City facing level of pressure not seen this season
OUR CORRESPONDENT ANSWERS QUESTIONS FROM SUPPORTERS ON A RANGE OF ISSUES
THERE is no denying that Leicester City are in a spot of bother. The Premier League have charged them with an alleged breach of financial rules, and the EFL have placed them under a transfer embargo because they believe they are on course to do so. They could receive points deductions for both.
Rightly, fans have questions. How did City get into this predicament? Can the club’s relegation be argued as mitigation? Is the club’s argument a sound one? Will it be a distraction for players?
Those were among the topics discussed on our latest Q & A with supporters.
Q: The terrible January 2023 transfer deals, is that what will ultimately hurt us when we release our financial report?
A: I don’t think you can say it “ultimately” cost City, no.
As far as PSR goes, the big problem really is the £92 million loss they made the season before, when they spent heavily without a big sale and didn’t progress, failing to qualify for European football.
But yes, January 2023 was a problem. In summer 2022, there was recognition of the issues to come, with Fofana sold and replaced at a quarter of the cost by Faes, and with Schmeichel sold and nobody arriving in his place.
But with relegation a possibility, the club have obviously tried to push the boat out with a few signings that didn’t pay off.
At the time, I thought they were good deals.
Tete was a talent who had torn it up for Shakhtar and Lyon.
Kristiansen had Champions League experience but was still very young and could get better.
Souttar would help City dominate their defensive box. But that’s clearly not how it played out.
So it was a contributing factor, but not the only problem.
City’s high wage expenditure, underperformance on the pitch, failure to move on unwanted players, those were all factors in this predicament.
Q: The silence from the club to the fans recently regarding FFP has been deafening. Surely they need to come clean and address fans’ legitimate concerns?
A: I don’t disagree. I do think the hierarchy should be more open with supporters. But I can’t see that happening now.
City said in their second statement, about the legal proceedings they were taking out, that “the relevant rules require that these proceedings are conducted confidentially, and LCFC will therefore not be able to comment further about them at this stage”.
So I’d expect there will be limited comment from the club until decisions are made and resolutions are found. The club also suggested in that statement that they would “prefer the proceedings to be in public, so its supporters and the wider world can be informed”, but I think plenty of people will feel that that doesn’t really wash, given their lack of communication.
Because of their approach over the past few years, I don’t see this issue changing things.
Q: Do you think it’s just a strange coincidence that we play before Leeds every weekend for the rest of the season now or another example of those holding power trying to mess us up?
A: I’d not noticed that, but I wouldn’t subscribe to any conspiracies over it.
Either it’s a coincidence or because that’s the order which Sky feels could generate the most drama. I’m also not sure it’s a bad thing.
By playing first, City can put the pressure on with a win. Leeds then have to win to keep up.
Equally, Leeds could be buoyed if City slip up, knowing they can take advantage.
But I think if I’d been asked whether I would want City to play first or second every weekend, I’d probably say first.
Q: Do you suspect the club are going to hang Enzo out to dry in front of the media and leave him to answer questions which are not his responsibility?
A: Maresca will inevitably be asked questions, but I don’t think they will see it as him being hung out to dry.
It’s quite easy for Maresca to say that it’s not something he knows the details about and not something he is worrying about. They would be fair responses.
City have been charged for their expenditure over a three-year period and he wasn’t at the club for any of it.
Plus, him focusing on it would be detrimental to the team’s performance on the pitch. Nobody could dispute that if he shrugged off any questions.
Q: In your opinion, do the club genuinely think they have found a loophole in which we exist in some kind of limbo and can’t be investigated by either the Premier League or the EFL this season?
A: I don’t think the club see it as a loophole, but their argument does appear to be based on technicalities and timing, and they seem willing to really fight on that front.
Their point seems to be that they can’t be investigated by the Premier League because they’re not a Premier League club, and that they can’t be investigated by the EFL because the season they’re investigating hasn’t finished yet.
I think the latter argument is a
stronger one than the former. Particularly because City are fighting for promotion, the Premier League are bound to want to investigate now ahead of the club’s potential rise back into the division.
The point about the EFL’s embargo being premature I think is a solid one.
But it is written into the rules that the EFL can hand out embargoes to clubs they feel are at risk of breaching financial regulations.
Q: Wasn’t there going to be a review of last season’s decisions? Has this been done? If so, will it be published?
A: Yes, there was supposed to be one. I don’t know if it’s been conducted, but I would imagine that there would have been soul-searching to a degree.
To be relegated despite having a top-half wage budget means questions need to be answered about where it went wrong.
No, I don’t think it will be published, although there may be some reference to mistakes that were made when the finances for last season are published at some point in the next week.
Q: The club needs support now more than ever yet all I see is finger-pointing and the blame game towards LCFC. Why do you think Foxes “supporters” are so bad in a moment when we need to rally around the team?
A: I think fans can support the team while still wanting their club to be better.
I think, once kick-off comes on Friday, the fans will get behind Maresca and the players. They’re innocent in all of this.
But matters like this, if fans truly believed the club had been wronged, would make for a siege mentality that would raise the atmosphere at the King Power Stadium significantly.
I don’t think that will happen. For plenty of fans, their allegiance isn’t blind. They can see mistakes have been made.
It will be more difficult for them to support a club that may have worked outside the lines.
Q: It’s highly likely that both Everton and Nottingham Forest will avoid relegation this season thus rendering their points deductions redundant. If the Premier League are assessing us over the last three years then could we not use our relegation last season as mitigation? It would seem disproportionate for us to be effectively punished twice.
A: I think that point will be made, yes. But I don’t know if it will wash. The relegation wasn’t punishment for the alleged PSR breach, it was punishment for not doing well enough as a club to stay up.
If the charge is proven by the independent commission, then that will need a separate punishment, I think.
That City may have worked outside the rules and yet still gone down is the club’s problem, not the Premier League’s.
I’d also say that I don’t think Everton and Forest’s points deductions have been rendered redundant.
I think both, but particularly Forest, could still go down (although I do think both teams will be happy to have taken a points deduction in this season more than any other, when the Premier League definitely is a weaker division).
Even if they don’t go down, their deducted points are likely to lead to less prize money. Each place in the Premier League is worth over £2 million.
There was a point earlier in the season where Everton would have been five places higher without their points deduction. If it finishes that way, that’s more than £10 million they’ve lost out on.
Q: There are nine games to go. It feels to me like the next two are the most important because we need the momentum to start going in our favour. Part of me thinks that with Ndidi back and Ricardo close, that’ll tip it our way. However, I’m also wondering whether our moment has passed and we’re now heading for third or fourth. Please convince me to believe in the former, rather than the latter!
A: I’ll do my best. As you’ve mentioned, Ndidi is now pretty much 100 per cent and Ricardo could be back this weekend. That’s huge news.
When those two have played and when City have had their strongest 11 out, there have been very few losses, and very few poor performances.
I’d also say that, bar the past few games, City are actually a better team now than they were at the start of the season.
They’re not as reliant on late goals to get them victories. Yes, they’ve conceded late more often, but they’ve also racked up good leads going into the final 30 minutes more often, too.
Looking at the fixture list, they have the easiest run-in on paper.
The average points-per-game of their remaining opponents is 1.28. That’s compared to Leeds on 1.33, Ipswich on 1.55, and Southampton on 1.67.
Momentum isn’t with them and teams catching them up could bring a level of pressure that they haven’t had to deal with this season.
But equally that means we don’t know how they will cope with it. I think in the past you’d have said the group aren’t good in pressure scenarios, but this is a different group.
The late goals conceded of late admittedly don’t bode well, but there’s not a mountain of evidence that they won’t be able to cope.
To this point, on a points-pergame basis, they have been the best team in the league.
I think they’ve earned the trust to be able to keep that up for another nine matches.
Q: The PSR issues have come up at possibly the worst time for us, but do you think this will play on the players minds?
A: Honestly, I don’t know. They always say that matters like this just go on in the background and don’t bother them, but they will surely be aware that the club need to sell players in June.
They will be aware that the club could start next season on minus points, and that could decrease motivation to get promotion.
But equally, I think they know how to get into game-mode.
Maresca won’t be talking about it with the players.
His concentration will be on the tactics for each game.
As soon as the whistle blows, you would hope off-field matters are not a consideration at all.