Jamie Vardy made a remarkably speedy recovery from a hip injury that kept him out of worldwide duty earlier in the week to return to start for Leicester against Newcastle on Saturday.
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Former Barcelona forward Bojan Krkic scored the only goal in the game between Stoke City and Southampton at St Mary’s to help the Potters grab all three points from the encounter.
“I would invite you to become manager for six months and to come up with that conclusion – I’m not sure you would!” the Arsenal boss joked when asked if it was easy to win the Premier League this season.
“We could make an important step to finish first in our group in the Champions League and we could climb to the top of the Premier League”.
Data courtesy of the EA SPORTS Player Performance Index, the Official Player Rating Index of the Barclays Premier League. Leicester could barely have a better chance than the midweek game on December 15th to inflict misery on the Blues, the day when Ranieri will face off against his former employers in Leicester colours for the first time. “Whether they be title contenders or not, we should focus on what they are doing and say they are doing amazingly well”, Mourinho said.
The 28 year old has been the subject of a Premier League fairy tale.
In the meantime, the Foxes – and the media – should be realistic. Ross Barkley hit two and created one against the Villains, guiding them to victory.
Their next opponents, Swansea, look the easiest team to take all three points off during their year-end run-in.
The Foxes have been an effective pressing unit this season, and by recovering the ball in advanced areas of the pitch, they counter attack with pace and trickery, which have been enough to put nearly half the league to submission this season. With the players I had around me, I’d be gutted if I failed to score even if we won. Thanks to our friends at Opta I can tell youthat in the Premier League erait’sa tie between Robert Pires as part of the Arsenal Invincibles side of 2003/04 and Chelsea’s Eden Hazard last season.
Under Nigel Pearson at the end of last season and Ranieri at the start of this, Leicester have proved that you don’t have to spend the most or have the biggest names to succeed. Ranieri himself was a bit of a punchline when he came into Leicester, both for his eccentric demeanour and his failure with Greece – who lost home and away to the Faroe Islands in the Euro 2016 qualifiers.
Chelsea’ Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink was the league’s top goal scorer for the 2000/01 campaign, while Leeds United and Ipswich Town qualified for the UEFA Cup. They have many star players that can change the game to their advantage.
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We suffered a 3-0 defeat and the season went down hill from their on in. They finished a respectable 13th, but a result which was disappointing after four consecutive top-10 finishes. They dominated the first weeks of the new season and were unbeaten in the first nine games.
