City Duo Realising Their Potential, Says Former Fox Alan Smith
Smith scored 76 goals in 200 appearances during his five years at Filbert Street across the 1980s before also earning 13 caps for the England senior team. As a Foxes favourite, the 54-year-old player-turned-pundit has monitored the progress of Chilwell and Gray closely as they embark on their careers at the Club and he has seen much to enthuse about this summer.
Gray scored for England Under-21s as they defeated hosts Poland 3-0 in Kielce last Thursday to book a final four encounter with Germany after linking up well with City colleague Chilwell down the left flank. Speaking to LCFC.com this week, Smith revealed his belief the City have two of English football's brightest talents on their books.
“They’ve both come on such a long way,” he said. “I thought Chilwell was Man of the Match against Poland, just ahead of Gray. I thought he was excellent, the Poles just could not handle him. He was slaloming down that left-hand side and obviously he set up Demarai’s goal too. It was great to see because, up until that point, his final ball was letting him down a little.
“He was a lot better in possession, compared to the other matches. As for Demarai, what a great goal. It was a lovey bit of skill and that settled England down a bit. It allowed them to enjoy some possession more than they had done up until then. He was full of confidence and he did ever so well to set up Jacob Murphy to score when he might have had a shot himself.
“That showed a little bit of maturity and, following such an impressive outing, you would imagine that he has settled his place in the starting line-up for the semi-finals. Everything is paying off for Aidy Boothroyd at the moment, all of his decisions are coming off and it’s all working out but, on a personal basis, Demarai must have been delighted by his own display.”
Smith considers Gray as one of the most exciting forward players in the English football pyramid. Coupled with his willingness to take advice on board, the ex-Arsenal forward is confident that the 20-year-old winger has the ingredients required to continue improving his game under City manager Craig Shakespeare over the course of the 2017/18 campaign at King Power Stadium.
Analysing Gray’s prospects in the game, Smith added: “He’s definitely got the talent. In terms of his application and his decision making, he has proven that he can do that too. It’s helping him a lot to be playing for England, it must better than to just be playing in training. His decision making has improved a lot and it can only help him to be playing at the moment.”
On Chilwell, Smith added that he believes the Academy product has already shown signs that he has a bright future: “Once he gets going on those gallops down the wing, he is quite hard to stop, he has nice feet and he moves the ball quickly. He’s young and there is a lot more to come from him. Everybody knows his talent and he seems to have a good head too.”
Make sure to check back to LCFC.com on Tuesday evening to find out how Gray and Chilwell fare for the England Under-21s as they take on Germany in Tychy.