The more you think about it, the less Leicester City’s 4-2 defeat to Arsenal makes sense. Was this a shellacking, a robbery or somehow both?
Steve Cooper’s side conceded 4.62xG from 36 shots, with Mads Hermansen breaking the Premier League record for saves in a single match (13).
But equally they were level until the 94th minute, with Arsenal’s first goal controversial after a clear foul on Jamie Vardy in the build-up. Riccardo Calafiori could and should have been sent off. Wilfred Ndidi’s deflected own goal was both inevitable and hugely unfortunate.
This was a game of incredibly fine margins yet overwhelmingly statistical dominance, leaving Leicester now six games into their top flight return without a win.
The most obvious target for fan ire has been Cooper, the former Nottingham Forest head coach who was the most obviously available, affordable option when Enzo Maresca followed the Chelsea billions. An exciting, free-flowing tactician he is not, but the trade-off is supposed to be that he gets results. Those are yet to come.
Leicester have taken the joint-fewest shots per game in the Premier League this season, while also conceding a league-high 19.3 shots on average. Their expected goals (xG) is 5.38 is also the lowest of all top-flight teams, suggesting even their relative attacking underperformance has still been technical overperformance.
Their only win in any competition was a 4-0 thrashing of Tranmere, even needing penalties to beat Walsall after a dire 0-0.
It was during that draw a fan broke onto the pitch in an attempt to confront Cooper, while “Cooper, sort it out” echoed throughout the travelling fans. All in all, it appeared to take seven competitive matches for supporters to turn on the Welshman.
“There’s a perception with Cooper that he’s overly cautious and when he can pick a hard-working defensive player over a more popular attacking one, he will,” James Knight from The Fosse Way Podcast tells i.
“That’s caused a lot of the personal antagonism towards him. When you marry that with the lack of wins, that’s caused some of the frustration.
“The reality is there’s been an undercurrent of anger for a long time, going back to when Brendan Rodgers was manager. It bubbles out from under the surface after every poor run of results.”
This anger isn’t Cooper’s fault, but he has to bear the brunt of it as the club’s closest answer to a public-facing executive. Director of football Jon Rudkin is the most influential backroom figure, but he avoided fan interaction even when things were going well. Aloof and private to a fault, many believe Rudkin is only surviving off the emotional cache built up from Leicester’s title-winning peak, despite years of questionable transfers and a humiliating relegation.
“There’s a lot of anger towards Rudkin,” Knight explains. “There’s a sense that Cooper was the cheap option, that they picked him because he was free and available.
“Look at the Odsonne Edouard signing too – it just seemed like he was suddenly available, rather than any long-term planning for a player they wanted. It’s hard for a manager to turn that into a functioning team.”
The disconnect between Maresca’s Guardiolan influence and Cooper’s preferred style highlights a lack of long-term strategy or coherence in Leicester’s backroom. Even after 10 departures and nine incomings this summer, totalling £77.4m, the squad feels trapped between two styles at best and totally unplanned at worst.
“It feels stuck between what Cooper wants to do – a more physical, direct style – and the players he has, which aren’t really there for that,” Knight says.
“His team selections have reflected that. They’ve started every game really slow, it’s almost that they’ve started trying to get through an hour and see where they are.”
The 2-2 draw with Crystal Palace was a particularly poor example of this, as Cooper brought on centre-back Conor Coady, defensive midfielder Hamza Choudhury and winger Abdul Fatawu for an attacking midfielder and two wingers while Leicester had a 2-1 lead. Coady then conceded the 91st-minute penalty which led to Jean-Philippe Mateta’s equaliser.
But given Leicester fans came into this season believing at least one points deduction was inevitable, has there not been a boost in morale that the club won their case against the Premier League and can continue on equal footing?
No, Knight explains: “The disappointing results on the pitch have diluted [the impact of the points deduction] a bit. There was no big moment on the pitch where you felt like the clouds had cleared a bit. It was one of those things there was a lot of Twitter celebration when it got thrown out.
“But I don’t think there was any sign of that in the crowd. You need to get some football momentum to really benefit from that and they just haven’t had that at all.”
There is finally the chance to build some of that football momentum over the next four matches.
Leicester face Bournemouth, Southampton, Nottingham Forest and Ipswich, sides which have only won three league matches between them this season.
Beating either Bournemouth or Southampton would be a huge positive, but an embarrassing defeat against Cooper’s former side, now a derby on multiple levels, could be the final straw if things are not looking up.
“The next four are going to be very important,” Knight says. “If they don’t win a couple of those, there is going to be a lot of pressure.
“I trust that Cooper will get this right given a bit more time. But a couple of more bad results, especially at home, and it is going to get very toxic.
“All bets are off at that point – if he loses the crowd with his Forest connections as well, it’s going to be very difficult for the players.
“This is what happened in the relegation season, where every home match, every time anything bad happened or they went behind, there was just so much anger. You feel like you’re stuck in this cycle where it’s just going to keep getting worse.”
