Brendan Rodgers is experiencing the most difficult moment of his managerial career regarding player availability – and so is proud of the players who filled in and nearly clinched an incredible comeback at Premier League champions Manchester City. The Leicester City boss had to pick a side without his three best full-backs, his three best centre-backs, his best defensive midfielder, his best winger, and his best striker at the Etihad Stadium as injury and illness continue to ravage the squad. Asked if this is the toughest period he has had in terms of injuries,
Brendan Rodgers replied: “It definitely is. You’ve known me for a few years now and I’m not one to get the violins out, but it’s a huge challenge, you can see us offensively, we have scored three at Anfield and three here, but if you are missing the players we are missing… You take Evans, Soyuncu, Justin, Ricardo and Fofana, one of the best young defenders in the world, we have to keep trying to find the solution and try to have a perspective. The guys who are available are giving everything. That’s a huge challenge for us. To play Man City and Liverpool when they have free weeks… we’ll continue to fight, we’ve shown what we can do when we have players available. That is a challenge when we don’t have them.”
As well as the injuries, a consistent problem, City conceded two more from corners and two more from penalties, which also remains annoyingly persistent features of their season. But at 4-0 down inside 25 minutes, it could have been a lot worse for Leicester had they folded. Rodgers was proud they didn’t.
Brendan Rodgers said: “It was a difficult start to the game for us. I was really disappointed with the first penalty, it was really soft, so that was frustrating. We came in at half-time, the scoreline for me didn’t reflect the game. We had eight shots, they had 10, but we were 4-0 down. We were in a tough position, but we make a change, and then we challenge the players in the second half to win the second half, bring us closer to their goals, and to show the mentality and character that is in this team. We never unravel, that could have been an easy thing to do, down 4-0 to the champions, but the players didn’t do that. We played some incredible football. It was disappointing to concede from a set-piece but we had two big chances at 5-3. The challenge was to forget the result and go and show our mentality. It was a big ask away to the champions, and they have had a free week to prepare and did not have too many players missing. The players took that on, and I was so proud of them to do that. We scored goals and maybe could have got something out of it.”
