Ben Dinnery

Thu 7 July 2022 12:19, UK

It is no surprise that Leicester City were among the most injury-hit teams in 2021-22 given the “extraordinary” demands their players were under.

That is the view of injury expert Ben Dinnery, who runs the Premier Injuries site and has a background in medicine and data analysis.

Data collected by Premier Injuries and published by Dinnery via Twitter last Wednesday (29 June) shows that Leicester suffered the joint-most hamstring injuries in the top flight in 2021-22.

The Foxes and Watford suffered 12 in total for a campaign that was heavily affected by Covid and the after-effects of the European Championship.

Dinnery insists that there are several mitigating factors for Leicester’s injury record.

“We always have to talk about context,” he told Football Insider’s Adam Williams.

“First and foremost, we’re not comparing like-for-like. Leicester were involved in a lot European games last season. The sheer volume of additional minutes is always going to put extraordinary demands on players.

“The fact that players struggled more with soft tissue problems doesn’t really come as any great surprise. There were periods in the season when they were really stretched in terms of players in key positions.

“When you are alternating between European competitions and the Premier League, you don’t always have the opportunities to rest players. Sometimes you take that risk, but it’s a very fine balance.

“Sometimes it pays off, sometimes it doesn’t. So, it’s not a reflection against the players themselves or the backroom staff.

“In hindsight, you might ask about recruitment. Could they have tried to bring a few more bodies in?

“But then you have to balance that with player management. You’ve got to keep a full squad happy. That’s not easy.

“So, I wouldn’t want to single out a single department or team because you never understand the full story.”

In other news, Newcastle United and Leicester City race to sign Boubacar Traore after Wolves bid rejected.