were able to get bodies behind the ball. At these moments, the lack of spark in the final third and no real presence in the box meant there were few realistic routes to a goal.
Teams in League One are unlikely to play out and come forward in the way Malaga did. In the moments were the structure broke down, Leicester were good. When the game settled into a pattern, Malaga tended to dominate.
The only consistent threat for Leicester in those situations came from getting the ball to Mavididi and him driving at his full back. Beyond that, there was little threat following on from spells of possession. With the squad as it is now, there’s no X-factor in attack and not much ability to mix things up.
Otchere showed flashes of awareness to come deep and help his defenders out by offering for the ball, but he still looks very raw. Realistically, two strikers might be a necessity to offer some different threats and create more options for players like Braybrooke and Mavididi, if he stays.
Likewise, another couple of options out wide are a must. Despite the fact that the young attacking midfielders played well on the whole, none of them look like genuine wingers. Everyone seems to want to play the same sort of role, breaking through the midfield or hanging around on the edge of the area. More variety is required before the shooting starts.
4. Where’s Fran Vieites when you need him?
When Alex McCarthy joined, the assumption was that he would play the Asmir Begovic role. Loiter around the bench, get called in occasionally to disgrace yourself, focus on your media career.
Is it possible instead that he’s signed to be first choice?
He has split time with Jakub Stolarczyk in the last few games, and his superior ability on the ball was noticeable here. Managers like Martin tend to prioritise playing out from the back above humdrum things like saving shots. They also tend to love ‘keepers they know.
Stolarczyk failed to nail down his spot last season and is no better than bang average with the ball at his feet. He is probably a better shot-stopper than McCarthy – he made some nice saves here and played the half in which Malaga presented far more of an attacking threat – but he concedes a lot of goals that he shouldn’t.
That (in)ability flared up again for Malaga’s first equalising goal, a low shot from a well-worked corner to the near post that felt a bit too easy. You would, ultimately, prefer the odd howler from a generally good goalkeeper than the constant leaking that has been a feature of the last year of Stolarcyzk’s career.
If another manager were to bin him off in favour of a decrepit old has-been, the writing is on the wall.
5. The Woyo conundrum
Coulibaly’s dramatic, unexpected impact off the bench was an example of the ways in which this is still a very odd group of players. The squad is lop-sided, with far too many resources in defence, and a lot of names who are presumably desperate to avoid playing in League One but haven’t done anything to encourage anyone above that level to sign them.
It’s hard to get a grip on folks like our man Woyo. He is, on the one hand, generally accepted to be bad. But he was bad within the context of having been signed in the Premier League as the only reinforcement to a team that failed to score a goal for four months, then hooked at half time two weeks later and never seen again.
He probably isn’t bad once the question becomes “can this man play football at League One level?” The same applies to Wout Faes, Caleb Okoli (probably?), Oliver Skipp, De Cordova Reid.
From a financial point of view, and in many cases from an emotional one too, we want them gone. There is a footballing argument to keep some of them. Skipp showed here how he is well-suited to a more intense, pressing game and he adds some experience to a midfield that doesn’t have much.
Leicester’s only senior full backs, apart from Coulibaly, are Luke Thomas and Olabade Aluko. Can we rely on Aluko and Jayden Joseph as the right backs for an entire 46-game season? Joseph by all accounts played well in midweek but was a little exposed here, with a lot of Malaga’s attacks targeting him or the space between him and Okoli.
Okoli himself is one of four centre backs who could all be sold. Harry Souttar looks to have one foot out the exit door, and excelled himself with a pretty lazy display off the bench. Faes and Ben Nelson could conceivably join him.
But is it realistic to need to sign a whole load more players in addition to the work that needs doing further forward? Or do you try to keep one or two of these names purely to reduce the amount of rebuilding work?
That is the question for our transfer supremo heading into what looks like a very busy August ahead.
