Of course last season can be classed as a fluke. This season has shown that.

Maybe you're right, but a 38 game fluke. Really?

FFS
1,4,6,7,10
I think its a cumulative effect of those 5 reasons. Our defence has been performing ok in recent games but we are looking void of ides and quality as we attack.
Lets hope CR can grasp this over the next 2 weeks and address it asap.

I think fluke is the wrong word, we deserved to win the PL last season as we were the most consistent team over 38 games, but as I and many others have alluded to. It was the perfect storm of all of the big clubs having a 38 game downturn in form allowing smaller clubs like us and Spurs to capitalise and try to wrestle the league from the grasp of the big boys. Luckily we weren't found wanting at the end and we kept going until the very end, we were the little club that could.....

Kanta took a lot of pressure away from Drinky.
Drinky could then play balls through to the front from
a more forward position.
He now has to defend deeper which leaves longer balls to the front which often get intercepted.
With Slamarni in the team and no Singy the problem is magnified.
We should not be playing anyone outside their comfort zone. But we do all too often under the pretence it's necessary due to CL.
The fans have lost enthusiasm due to above and it
all contributes to poor results.

I think most of them apply to some degree, but "struggling to find the right tactics" is a huge one for me. Other teams have finally figured out how to cope with the way we played last season (e.g. with regards to stopping Mahrez cutting inside) and we have yet to work out a new way to win that takes account of this. For example, if there are three players on Mahrez, there must be gaps elsewhere that we could exploit. UTF

I think a little bit of most of them, but 2 is the closest. We weren't prepared well in pre-season, mostly due to this champions cup and - more to the point - inability to prepare well around it, then the players have expected to hit the ground running and haven't. The spirit of the great escape and the title run has all but vanished as they expect they'll be able to get results without putting in the necessary basic effort and running through walls in order to get it.

I thought that was painfully clear yesterday - second to every second ball, not making challenges, not working for each other, and that was happening all over the park. It's a hangover from last season and the desire's diminished. There's only so much Ranieri can do about that because it's up to individuals to say to themselves and each other: "Our achievements don't stop at winning the league; I want more."

Dunge

I am not sure that I can agree with you about that......
I have not seen or heard anybody say within the club ( rumours that escape out etc) that the players are complacent or have switched off and think that their career is complete after last seasons fairy story.

From what I know CR is not the type of manager to put up with anybody with that attitude, I am more in the " tinkering around with the starting 11 EVERY game has created an unsettled starting 11 and this has led to a lack of understanding and teamwork on the pitch" which were 2 of our major plus points last season.

I say it more from observation of performances on the pitch than any leaked rumour. Several players look to me like they don't have the hunger that they did last season.

Agreed Dung and its only natural after the last two season DDDD the manager has to move things on and change the team standing still is going backwards. New players have to be intergrated theses Are Walshy's picks and he did well for us we need to give it time.

Nev
I completely agree that standing still is not an option and integrating the new players is a fine balancing act.
What I am saying is that at the moment the integrating is happening st a detriment to our PL performances and points tally.
Now you know as well as I do that CR and his team will be working overtime behind the scenes to fix this......
But all I am saying from my point of view we have tried this and it hasn't worked YET. But we need some points PDQ to stop us looking over our shoulder. If we had another 6 points in the bag then I would happily say lets persevere with the new players and take the odd WBA performance along the route. Unfortunately we have seen this type of performance more than we would like to this season.
So the priority is PL points and at the moment my opinion is playing Shinji behind Vardy with Mahrez and Albrighton or Gray on the other side is our best chance of getting these points.
But like most things it's open to debate of course

UTF

DDDD - One of the big problems at the moment is that Vardy's doing nothing regardless of who's with him on the pitch. It's not just service, he's not making the runs that he was last year to get on the end of anything. Slimani's team play isn't great so far but at least he knows where the net is and is getting into dangerous positions.

But then if you don't play Vardy you haven't got that raw pace in the side, unless you play Musa or Schlupp on the wing and they've both contributed very little so far.

I agree Dunge but to counter that Vardy hasn't had the consistent run in the side so far this season. We all know how he plays when he is confident and on top of his game, and my opinion is that reverting to Shinji behind Vardy will reignite Vardy and therefore help the team.
Now we can all throw around ifs and buts but at the end of the day something has to change and a settled side is a starting point for that.
But whichever way CR goes ( and I hope it's not Schlupp that we are pinning our hopes on) we need to stop the under par performances that we have had in the PL this season.

This imo will get sorted soon the CL group stage will be settled and a more settled team will be playing week in week out. We are concerned about being 2 points of the relegation zone but if we had won we would of been in the top half of the league.

What did we really expect this season once we lost you know who Marhez according to my son looked a lot better and are we really going to lose faith in our record breaking scorer because he's lost form he's still creape enough to get in the England squad i hate to say it but keep the faith.

I'm concerned by form Nev, nothing else. Right now we look very short of it.

I'm totally with DDDD - we need to go back to Albrighton, Vardy and Okazaki until any of the new boys have a semblance of a good game.

I don't agree that Vardy has been poor. He's been working hard but the space and passing just hasn't been there to find him. Our final ball has been terrible all season.

I actually put most blame on the Manager and don't see any of the play as a lack of desire or complacency from the players as such, that's down to team selection , how the team is set up and tactics employed from the Management.

I agree TB in that our last two games I've felt have been tactically wrong.

We've lacked cohesion in both games. Ranieri either needs to do more work on these formations/tactics on the training pitch or stick to what we know and do well.

Comment deleted by Site Moderator

comment by HuthTheGreatest (U21175)
posted 25 minutes ago
Four things that leap out to me:

1. Refereeing. The new refereeing tactics have ruined Morgan and Huth's game, and adversely affected our ability to defend properly.
2. Danny Simpson. We've still got him and we needed a better RB.
3. Not trusting enough in Claudio. Look at what he has done, a winner at every level of the game, everywhere he's been. I believe in him and I hope most other fans still do.
4. Media snarking. The pundits, big teams, TV operators etc like Leicester doing well as a one off novelty, they don't want it to happen again due to the money the "big" teams generate from abroad. So they magnify any issues with our club.
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Four replies

As a serious response, I don't think anyone is questioning Ranieri's role at our club or doesn't support him.

But it's fair to say he got he last 2 games wrong tactically. That's just an observation.

It was clear in the Copenhagen game that Schlupp and Musa were clueless about what to do and were fearful of crossing the halfway line. Against WBA, it's was again clear that we were trying to stretch play by playing diagonals out to our wingers but Musa was not up to it and Mahrez was nullified.

As suggested previously, going back to what we know for a couple of games whilst we work on the training pitch would do us no harm.

HuththeGreatest makes me laugh

It was clear in the Copenhagen game that Schlupp and Musa were clueless about what to do and were fearful of crossing the halfway line.

As a serious response to Mersey, it helps to understand Schlupp at least first half that he was essentially playing wing back and probably to instructions.

He did look stronger second half when given a bit of freedom.

I know TB - but wing backs are allowed to cross the halfway line no?

Schlupp seemed to get in the opposition half. Take one look at the full back, check back and play a sideways pass. Very odd and looked instructed.

Agree he was average in the second half as opposed to poor.

I seem to remember back in MONs days, he did exactly the same with Jamie Laurence, it was so frustrating but you can't blame the player if it's instructed?

While I completely agree that the tactics in the last 2 games have been wide of the mark to say the least, it cant be used as an excuse for poor player performances.
I am not picking on Schlupp but if we all look at his last few appearances they have all left a lot to be desired. Now while I agree that he did start out at Wing Back against Copenhagen he didn't look comfortable, tactical awareness was poor etc but he has played in that role before so should have been a tad better on the pitch than what we saw.

At the end of the day we need to go back to basics as I have said before, get the spine of the team sorted and lets start the season now.