Emile Heskey believes that missing out on the Champions League will not stop the likes of Robin Gosens signing for Brendan Rodgers’ Leicester City, speaking to HITC.
As Gareth Bale sauntered through a weary backline to hammer the final nail into Leicester’s Champions League coffin, a deflated Foxes fanbase might have feared the worst.
Would another season without a place at Europe’s top table halt the progress of a side who have improved year on year since Rodgers took over?
Would Youri Tielemans, Wesley Fofana or Harvey Barnes now follow Ben Chilwell, Harry Maguire and N’Golo Kante out of the door?
Would the likes of Robin Gosens, Atalanta’s £35 million-rated Germany international, turn down a move to Leicester in favour of a bigger offer from elsewhere?
According to Tuttomercatoweb, Leicester have held initial talks with one of the continent’s most swashbuckling full-backs.
Gosens, however, was unwilling to commit to the Foxes until Champions League football was secured.
And now that their worst fears have come to pass, can Leicester be ruled out of the race for ‘defender’ whose tally of 12 goals and eight assists would make Trent Alexander-Arnold look like Tony Hibbert?
Well, perhaps not.
Will Robin Gosens now turn down Leicester City?
With Brendan Rodgers still at the helm, Leicester remain an alluring destination for up-and-coming talents like Gosens – Champions League football or not.
“I think, first and foremost, they’ve had a phenomenal season. Brendan has done a fantastic job. Is it a bad season (because they missed out on the Champions League)? No it’s not, because they won the FA Cup,” says Heskey, the former Filbert Street hero.
“I don’t see it stopping them going after the targets that they want because the targets they want are not the ones Manchester United or Man City are going to go after.
“When you’re looking at Brendan Rodgers and what he’s achieved, I don’t think you’ll find one player with a bad word to say about him and I don’t think you’ll find one player who’s worked under him who’s gone backwards.
“Everyone has gone forward. He’s made household names out of, I wouldn’t say average players, but they weren’t top players.”
Given the imprint Rodgers left on Raheem Sterling, Philipp Coutinho, Kieran Tierney, Moussa Dembele, Youri Tielemans, Harvey Barnes, Kelechi Iheanacho and more, just imagine what the Leicester boss could do if he got his mitts on Gosens too.
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