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One of the great advantages of English football’s packed Christmas schedule is that it leaves very little time for brooding. Has your team somehow managed to crash out of the League Cup away to Championship opposition? Don’t worry! There’ll be a league game just a couple of days later, and you can forget all about it ...
... unless, of course, Manchester United find a way to mess this up too.
And here we should note that Leicester City, after a wobbly start to the season, are distinctly awkward opponents. They haven’t been perfect since Claude Puel took over, but they have been dangerous, and the marauding front three of Jamie Vardy, Riyadh Mahrez and Demarai Gray is enough to give even the sturdiest of defences conniptions. And United’s defence? It ain’t the sturdiest.
On that note, it looks like Antonio Valencia is missing today with hamstring fatigue, so once again Jose Mourinho is going to have to reshuffle things at the back. Also absent with injury are Eric Bailly, Michael Carrick, and Marouane Fellaini, while Daley Blind and Matteo Darmian have been omitted from the squad for reasons of professional humiliation.
In the wider scheme of things, Arsenal and Liverpool drew last night in hilarious fashion, but City and Chelsea with both have played by the time United kick off. Chelsea have a tricky away game against Everton to negotiate, but City are at home to Bournemouth, who are very accommodating opposition. So United will likely be 14 points behind when they kick off.
Premier League schedule
We kick off at 19.45 in Leicester, which is 14.45 on the east coast of the USA and 11.45 over on the west. Just time to finish off your brunch.
Premier League TV channel
Sky Sports Main Event in the UK, NBC USA in the USA, and livesoccertv for the rest of you.
Premier League streaming
Sky Sports Go in the UK, and NBC Sports Live in the USA.
Starting lineup
We can probably assume Mourinho will be out on some kind of punishment jag after the debacle in the League Cup, so your guess is as good as ours. And our guess is: David de Gea, Ashley Young, Phil Jones, Chris Smalling, Marcos Rojo, Luke Shaw, Nemanja Matic, Ander Herrera, Paul Pogba, Anthony Martial, Romelu Lukaku.
It's Lindelöf at right-back, and a return to the current first choice front six.
#MUFC's starting XI to face Leicester City tonight... pic.twitter.com/N3HDIER4fp
— Manchester United (@ManUtd) December 23, 2017
Full lineups to follow once we have them. This will also be our live thread for the game, so do join us in the comments below.