Deal completed as Leicester City Looks Forward In promotion to the Premier League

Leicester City’s transfer window was always going to be busier than in recent years. In a new league, under a new manager with brand new ideas, deals in and out needed to be done.

             Deal completed as Leicester City Looks Forward In promotion to the Premier League

After eight players left on free transfers, City moved on another seven, including four this week. Importantly, they have added nine, giving Enzo Maresca plenty of new faces to work with. Here’s our look at each completed deal.

An England international who should still have his best years ahead of him, Winks was brought in as a key player and under Maresca he is proving as such. He’s an intelligent midfielder who has now found a club that plays to his strengths after a few years of counter-attacking at Spurs. He will be able to make the step up should City get promoted too, so it’s a smart buy all around.

Typically, Coady has picked up the first injury of his career and so is yet to make his debut, but provided he comes back from his broken foot and performs to the level he did with Wolves, he will be a great purchase. He is already paying off his transfer fee without kicking a ball in the leadership he is showing in following the team home and away and encouraging the young players. At the very least he is a terrific person, and that goes some way to making him a terrific buy.

Callum Doyle

Plenty of players have done a fine job to get City to six wins from six but if a top performer had to be picked from the opening month, it would probably be Doyle. He knew Maresca already and is showing it, fitting in superbly. His passes through the lines are excellent and he has the right level of aggression in his defending too. Already it looks like a deal that the club, the manager, and the fans will rue that it’s only a loan.

Mads Hermansen

The signing of Hermansen feels like it puts City at the forefront of the game. A goalkeeper is so comfortable with his feet that he can step up alongside his defenders is the way the game’s going and the Dane is brilliant at it. So far, he’s been solid with his hands too. At £5m, he could be City’s best buy of the summer.

Stephy Mavididi

An early goal has helped Mavididi make a decent introduction, and his numbers in Ligue 1 suggest he will be able to contribute plenty of goals and assists in the Championship. But as with most wingers, he looks like he will frustrate from time to time. If he fairly regularly delivers winning goals like he did at Huddersfield, the less-impressive performances can be overlooked.

Cesare Casadei

He is clearly a player that Maresca knows and likes and the early signs are that the Chelsea youngster will be a perfect fit. His energetic style and consistent runs into dangerous areas should make him a threat in that number eight role. Like with Doyle, City may get to the end of the season wishing he had arrived on a permanent deal.

Yunus Akgun

A Turkish international with European experience, Yunus looks set to be City’s new starter on the right flank and the next man who will be compared to Riyad Mahrez. He didn’t have the most productive of seasons with Galatasaray last year, but put some excellent numbers the campaign before when he played under Maresca’s mate Vincenzo Montella, which should bode well for the City boss getting the most out of him.

Abdul Fatawu

On the face of it, this is perhaps the most head-scratching signing of the summer. Maresca has confirmed that Fatawu prefers to play on the right side, but with Yunus and Marc Albrighton there, and with Kasey McAteer and Wanya Marcal doing well in their games there, all of a sudden City have a lot of options for one position. It feels like it could limit McAteer and Marcal’s game-time, unless they are handed new roles in midfield or on the left.

Tom Cannon

Being overlooked by a side as crisis-ridden as Everton always seem to be is not necessarily a bad thing. Cannon goals record at Under-21 level is very good and in his first senior spell with Preston last term, he was promising too. With so much room for development, and with Jamie Vardy to learn from, this could be a very good deal.

OUT

James Maddison

For the level of player he is, £40m feels like a steal. Spurs boss Ange Postecoglou has already been asked if he’s a bargain. But City’s hands were tied with just one year remaining on his contract, and at least the transfer was conducted quickly and without drama.

Harvey Barnes

He’s not the star name that Maddison is, but with the consistent numbers of goals and assists he has notched up over a few seasons in a row, again it feels like the fee of £38m is small. He is already off the mark at Newcastle and if they keep playing to his strengths, then he’s quickly going to pay back that outlay.

George Hirst

Hirst had had two previous chances in the Championship and struggled, so it was maybe not a surprise that City weren’t willing to offer him opportunities this season, especially with established strikers in their ranks already. Even if he bags a few for Ipswich this season, it doesn’t feel like a sale City will regret, even at £1.5m.

Timothy Castagne

The Belgian full-back made it very clear very early into the transfer window that he saw his future away from the Championship, so once that was established, City needed to move him on. To get him to Fulham for a fee that could reach £15m – not far off what City paid for him – feels like decent business. Only making a slight loss on a player who gave a good three years of service is not to be concerned about.

Victor Kristiansen

What a shame. Kristiansen was the most enthusiastic City player about a Championship promotion bid, declaring his commitment to the club not long after relegation. But then a new manager came in that didn’t have a role for him and all parties have agreed on an exit to Bologna. With City short of a back-up to Callum Doyle on the left of the back three, there probably would have been game-time for the Dane had he been willing to stick around, but he wouldn’t have been first choice.

As far as Thomas’s loan move away goes, the most important aspect is that he’s not gone to Leeds. To see a local lad and former season-ticket holder turning out and helping one of the club’s promotion rivals would have been a kick in the teeth. Given he’s gone to the Premier League, he can be wished all the best. It was a deal that made sense too, even if he ends up as a back-up for Sheffield United, as Maresca admitted there was not a role for him in his team.

Boubakary Soumare

It’s just not happened for Soumare at City. There would be flashes every now and again of a potentially brilliant, bulldozing midfielder. And then he’d switch off and the good work would be undone. If the Frenchman can become a hit for Sevilla and City can claw some of the £17m back they paid to Lille, they’ll be happy. As for Soumare himself, getting a Champions League club is some going.