Leicester City will host Arsenal in the Premier League match at the King Power Stadium on Sunday (28/2) with the striker’s condition, goal drought.
Vardy, who has been Leicester’s goal machine for years, is experiencing a goal drought at the moment. Of the 11 matches he has played since 2021, Vardy has only been able to break into the opponent’s goal once.
The England striker underwent groin surgery in January and since then his form has not returned to his best. Leicester coach Brendan Rodgers still has full confidence in Vardy.
“I always get 100 percent of the appearances from Jamie Vardy. His mentality is strong even when he is not in the game as if he is always ready when the opportunity arises,” Rodgers said as quoted by Sky Sports.
Even though Vardy is on a goal drought, Leicester as a whole remains consistent in the Premier League. Even in the last 12 matches in the Premier League, The Foxes have only lost one defeat.
That impressive record finally allowed Leicester to stay in third place with a collection of 49 points, as was Manchester United who were in second place.
“He always disturbs the balance of the opponent’s defense. He also doesn’t get good service but the most important thing is we won. Scoring goals is not only up to Vardy, but is the contribution of the whole team,” said the former Liverpool coach.
In addition, Rodgers reminded that players who are good at giving mature bait to Vardy like James Maddison are injured.
“Vardy is the type of striker who relies on [team mate’s] serve, in terms of movement and also in terms of making him run more.”
“When a team loses a lot of players, that is someone who can serve it, it makes it a little more difficult to score goals,” said Rodgers.
Arsenal’s efforts to compete in the European zone will be tested by Leicester City. Instead of moving up the ranks in the Premier League standings, the Gunners can be fixed in the middle of the table.
The Gunners, who are outside the radar of the championship competition, as well as the Champions League zone, had shown a change in a positive direction at the end of December 2020 by winning five wins and one draw until finally being defeated by Southampton.
After the end of January, Mikel Arteta’s team again showed unstable performance. As a result, Arsenal are still struggling in the mediocre zone competing with Tottenham Hotspur, Leeds United, Wolverhampton Wanderers and Crystal Palace.
Arsenal are only nine points adrift of Chelsea who are in fifth place, but Pierre Emerick Aubameyang has not been able to appear consistently to catch up with his neighbors.
Leicester, who will host Arsenal, will be reinforced by Harvey Barnes, Ricardo Pereira and Timothy Castagne. Arsenal could become victims of the Foxes’ failure to penetrate the last 16 of the Europa League.
The rotation of players by Brendan Rodgers could endanger Arsenal, who lowered their core players when they beat Benfica.
The Premier League champions in the 2015/2016 season also have a good record of weekend matches despite previously playing in the middle of the week. Six of the seven Premier League games that Leicester played after undergoing midweek matches on the European stage ended in victory. Including when Leicester won 1-0 over Arsenal in the first meeting of the season.
The London Cannon Team has never won over Leicester in the last three away games. There is even a record that Arsenal only won one win from seven visits to the King Power Stadium or only 14.2 percent which made Leicester’s headquarters as haunted as Old Trafford Stadium where Arsenal could only win 13.8 percent of their victories when they visited Manchester United’s headquarters.
