Always a pleasure to listen to Matt Elliott and his sarcastic jokes as it gave the best laugh of the evening, with the host, Dan Bates, talking up Gerry Taggart, comparing him with Callum Doyle, both being left footed, Matt Elliott knows how to keep his old buddy down and replied, “Callum Doyle is far better looking”.
Tony Cottee and Iwan Roberts were other familier faces in the panel as the four discussed different topics and brought forward most of the positives and negatives we had earlier pointed out in our #LEICOV match report.
Summing it all up you could say that they are all a bit sceptical to the new Leicester approach and pin pointed the dilemma of having Pereira as a midfielder and driving him into that area too often, instead of playing him as a regular full back going forward to be overlapping and supporting the three forwards up front, more or less left on their own, as they had struggles to find options out on the flank.
We couldn’t agree more on this subject, but still to keep a midfield tight and composed and to keep a defensive balance you cannot play this way in modern football with Harry Winks alone as a holding midfield anchor. This is the main purpose and it will of course give the project a weakness, missing Pereira’s runs and overlapps on the flank.
There were of course lot of praise to Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall as his goals obvously became a positive topic, and everyone hopes KDH will take the “job on” left with massive “gaps” to fill after Youri Tielemans, Harvey Barnes and James Maddison. Those three players added up a lot of goals and assists, and a tall order for KDH to get that job, but in all he has started brightly, both scoring with a header in pre-season, following up with another yesterday and his wonderful and fantastic finish that leaded to the 2-1 win.
Iwan Roberts had his own “magic act” when he pulled Hulk out of the hat, talking about free kicks from long distance, as Hulk’s cracker is absolutely one to watch. Matt Elliott and Tony Cottee also had their favorites talked up, as the 1978 and 1982 World Cup goals from Arie Haan (78) and Roberto Falcao (82) comes to mind, as well as getting reminders of special long shots from Johnny Metgod, Glyn Hodges and Liam Brady.
Bates, Roberts and Cottee all had Leicester as their favourites to go up, placing them as number one. Matt Elliott had Leicester in 6th, so we just have to hope he is very wrong about his opinion and believe the three others will get everything correctly.
The riddle cut in four clips was one easy as Kelechi Iheanacho fired in the penalty goal that won Leicester the Community Shield two years ago today.
Again fantastic reminder on those fantastic days that melted into something very different, as things can change fast, hopefully it will turn again.
A run of questions regarding teams in the Women World Cup did see Tony Cottee and Iwan Roberts being the two men last standing, as Dan Bates and Matt Elliott fell at earlier hurdles. Strangely and a bit sad to see them all miss out on Norway, having Erling Haaland and Martin Odegaard as the two massive stars of the Premier League men’s game, but also a long list of players in the WSL, some playing at clubs such as Chelsea, Man Utd, and Arsenal. One is the teams captain Maren Mjelde (33), playing for Chelsea. She passed 165 caps in the tournament. They could call up Emile Heskey, as he has he probably knows where New Zealand World Cup particepent CJ Bott came from when joining Leicester. She joined from Norwegian club Valerenga. Room for improvement, for all four.
Just seeing the faces of our old heroes and listening to them having good talks, laughs and grand memories that you can relate to is just wonderful. This gives us all the picture of what football is all about, togetherness.
One fun fact, not mentioned on the show, Coventry manager Mark Robins made his Leicester debut vs. Man City in 1995, scoring the only goals of the game as Leicester won 1-0, alongside him up front, Iwan Roberts.
A pleasure, watching, listening and getting updates from a unique group of people, well represented by host Dan Bates.
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