Ruud van Nistelrooy point made as Leicester City survival chances assessed after Liverpool defeat
Midfielder Wilfred Ndidi has backed Ruud van Nistelrooy to steer Leicester City to Premier League survival as the team are “up for” the fight.
City put in a spirited display away to league leaders Liverpool on Boxing Day, but a valiant effort failed to yield any return as they fell to a 3-1 loss at Anfield.
They had gone into the game knowing only a win would lift them out of the bottom three, having dropped into the relegation zone earlier in the day when they were leapfrogged by Wolverhampton Wanderers. The visitors threatened to spring a surprise when Jordan Ayew opened the scoring but the table-toppers responded by coming from behind to win.
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It meant a third successive defeat for Van Nistelrooy’s side and next up is a clash with reigning champions Manchester City at the King Power Stadium on Sunday (2.30pm kick-off). However, sidelined midfielder Ndidi is confident the recently-installed Dutchman can get the club out of trouble.
“He’s an amazing manager with an amazing personality who is trying to put the team together,” he told Nigerian newspaper Punch. “He’s building up from there and with time we will get his philosophy and win games. There are still many games to play and we are up for it.
“We have the quality to remain in the league. Things are not going the right way now but we have the quality to get there with time.”
Van Nistelrooy took heart from the visitors’ display on Merseyside. He knows their season will not be decided by games such as the one against Liverpool.
“It’s up to us to keep developing, to keep doing what we’re doing, keep creating game plans for every opponent and think how we can win the game,” he said after the full-time whistle. “The players know what to do and they acted on it and today it was the maximum possible.
“Of course, Anfield is not the place where usually we have to collect the points, these will be in other games, but for our development and to keep improving we have to do it because the points need to be collected.”
