Leicester v Wolves Preview! – By Simon Mack

Leicester City vs Wolverhampton

Sunday 11^th August 2019 14:00

King Power Stadium

The Foxes get their 2019/20 Premier League campaign underway on Sunday afternoon as they welcome midlands rivals Wolverhampton Wanderers to King Power Stadium.

Leicester will be looking to improve on their 9^th place finish of last term, and with the comings and goings of the transfer window now over all eyes will be on Manager Brendan Rodgers new starting 11 and who will feature as the Northern Irishman’s first full season at the helm commences.

New attacking signing Ayonze Perez looks certain to make his competitive debut for his new club this weekend slotting in with foxes talisman Jamie Vardy as the attacking threat. City left it late to confirm the acquisition of Sampdoria attacking midfielder Dennis Praet, and with his pre-season also commencing later that the rest of the Leicester squad he is less likely to be afforded a debut.

With the best tackle stats in the league  Wilfred Ndidi played a vital role in defensive midfield last time around but he’s not featured in pre-season having only returned to the camp 3 weeks ago, and whilst Rodgers positive talk regarding the Nigerian international’s fitness has raised hopes of a start, the impressive Hamza Choudhury is more likely to take the berth in front of the back for in this opening encounter.

The summer of 2019 has been as much about retaining what the foxes had as making new additions to the ranks, and Harry Maguire’s departure to Manchester United has left a spot in the back 4 that the foxes failed to secure a new addition to fill as the last week of the window slammed shut in the foxes face with a bank account bustling with cash and asking prices for suitors highly inflated. Pre-season saw Turkish international Caglar Soyuncu take most of the game time in the absence of Maguire, and with the Croatian centre back Filip Benkovic still nursing and ankle injury from his summer U21 International campaign with his national side Turk seems the most likely candidate to take this spot even though club captain Wes Morgan is available ad could feature.

For Wolves they have already been in competitive action as their qualifiers for the Europa league have already taken them to some of the continent’s farer flung outposts. They are not long back from a trip to Armenia where they defeated Pyunik 4-0 on Thursday night, but they’ve kept something up their sleeve for the Premier League opener as they rested Jonny and Ruben Neves for the 6000+ mile round trip.

Wolves new forward Patrick Cutrone formerly of Milan may sit this one out as boss Espirito Santo gives him more time to settle in. Wanderers have been active in the summer market to an impressive degree, with Bruno Jordao and Pedro Neta touching down from Lazio and highly-rated central defender Jesus Vallejo signing on loan from Real Madrid.

There can be no doubt that Wolves superb 7^th place finish last season at the first time of asking was quite a feat, but both of these sides will be setting their stall out to challenge the establishment that occupy the top 6 births in the table to outdo them if they dare. Leicester’s new look squad has been tipped by quite a few of the games pundits to be the main threat to that monopoly, but even with Wolves foray into Europe potentially becoming a distraction they must also be contenders to challenge English football’s established achievers.

Foxes fans will be eagerly looking on to see if the loss of Maguire and the lack of a replacement leads to a weakening of their back line whilst at the same time be salivating at the prospect of Tielemans and Perez linking up with Vardy and co to bang on the door of the league’s best defences.

If there is going to be an assault on the glass ceiling of England’s elite the foxes have proved they are not afraid to stare them in the face before, and with Wolverhampton’s superb debut season giving them belief and confidence they’ll also believe they can go one place better and snag the esteem of deposing one of the big boys.

The majority of tipsters are predicting a narrow victory for city in this midlands tussle. Let’s hope they are right and a late Sunday lunch is crowned with a toast to 3 points and a winning start for Brendan Rodgers and his exciting new crop of talent.

Predicted line-ups

Leicester City: Schmeichel; Pereira, Soyuncu, Evans, Chilwell; Choudhury, Perez, Tielemans, Maddison, Albrighton, Vardy 

Wolves: Rui Patricio; Bennett, Coady, Boly; Doherty, Dendoncker, Neves, Moutinho, Jonny, Jimenez, Jota