Premier League 2019/20: Wolves vs Leicester City – tactical analysis

This week’s Premier League returned with a clash between Wolves and Leicester City on a Friday night. After 90 minutes, Brendan Rodgers’ team failed to secure the fourth win in the new calendar year. It was a tight game between the two, Nuno Espírito Santo’s defensive tactics were vital to keeping a clean sheet, which would be a key point of analysis.

In this tactical analysis, we will show you how Wolves drew with Leicester City.

Lineups

For Wolves, they played in a 3-4-3 formation. Nuno slightly rotated the squad given there was a Europa League game in this week. Both João Moutinho and Adama Traoré were rested on the bench, with the new signing, Daniel Podence. Leander Dendoncker returned to the midfield and partnered with Rúben Neves; This was the first time of the season that Pedro Neto jointed Diogo Jota and Raúl Jiménez at the front line.

Leicester played in a 4-1-4-1 formation. Wilfred Ndidi’s absence gave Hamza Choudhury a chance to play as a sole pivot, in front of Jonny Evans and Çağlar Söyüncü. Jamie Vardy was looking to end his fifth consecutive game goal drought in the league.

Wolves’ excellent midblock

In this analysis, we will pay much attention to the tactics of Wolves as they denied Leicester to play their own football. The solidity of Wolves’ this game could be attributed to their midblock.

To begin with, we simply illustrate the attacking shape of Leicester with the following image. Rodgers’ team liked to play out from the back, possessing a pair of attacking full-backs and creative midfielders (James Maddison & Youri Tielemans). In general, the shape was like a 4-3-3, with a wide player (Harvey Barnes on the left and Ricardo Pereira on the right) to provide the width.