Leicester V Sheffield Utd Preview – By Simon Mack

Sheffield United vs Leicester City

Saturday 24^th August 2019 15:00

Bramall Lane

The foxes 2^nd away day on the bounce takes them north this time for an encounter against newly promoted Sheffield United.

Leicester’s travels last week took them to London, and a bright second half display against Chelsea saw them grab a point and spoil Manager Frank Lampard’s homecoming party.

Many foxes fans felt last weekend’s match up with the blues should have ended in victory for the travelling side, and had their finishing been a little sharper that could well have been the case.

The Blades return to the top flight has got off to a bright start to date with 4 points taken from a possible 6 including a 1-0 home victory last week against Crystal Palace, and their first Premier League victory for 12 years.

Midfielder John Fleck limped out of the match against Palace with a leg problem and is a doubt for this one, however Callum Robinson who was also subbed off with a thigh issue has been declared fit.

The game against the foxes could also mark the debut of Sheffield United’s new signing Ravel Morrison. The journeyman midfielder (now 26 years old) has been something of an enigma since bursting onto the scene at Manchester United. Having played in Sweden and Mexico recently the blades are the latest club to believe they can tame the former U21 England internationals temperament to allow him to deploy his obvious talent to their benefit, and this match up with city could well be the first indication of their chances of success.

For the foxes Ben Chilwell is still a doubt having been a late withdrawal with a hip problem last week. Leicester Manager Brendan Rodgers was quick to praise Austrian Christian Fuch’s superb display in the absence of Chilwell, and he is likely to continue in the left back spot if the England international isn’t available.

City boss Brendan Rodgers has been speaking a lot lately to the media about commencing the league campaign with a solid defensive base, and building the foundations for an assault to climb as high in the table as possible. Conversely there have been some mixed reactions from foxes fans to the exit from the club of Islam Slimani on loan to AS Monaco. Whilst some fans believe Slimani hasn’t cut the mustard at King Power Stadium for others this is a further weakening of Leicester’s attacking options and as such for city an injury to Jamie Vardy could be catastrophic to their season’s ambitions.

Most of the pundits and tipsters were impressed with the foxes quality in their draw with Chelsea last week and many are suggesting that city’s creative abilities will be too much for the newly promoted blades to handle.

If the foxes can recreate the level of performance from the away trip to Stamford Bridge last time out then the home side are going to struggle to live with the, and despite some murmurs of question around Leicester’s performances to date they are unbeaten and seem to be warming to this season’s challenge as each game passes.

Jamie Vardy is of course a Sheffield boy and a boyhood fan of Blades main rivals Sheffield Wednesday, and whilst his chances to score so far this term have been few and far between he would take huge delight in hitting the back of the net this weekend and spoiling the home sides unbeaten run.

Likely line ups:

Possible Blades (3-5-2): Henderson, Basham, Egan, O’Connell, Baldock, Lundstram, Freeman, Norwood, Stevens, Robinson, Sharp

Likely Foxes (4-1-4-1): Schmeichel, Ricardo, Soyuncu, Evans, Fuchs, Ndidi, Perez, Choudhury, Tielemans, Maddison, Vardy