{"id":662693,"date":"2025-12-29T07:00:55","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T12:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/?p=662693"},"modified":"2025-12-28T16:11:16","modified_gmt":"2025-12-28T21:11:16","slug":"leicester-city-predicted-lineup-vs-derby-county","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2025\/12\/29\/leicester-city-predicted-lineup-vs-derby-county\/","title":{"rendered":"Leicester City Predicted Lineup vs Derby County for December 29"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Last time out, Leicester City fell to yet another defeat in damming fashion. Goals from Othmane Maamma and Matthew Pollock sealed a 2-1 win for Watford, as Jordan James’ early opener proved not enough. Nonetheless, it’s City’s second consecutive defeat after being on the receiving end of a thrashing at Loftus Road just a week earlier. They currently sit in 14th place with 31 points, which is five points from the play-off places. Therefore, here is the Leicester predicted lineup for the final time this calendar year, as the Foxes host East Midlands rivals Derby County.<\/span><\/p>\n

Leicester Predicted Lineup vs Derby County for Championship Tie<\/h2>\n<\/header>\n
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How Leicester City Have Lined Up Recently<\/h3>\n

Against Watford, Marti Cifuentes made minor changes despite a heavy defeat against QPR. Jakub Stolarczyk remained in between the sticks, but once again came under scrutiny as it was his mistake which led to the winner. The one change to the starting lineup came at centre-back due to Jannik Vestergaard’s injury and Caleb Okoli’s return to full fitness. Alongside Okoli stood academy graduate Ben Nelson, who started his eighth game of the season. At full-back, Luke Thomas and Ricardo Pereira provided the width, although the latter was replaced by Hamza Choudhury late on. Vestergaard and Ben Nelson also starred, as Caleb Okoli is still not ready to return.<\/p>\n

Read More:<\/b>\u00a0Former Leicester Player Praises Duo, Says One \u2018Fits the Bill for Most Premier League Clubs\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, in midfield, once again, no alterations came. In the double pivot, the inform Oliver Skipp accommodated Welsh international Jordan James, who managed to score his sixth goal of the season. Just in front of them was Bobby Decordova Reid. The 32-year-old has been in decent form for the Foxes, but after being replaced by the returning Aaron Ramsey, the competition for the number 10 role is set to heat up. Out wide, both Stephy Mavididi and Abdul Fatawu started, but Leicester’s woes coincided with the need for Jeremy Monga to come on, which ultimately led to Mavididi making way after 69 minutes. To cap off the eleven, Jordan Ayew led the line once again as Patson Daka is at the Africa Cup of Nations, whilst Julian Carranza is clearly out of favour.<\/p>\n

Leicester City\u2019s Recent Form And Tactics<\/h3>\n

Following the defeat against former club QPR, Cifuentes and Leicester’s hard work over the previous weeks was all undone. Four goals and complete domination in the first half, whilst City had just one shot, perhaps best epitomises an abysmal first 45 minutes of action. As a result, Leicester came into the Boxing Day clash against the Hornets in 13th place. This is a mid-table position, where they have been struggling for a while now.<\/p>\n

Despite the underwhelming ending, the Foxes did get off to a perfect start. James scored after just seven minutes via an excellent finish, which trickled into the far corner and past Egil Selvik in goal. Despite this, Javi Gracia’s side reacted well to falling behind, and even had a set-piece goal ruled out due to offside. A mistake from Okoli seemingly led to the visitors’ equaliser, as they pounced on the deflected ball, and made use of their numbers by finding Maamma, whose outside-the-foot finish beat Stolarczyk.<\/p>\n

Read More:<\/b>\u00a0Leicester Owner Khun Top Eyes \u2018Major Reshuffle\u2019 Following Years of Decline<\/a><\/p>\n

After the first half, where Watford had double the shots with eight and two more big chances, it’s easy to see why they found the decisive goal. The East Midlands outfit struggled to clear their lines from the corner and didn’t put the pressure on Imran Louza, who was given the time and space to put a delicious ball in the box, which wasn’t claimed by Stolarczyk, and was instead met by Pollock. Even when trailing, City continued to struggle, as their five shots in the second half amounted to just 0.18 expected goals, which further emphasises their struggles to work the ball into dangerous areas.<\/p>\n

It was a damning defeat, and one that adds to the staggering total of 24 for the club this calendar year. The poor recruitment is becoming more and more evident by the week, and has severely hurt the club for the past five years. Bringing in Carranza is baffling as the Argentine is clearly out of contention, and has left a 34-year-old Ayew starting week in, week out. This lack of planning or perhaps lack of finances really emphasises this dark period for the club, as year on year the same mistakes are happening. This season needed to be a time for change, and a youthful revolution built around the likes of Monga, Fatawu, Nelson and James. This hasn’t happened, and it feels like the club is closer to League One than returning to the Premier League.<\/p>\n

Leicester City Team News<\/h3>\n

As confirmed by\u00a0the\u00a0Spaniard<\/a>, some absences are to be expected for the clash against Derby. As mentioned previously, Patson Daka is representing Zambia at AFCON, which has led to his recent absence and a lack of options up front. Meanwhile, Vestergaard, who is recovering from a knock against QPR, is also unlikely to start. Aside from this, Boubakary Soumar\u00e9, Victor Kristiansen and Harry Souttar round up the long list of Leicester absences.<\/p>\n

Leicester Predicted Lineup vs Derby<\/h3>\n

GK: Jakub Stolarczyk<\/p>\n

RB: Hamza Choudhury<\/p>\n

RCB: Caleb Okoli<\/p>\n

LCB: Ben Nelson<\/p>\n

LB: Luke Thomas<\/p>\n

DM: Oliver Skipp<\/p>\n

DM: Jordan James<\/p>\n

RW: Abdul Fatawu<\/p>\n

AM: Aaron Ramsey<\/p>\n

LW: Stephy Mavididi<\/p>\n

ST: Jordan Ayew<\/p>\n

Featured Image Credit: IMAGO \/ Pro Sports Images<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last time out, Leicester City fell to yet another defeat in damming fashion. Goals from Othmane Maamma and Matthew Pollock sealed a 2-1 win for Watford, as Jordan James’ early opener proved not enough. Nonetheless, it’s City’s second consecutive defeat after being on the receiving end of a thrashing at Loftus Road just a week […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5391,"featured_media":658904,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33,15],"tags":[173],"class_list":["post-662693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-championship","category-leicester-city","tag-leicester-city"],"modified_by":"Henry Chung, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5391"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=662693"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662693\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":662703,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662693\/revisions\/662703"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/658904"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=662693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=662693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=662693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}