First off, lets start again. I apologise for coming across overly defensive. It's just that once you've heard your team written off as a freak one off, a fluke, worst champions ever or a million other things from people who don't know your team, you tend to be on the defensive a lot. Apologies.
Back to the point, I don't care what pundits or other fans predict before a ball is kicked. They don't watch every second of every Leicester game, understand where our weaknesses were, reasons we might have been underperforming etc.
To simplify that, no united fan or pundit knew Harvery Barnes was any good, they'd probably never even heard of him. But those of us who followed the club and followed him, could see that he was smashing it at every level he went to. We had a very high degree of confidence that he was capable of being a top player. So in terms of the team, am I shocked to see us here again... no. I think we've got a brilliantly balanced team with some cracking players.
Under Puel we had glimpses of great stuff, but so many players were very very raw and obviously needed time. We also needed a creative midfielder, it was obvious having to play two DM's stunted our creativity. The second Tielemans arrived, the potential sky rocketed even further and it was obvious he was the key. He's the player that can elevate a team a 6th / 7th / 8th team to something potentially greater.
That was obvious when he arrived and it was obvious after Puel got sacked and before Rodgers even had his feet under the desk. We hit good form before Rodgers had a chance to make much impact at all, the Puel shackles were off** and the major problem was fixed.
Of course manager make a difference, I'm not arguing that. My argument is that I DO think this squad has top 4 ability, what Rodgers can do is elevate that even further to a team capable of a bit more. We're arguing about a place or two in reality here, I'm just saying don't underestimate the squad or the other elements that make us what we are at the moment.
** He'd dumped most of the title winners and clearly made himself hated in the process.
No problem at all, apologies accepted. I suppose the thing is, I've always spoken positively about Leicester on here and I found it a peculiar post to become defensive about.
To be fair, regarding predictions and pundits; the same can be said about their predictions regarding any team, not just Leicester. So by your assertion, all predictions are moot. This simply isn't true as a-lot of statistical work actually goes into certain predictions especially when it comes to betting odds etc. Given the diverse range of people who make predictions around these types of things; if you average it out, you'll generally get a good gauge. I posted a link down the bottom of the page regarding top 6 predictions for this season. Not one mention of Leicester in the top four from over 300 posts. Now bear in mind, the responses are from a diverse range of posters and not just United fans.
Now, you may think predictions are a load of hogwash and you're fully entitled to your opinion. But for me, it's a fair reflection of where I see this Leicester squad to be. It's a good squad, that I would have predicted to finish around 5th to 7th. You're saying there's not much between 4th and 5th, but that's not necessarily true. How many sides have broken the top four monopoly over the years? Now compare that to 5th place; there's been plenty of random sides that finished 5th and no one cares nor remembers them. There's a certain mentality required to finish in the top four with an unfancied side and a top class manager is required to do so. Even with a very good squad, it's still a very tough ask for an unfancied side to finish there. It's why so many have come relatively close over the years but ultimately failed. For me, a good squad needs a really good manager to actually achieve it.
I also don't agree really about not knowing the Leicester players etc. In this day and age, a decent football fan has a pretty good idea about most of the sides in the league. The amount of football broadcast on tv along with the internet etc makes that fairly easy. For example, I remember some on here talking about Barnes long before he broke into the Leicester side. There's also some on here talking about KDH and I myself, have taken an interest in him due to the hype. Many fans, including myself will have teams we take an interest in. For me, Leicester are one of those as I find Rodgers a fascinateing manager and I enjoy his style of play. I also enjoyed his Celtic team and look what happened to them after he left. Now I wouldn't tune into a Celtic game if it was the only ball on tv.
To label non-Leicester fans as not fit to make judgements on your team is disingenuous and not factually accutare. I mean, there's mostly United fans on here, but it doesn't mean that I don't find some of their opinions utterly nonsical and often the oppo fans can be more objective.
So it's really down to subjective opinions at the end of the day. You think Leicester were going to challenge for top four whereas the overwhelming majority would have predicted a 5th to 7th place finish. I find that totally fair, thus I think Rodgers is performing better than the sum of his parts. Maybe Leicester will end up finishing between 5th and 7th, which would be par for the course. But maybe it would be seen as slightly disappointing given their positon and form just now.
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/predict-the-top-6-20-21-in-order.456505/
