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Leicester City 12th (9-5-12) vs Crystal Palace 13th (7-6-13)
Live on Saturday at 12:30 PM ET on NBC
Forget the Carabao Cup final and Manchester United v Liverpool on Sunday, this is the match of the weekend. There is so much on the line for each of these teams. A Foxes defeat would see Palace just 2 points behind them. A Palace defeat could see them drop right back into the relegation scrap they’ve just recently emerged from.
The Opposition
Palace are on a current run of 5 matches unbeaten in all competitions. With a strong Manchester United team coming up next, they will be looking to secure three points from a relatively happy hunting ground for them in the past. While historically they’ve each won 26 times against the other, more recent results have the Eagles holding a 9 goals to zero advantage over the Foxes.
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Title winner with Leicester Jeffrey Schlupp has been banging in goals recently and scored a very Schlupp-esque goal in their FA Cup 5th round win over Doncaster Rovers. A simple shot took a slight deflection on the defender’s calf and it rang off the bottom corner of the far post and in. He hardly even celebrated after it went in!
The Foxes
I might as well just copy/paste what I have to say, because I’ve said it all year. Great performance against a strong team and our one mistake leads to goals. Make no mistake of my tone though, Claude Puel put on a tactical masterclass against Mauricio Potchettino, and for his sins still lost the match. We’ve never seen a more fluid Leicester attack under Puel than we did that day and if young Harvey Barnes could’ve finished half his chances, we’d have walked away comfortable winners.
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His pass to Ricardo to set up Jamie Vardy’s goal was immaculate! It’s what we’ve been missing all season! If there is a way we can convince him to stay at Leicester, then we must. Tielemans’ passing ability will free up James Maddison as we’ll have two chance creators doing work.
The Prediction
The performance has to match the result going forward if Claude Puel wants to stay at Leicester. I want payback for that 5-0 defeat last year, but I’d settle for a 3-0 revenge as well. A point per goal, please!