Match Preview: Leicester City v Brighton
The players of Leicester City couldn’t wait one more game to down tools and ensure Claude Puel but the bullet, the selfish scoundrels.
By effectively allowing Crystal Palace of all bloody teams to win 4-1 at the King Power Stadium at the weekend, they sealed their former managers fate to leave them without a boss ahead of Brighton’s visit to the East Midlands.
This is, frankly, a disaster. With Puel in charge, the Foxes were in an even worse run of form than the Albion have been, which made this a reasonable target for some rare away points. But now, the hosts will be the beneficiaries of the new manager bounce that occurs anytime a club sack their boss and will go from performing like Bexhill United Reserves to Barcelona in the space of three days as a result.
It’s really not what we need. Still, at least we’ve got the bonus of Leicester Races to go to in the afternoon before what now looks to be an inevitable defeat in the evening.
Who are Leicester City?
The Foxes used to be a byword for nearly-having-success. They are the most successful second tier team of all time having lifted that title a record seven times and have also appeared in the most FA Cup finals without ever actually managing to lift the cup, with four days out at Wembley between 1949 and 1969 ending in defeat. That all changed though in the 2015-16 campaign when they put years of mediocrity behind them to produce arguably the greatest sporting story ever. Having only escaped relegation out of the Premier League by the skin of their teeth the previous season, Leicester appointed Claudio Ranieiri as manager, a bloke who had last been seen leading Greece to defeat against the might of the Faroe Islands. As a result, they were every bookmakers favourite to go down but they only went and won the league title at odds of 5000-1.
What are they like now?
That miraculous success has also come as something of a curse for the Foxes – how can a side who will probably never win the title again top winning the title? The answer is they can’t, which leaves every subsequent manager in a bit of a quandary as to how live up to the expectations and standards set by that championship winning campaign. As a result, they’ve rattled through Ranieiri, Craig Shakespeare who lasted what felt like only 12 nights in the hot seat and Puel. Puel in particular had a difficult job as he tried to rebuild the side, with many of the Foxex championship winning squad having moved on or being past the peak of their powers. As a result, Leicester are at something of a crossroads where they are too good to go down but not good enough to crack a European spot. Where do they go from here? That’s not particularly clear in a season that has also been clouded by the unimaginable tragedy of chairman Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha losing his life in a helicopter crash outside the stadium back in October.
Which players should we be worried about?
That rather depends what caretaker boss Mike Stowell does. If Chris Hughton continues to persist with 4-3-3, then the Albion could find themselves in a world of issues down the flanks. One of the most notable problems with the Seagulls’ new formation is how exposed it leaves the full backs. Leicester’s squad contains the likes of Demari Gray, James Maddison and Ben Chilwell who are all extremely dangerous from wide positions which doesn’t bode well given our recent troubles.
What’s the Albion’s record against Leicester City like?
Brighton’s head-to-head record with Leicester is actually pretty even with the Albion having won 13 games to the Foxes’ 14 and six draws thrown in. The fixture has tended to be good for a red card in recent times as well. Maddison was sent off inside of 30 minutes in the 1-1 draw at the Amex back in November, following in the footsteps of Onyinye Ndidi, Matt Sparrow, Jermaine Beckford, Neil Danns, Marcos Painter, Dean Hammond and Stephen Hughes who have all contributed to a total of eight dismissals in the past 14 meetings.
What’s the best WeAreBrighton.com memory of Leicester City away?
The Foxes were already well on their way to the League One title in January 2009, but Micky Adams struggling Albion side still managed to pick up an impressive point at what was then known as the Walkers Stadium thanks to a 0-0 draw. What made the Tuesday night trip worthwhile was the fantastic sight of seeing Brighton having to borrow Leicester’s away kit as a result of the completely predictable colour clash issue that was always going to arise from playing a team who wore blue in a season when our home kit was blue and white stripes, our away kit was blue and yellow stripes and our third kit was all blue. This was made even better when Adams used his post match interview to credit the players for the pride they’d shown in the shirt. They were wearing Leicester away shirts, Micky.
What’s the worst WeAreBrighton.com memory of Leicester City away?
The game in which Painter got sent off was the Albion’s first defeat of the 2011-12 season. Not only did Craig Mackail-Smith manage to produce an astonishing miss from around three yards, but we then also got involved in a shouting match with an horrifically large female Foxes fan called Phoebe outside of a pub in the city centre after the game. Turned out she thought she was some sort of celebrity and started a thread about herself on North Stand Chat afterwards. Weird.
Who’s played for both sides?
With Adams and Peter Taylor both adhering to a strict transfer policy of only signing players who had played for them at their previous clubs, there have been a significant number of individuals to have represented both the Albion and Leicester this century. They include Junior Lewis, Simon Royce, Paul Brooker and Trevor Benjamin whilst in more recent times, both Leonardo Ulloa and Matthew Upson left the Amex in the summer of 2014 for the Foxes.
Other than football, what is Leicester famous for?
It was the final resting place of Richard III who was rather unceremoniously buried under an NCP car park, a fate we can sympathise with having once spent a night sleeping rough in a multistory car park outside of Basel Station when England played Switzerland in 2010. Richard probably had it easier actually as he presumably wasn’t working up by a couple of Swiss police officers pointing machine guns at him at 4am in the morning. The last of the Plantagenet kings isn’t the only famous resident either – Leicester is home to both Walkers crisps and Adrian Mole, the critically acclaimed television chef from Offally Good!
Where’s the betting value for Leicester City v Brighton?
Scoring goals away from home hasn’t been as much of a problem for the Albion this season as it was last and coupled with a Leicester side who have developed a liking for going a goal behind at home, that makes both teams to score yes at 21/20 look decent. We’ve already mentioned the ridiculous number of red cards that the fixture has inexplicably thrown up in recent years and if you reckon that will continue, then over 3.5 cards at 6/5 or a red card at 5/1 are worth a look. Night of Sin also looks a good bet in the 2.00.
Prediction?
As we said at the start, Leicester will no doubt go from looking like a pub side to playing like Barcelona after the sacking of Puel. A 2-1 win for the Foxes.
