It's stopped raining, we can carry on

It will be a new look Leicester too with manger Craig Levein having added six new players to the squad since the first day of 2005 and it was no surprise to see him head back north of the border for the first four of them who all arrived during January.

He firstly went back to his former club Hearts and signed Irish midfielder Alan Maybury and Dutch forward Mark de Vries before turning his attention to Dundee United and Canadian goalkeeper Lars Hirschfeld who has previously played in England for Luton and Gillingham.

They all arrived on free transfers but his next signing cost £100,000 to bring midfielder Stephen Hughes from Rangers to complete the transfer window signings.

More recently Levein has parted with another £100,000 to sign KKMC’s Irish defender Patrick McCarthy. He had never featured in the first team at the City of Manchester Stadium but has played league football in loan spells with Boston United and Notts County.

If none of these are familiar names to the Clarets then the sixth signing is, Darren Kenton who has joined on loan from Southampton. When Kenton’s about it usually means an injury to a Burnley player as Alan Moore, Lee Briscoe and certainly Glen Little can testify.

Their recent form hasn’t been particularly good and they currently sit in 18th place with 41 points, just four points and four places behind the Clarets. This follows their home defeat on Saturday against local rivals Nottingham Forest when four of those six signings featured with Hirschfeld and McCarthy unused subs.

In contrast to the league the cup form has been good and they remain the only Football League side in the FA Cup and could so easily have been back at the Turf on Sunday but instead have a date at Ewood, and we wish them well.

They have already beaten Blackpool, Reading and Charlton in the competition and were the giant killers in the last round with their 2-1 win at the Valley courtesy of goals from Nikos Dabizas and Dion Dublin.

Click HERE to see all Leicester’s results this season.

Levein has hinted that he could make changes to try and combat our 4-5-1 system and there are suggestions that David Connolly could be the player left out. Leicester have been playing well recently and it is surprising he is contemplating change, they should have beaten Forest after dominating the game.

They will certainly be without Joey Gudjonsson who misses the game through suspension whilst Dion Dublin is not expected to be fit following a hamstring injury. Jordan Stewart, sent off in the fixture at the Crisp Bowl, is back in training and is expected to play.

Leicester will select from: Ian Walker, Darren Kenton, Nikos Dabizas, Matt Heath, Alan Maybury, Keith Gillespie, Lilian Nalis, Gareth Williams, Danny Tiatto, David Connolly, Mark de Vries, Lars Hirschfeld, Tommy Wright, Stephen Hughes, Jordan Stewart, Patrick McCarthy, Richard Stearman.

Click HERE to see Leicester’s full squad.

Now comes the question – who plays for Burnley? We know we are without Lee Roche and Mo Camara who are both serving one match bans for five yellow cards after both collected their fifth in the last qualifying match at Preston.

Two minute wonder Ade Akinbiyi will now miss the next 270 minutes starting with this visit of the club against whom he would have wanted to do so well after having a bad time with them following his big move from Wolves.

With John McGreal still ruled out with injury it means we have just about got a side available to us as long as Tony Grant passes a fitness test. At least we have John Oster back after he was forced to miss the Sunderland game.

Should Grant make it then I expect the Clarets to line up: Brian Jensen, Michael Duff, Gary Cahill, Frank Sinclair, Graham Branch, John Oster, Micah Hyde, Tony Grant, Pete Whittingham, Jean-Louis Valois, Ian Moore. Subs: Danny Coyne, Paul Scott, Joel Pilkington, Cayne Hanley, Mark Yates.

It’s almost two years ago and it was the first home game after the cup defeat at Watford, the first of five successive home games.

Leicester were right up there at the top with Portsmouth but on the night they were second best to the Clarets and we were very unfortunate to lose the game 2-1.

It was 0-0 for virtually the whole of the game but Leicester took an undeserved lead through Paul Dickov with eleven minutes to go before Trevor Benjamin added a second four minutes later.

Our consolation came from a stoppage time own goal by Frank Sinclair who had come on as a substitute a minute before Leicester’s first goal.

The one thing I do remember is the incredibly empty Cricket Field Stand despite our opponents on the last charge towards promotion, that suggests we can expect very few visitors tonight.

The teams were,

Burnley: Marlon Beresford, Dean West, Steve Davis, Driss Diallo, Arthur Gnohere (Dimitri Papadopoulos 82), Glen Little, Paul Weller, Paul Cook (Alan Moore 57), Lee Briscoe (Tony Grant 45), Robbie Blake, Ian Moore. Subs not used: Nik Michopoulos, Mark McGregor.


Leicester: Ian Walker, Andy Impey (Frank Sinclair 78), Gerry Taggart, Matt Elliott, Callum Davidson, James Scrowcroft, Billy McKinlay (Trevor Benjamin 74), Muzzy Izzet, Jordan Stewart, Paul Dickov, Brian Deane (Nicky Summerbee 22). Subs not used: Paul Murphy, Jonathan Stephenson.