Leicester City Fan View: Time is up for Ahmed Musa and Leonardo Ulloa

Claude Puel’s been very open and honest in his assessment of the Leicester City squad. There are gaps, weaknesses and a surplus up front. With the Foxes dipping into the transfer market and signing a young forward, Fousseni Diabate, this surely means at least two strikers will be leaving this January. Puel has his chance to put his own mark on this team and the latest arrival continues his intent to add a more youthful edge to the Foxes.

Arrival of Fousseni Diabate may signal the end for Ahmed Musa

Diabate arrives from Ligue 2 side, Gazélec Ajaccio, costing just two million euros. It’s actually quite refreshing to make a more sensible purchase after a few seasons of big fees and little reward. He’s not a household name and at twenty-two, it’s probably more of a plan for the future. Admittedly though, it’s exciting. Simply in the sense that our last three purchases from the French league have all been relatively unknown, cheap and turned into stars for us. Anthony Knockaert, Riyad Mahrez and N’Golo Kante didn’t exactly get fans jumping for joy upon signing, but few regret having had the pleasure of watching them.

While Diabate’s immediate playing future isn’t clear, adding yet another forward to this squad signals the end for some. Virtually every single player has had at least some game time under Puel. Except Ahmed Musa. We’ll likely not make any money from a loan move, or a sale, but it seems best to part ways. It’s been an incredibly unsuccessful transfer for us both. Clearly Musa is not a terrible player, his record at CSKA Moscow testifies to that, but it has never and seemingly wasn’t ever going to transfer to us.

Musa likely won’t be the only departure either. Keeping so many strikers who aren’t playing regularly happy is challenging. With Puel looking to throw his weight of support to Islam Slimani and giving Kelechi Iheanacho another chance, it’s likely that player will be Leonardo Ulloa.

READ MORE: Leicester City yet to find a way to accommodate Kelechi Iheanacho

Leonardo Ulloa’s key moments for Foxes won’t be forgotten

What Ulloa has done for Leicester during his time means we’ll always be thankful. Brought in as Nigel Pearson’s main signing in our first Premier League season, he wasn’t cheap. It also gave him the infamous, annoyingly catchy, song. If you’re a Leicester fan, you’re already singing it in your head, apologies. It would have been timely to have departed with Ulloa at some point last season. Already down the pecking order, that didn’t look to improve with the direction we wanted to take our playing style in, or with the signings we made. Despite a rather public fallout with the club, Ulloa instead signed a new deal during the summer.

Playing time still limited, Ulloa has failed to make the substitutes bench in recent weeks. His absence from involvement during the FA Cup tie at Fleetwood, suggests he’ll be moving on. His time will be looked back on fondly though and we owe our thanks for the goals and the memories. During his first season, he was our top scorer, getting as many goals as anybody was going to in a team who just weren’t scoring enough. During the great escape, he played his part. A goal at Newcastle particularly memorable.

Personally, the moment that springs to mind is the penalty against West Ham. It was a penalty in the last minutes of a game we were losing 2-1. With Arsenal and Tottenham still on our heels, the significance of a home loss could have been huge. Ulloa hadn’t started many games that season but with our star men already off the pitch, he stepped up. It felt like a long wait until he could take it but he stayed cool and put it away as calmly as you’d like. His celebration, and the stadium’s, was anything but calm or collected. Coming during our tough spell of that season, he, and several other fringe players, contributed in their own important ways.

He deserves the chance to play more regularly than we can offer and if he does depart this January, we’ll wish him the best.

READ MORE: Numbers don’t necessarily equate to squad depth for Claude Puel