We Lacked Cutting Edge, Says McSweeney

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We Lacked Cutting Edge, Says McSweeney

Leon McSweeney believes the Leicester City Development Squad were slightly off the pace on their return to action, but did find positives in the 2-0 loss to Crystal Palace.

2025-01-14T11:00+00:00

by Matthew Temple

Published

14 Jan, 2025

We Lacked Cutting Edge, Says McSweeney

Leon McSweeney believes the Leicester City Development Squad were slightly off the pace on their return to action, but did find positives in the 2-0 loss to Crystal Palace.

Matthew Temple

2025-01-14T11:00+00:00

We Lacked Cutting Edge, Says McSweeney

Leon McSweeney believes the Leicester City Development Squad were slightly off the pace on their return to action, but did find positives in the 2-0 loss to Crystal Palace.

Matthew Temple

2025-01-14T11:00+00:00

We Lacked Cutting Edge, Says McSweeney

Leon McSweeney believes the Leicester City Development Squad were slightly off the pace on their return to action, but did find positives in the 2-0 loss to Crystal Palace.

Matthew Temple

2025-01-14T11:00+00:00

We Lacked Cutting Edge, Says McSweeney

Leon McSweeney believes the Leicester City Development Squad were slightly off the pace on their return to action, but did find positives in the 2-0 loss to Crystal Palace.

Matthew Temple

2025-01-14T11:00+00:00

The Leicester City Development Squad were beaten 2-0 by Crystal Palace on Friday evening
Ademola Ola-Adebomi and Hindolo Mustapha netted in each half at LCFC Training Ground
City's youngsters sit 15th in the Premier League 2 standings
Coach Leon McSweeney shared his verdict on the loss to the Eagles

The young Foxes returned to Premier League 2 duties for the first time since their Christmas break on Friday evening, when they were beaten by the Eagles.

Admitting that the team didn't look quite up to match fitness, that resulted in a lack of cutting edge in the final third against a team in seventh place, who were clinical on a frosty night in the East Midlands.

City's youngsters lost out on Friday to Crystal Palace.

"I think we were caught a little bit cold," McSweeney explained. "The lay off over Christmas meant we looked a little bit rusty. The technical elements that we were so good at in the first half of the season eluded us today.

"We made a lot of unforced errors today and seemed to panic a bit which we don't see on the training pitch. But we've gone so long without a match and maybe that's something we need to look at as staff to make sure the lads keep ticking over.

"We'll take a bit of blame for that as well but lots of positives to take. I thought the pitch was icy, the ball moved around a lot and those technical elements were tested. It was a tight game and they were ruthless in the box, which we lacked and their two goals made the difference."

The coach went on to talk about the positive aspects of the game, and how the weather conditions didn't help City acclimatise back to PL2 football.

Leicester travel to Brighton for their next PL2 fixture.

McSweeney also stated it is on the coaching staff and Club to get through to the next month and build consistencies on the football pitch, in an attempt to return to their early season form.

He added: "We try to replicate the game scenarios as much as we can but ordinarily the Under-21s team go through the same thing but Palace played a few days before and you could see they had that match sharpness.

"It was a tough game though, and we dominated the ball and spells of the game. We just lacked that cutting edge and more so than before Christmas. They were tough to break down, and despite having a lot of the ball, we didn't create enough to get the win.

"Our overall goal is to keep building consistency and the results will take care of themselves. We look back at the first six months with pride and now it's about getting on track again, getting through this period and to push on for the rest of the season."

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