'Clear Minds & Sticking Together' - Van Nistelrooy Pre-Liverpool

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'Clear Minds & Sticking Together' - Van Nistelrooy Pre-Liverpool

Ruud van Nistelrooy calls for reflection and togetherness as Leicester City quickly turn their attention to a Boxing Day trip to Anfield to take on Liverpool (8pm GMT kick-off).

2024-12-26T07:00+00:00

by Matthew Temple

Published

26 Dec, 2024

from King Power Stadium

'Clear Minds & Sticking Together' - Van Nistelrooy Pre-Liverpool

Ruud van Nistelrooy calls for reflection and togetherness as Leicester City quickly turn their attention to a Boxing Day trip to Anfield to take on Liverpool (8pm GMT kick-off).

Matthew Temple

2024-12-26T07:00+00:00

'Clear Minds & Sticking Together' - Van Nistelrooy Pre-Liverpool

Ruud van Nistelrooy calls for reflection and togetherness as Leicester City quickly turn their attention to a Boxing Day trip to Anfield to take on Liverpool (8pm GMT kick-off).

Matthew Temple

2024-12-26T07:00+00:00

'Clear Minds & Sticking Together' - Van Nistelrooy Pre-Liverpool

Ruud van Nistelrooy calls for reflection and togetherness as Leicester City quickly turn their attention to a Boxing Day trip to Anfield to take on Liverpool (8pm GMT kick-off).

Matthew Temple

2024-12-26T07:00+00:00

'Clear Minds & Sticking Together' - Van Nistelrooy Pre-Liverpool

Ruud van Nistelrooy calls for reflection and togetherness as Leicester City quickly turn their attention to a Boxing Day trip to Anfield to take on Liverpool (8pm GMT kick-off).

Matthew Temple

2024-12-26T07:00+00:00

Following a 3-0 loss to Wolverhampton Wanderers last weekend, the City Manager spoke once more on the defeat at King Power Stadium, before talking about his hope to turn the tides on Boxing Day, when his side travel to Anfield.

The difficult task of facing the league leaders along with the other main talking points from his pre-match interview follow below...

Losing out to Wolves & defensive errors

Leicester lost out to Wolves on Sunday afternoon.

The first couple of talking points looked back to Sunday's loss on Filbert Way, where first-half goals from Goncalo Guedes, Rodrigo Gomes and Matheus Cunha set the scoreline in the Premier League fixture.

Admitting that it gave the Foxes a difficult task in the second period, van Nistelrooy emphasised the opposition goals came from individuals errors, rather than a collective defensive performance.

"If you look at the result, it was a bad performance but if you look at the goals and how we conceded them, it's individual incidents and the rest of the game shows it wasn't as bad as the scoreline suggests," the Dutch Manager explained.

"We are conceding way too much; you see (against Wolves) that we took one expected goal, and against West Ham we took three expected goals but because you get the points, everyone is happy.

"Today, overall, we defended better, however weird that sounds, but individual mistakes cost us and led to their three goals. Over 90 minutes, they were incidences that we couldn't overcome.

"It's about the team; 11 players attacking and defending and of course the mental and emotional part is important to make sure the players are dealing with mistakes.

"It was about communication and individual mistakes so I think it was mentally more than anything else."

A quick turnaround

ผู้จัดการพูดถึงความสำคัญของการสามัคคีและการโฟกัสไปที่เกมนัดต่อไป

The positive thing about playing football over Christmas is that there is always another game around the corner. That next fixture sees Leicester travel to Liverpool on Boxing Day; a side currently four points clear at the summit with a game in hand.

But that doesn't faze the former Manchester United and Real Madrid striker, who spoke on his old rivalry with the Merseyside club, but assures the fans he is fully focused on his current job with Leicester.

He added: "It's good to focus on a new game and it's a big task ahead, but also a quick turnaround as you say, and the chance for players to recover and bounce back from this one.

"I've had some rivalry in the past with Liverpool, but that's in the past and right now I'm fully focused on Leicester. We need to have everyone involved to get the best out of the players in the most efficient way.

"We can't forget about the game against Wolves. We need to look at the game, everyone's performance, reflect on it and I will do so with the staff and talk to the players about what happened and then we can look forward to Liverpool.

"It's important to us that we focus on performing and get the most out of our squad. That's what I said, we have to be spot on in all the parts of football. That's what we need to focus on."

Bouncing back

Putting in the preparation in Seagrave.

The 48-year-old spoke about the importance of bouncing back, no matter the next opponent to face. On the back of two consecutive losses, van Nistelrooy encouraged his squad to clear their minds, identify mistakes from previous games and continue to work hard as a group to rectify them.

Currently 17th, the Manager went on to talk about the need for togetherness, as the Foxes await tough challenges against Liverpool, Manchester City and Aston Villa in the coming weeks.

"What's important is the ability to bounce back," van Nistelrooy continued. "We wanted to bounce back from the Newcastle defeat, but that sadly didn't happen.

"But effort wise, and spirit wise, when I came in a few weeks ago, I was emphasising that. I saw all the strikers and midfielders running back and defending until the last second, and they did as I asked.

"Now it's about bouncing back on two defeats; clearing your mind and still sticking together to get the maximum out of this squad. That's why I'm here and we'll keep sticking together.

"Every single game we are tested and every single game we can show what we're capable of. We're accountable, we own our mistakes and I'm part of that so we move on to do better."

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