Fans love a transfer, they love to see new faces, and of course positive news. We all loved to see Leicester return to Premier League, but just days after it was clear that surprising changes would appear, watching on as Enzo Maresca made his move to Chelsea, with the official statement dragging out as it took time to get everything over the line.
The difficulties regarding FFP and PSR are still there with their dark clouds. Losing Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall in that move to Chelsea is a bit of a mix, getting the money in to solve a difficult matter, but at the other hand losing a player who had speical impact, makes us all worry a bit of what will be done to replace him.
The return to pre-season on Monday will give us a few clues regarding next season, but with so many players on international duty during June, we will probably not see the full picture of anything, not yet.
The build of the 25 players that will be listed for next season is of course one major topic at the moment. Different Leicester fan channels on You Tube and Twitter do have this as their talking point, of course also looking up the updates on fan forum Foxes Talk. To have a look at it all, visit our special links library.
As it looks at the minute, a lot is missing, looking at the 25 players that will fill the Leicester squad next season. Each club is able to list up to 17 senior players that are not English or Welsh and did not spend a significant period in an English or Welsh academy, plus any number of homegrown players up to a maximum squad size of 25, plus an unlimited number of academy and under-21 players. This will be the perspective of Steve Cooper when he builds his group of players to compete.
We do see a lot of speculation regarding different players and systems to be in place, as speculations goes into a 3-4-3 setup, but we believe Steve Cooper will be pragmatic and having the cover needed to be able to adjust his systems slightly taking into consideration what teams you play against.
So with the PL squad rules and the manager perspective in mind, what will it all look like, we have drawn up a list with last season in mind and how the club have to approach the challenge.
We have seen different updates regarding Abdul Fatawu, and nothing else than him joining is what we believe will happen, but surely no confirmation and no photo of him at this point, as new shirts are all seen on photographs of other players.
We do believe that the club will have a full squad of 25 players, with a number to be available for selection from the u.21 set up, but still under the age of 21 and home grown, so then not going into that tally of 25. Will Alves and Ben Nelson we believe will both be among the players to be part of the first team group.
Last season the following were named among the 25, players marked * are no longer with the club, those marked # are uncertain at this point, waiting for a decision to be made regarding a contract proposal.
Yunus Akgun *, Marc Albrighton *, Cesare Casadei *, Hamza Choudhury, Conor Coady, Patson Daka, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall *, Callum Doyle *, Wout Faes, Mads Hermansen, Kelechi Iheanacho *, Abdul Fatawu Issahaku #, Daniel Iversen, James Justin, Stephy Mavididi, Kasey McAteer, Wilfred Ndidi #, Ricardo Pereira, Dennis Praet *, Harry Souttar, Jakub Stolarczyk, Jamie Vardy. Jannik Vestergaard, Danny Ward, Harry Winks
Players to be considered part of the first team group, under aged and home grown, could be; Will Alves, Ben Nelson, Sammy Braybrooke, Michael Golding # and Brandon Cover. Arjan Raikhy and Zach Booth will be either not available for full PL selection, or included in the 25, due to age and citizenship. Raikhy part of the u.21 set up last season, Booth playing on loan in Eresdivisie with Volendam. Tom Cannon will also be part of a full squad next season, as he last season was an underaged squad member.
Looking at this with all those different aspects in mind, we do have the following at present;
Goalkeepers: Jacub Stolarczyk, Danny Ward, Daniel Iversen, Mads Hermansen
Defenders: Conor Coady, Jannik Vestergaard, Wout Faes, Ricardo Pereira, James Justin, Harry Souttar
Midfield: Hamza Choudhury, Harry Winks, Kasey McAteer,
Forwards: Patson Daka, Jamie Vardy, Stephy Mavadidi
So far only 16 players of the 25 from last season are left at Leicester. That will possibly see 9 new additions to be made, possibly having Tom Cannon as one, Abdul Fatawu as another of those, having 7 transfers to consider. Arjan Raikhy and Zach Booth could both be included, taking the tally of new additions down to 5.
To have a look in the different positions, the squad lack depth in most areas, also having doubts about certain players still around that could be seen as possible departures. Harry Souttar, Daniel Iversen, Danny Ward, Patson Daka and Conor Coady all being part of transfer speculations. We are also in the blue regarding Wilfred Ndidi, so it is a lot still not settled.
Bobby De Cordova-Reid and Caleb Okoli are two players recently being named as potential new squad additions as they both would be good and quality inclusions to a squad, lacking depth.
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