Why Leicester City would be smart to cash in on Demarai Gray
As per Mirror, Leicester City are pondering over the sale of Demarai Gray who seems to have fallen down the pecking order and is in the last year of his contract.
Profile
Demarai Gray is a 24-year-old English forward who plays for Leicester City. He started his youth career at Birmingham City’s academy in 2006. Spending 6 years in the youth side, he was promoted to the U-18s.
After two more seasons, he was given a crack in the senior team and was handed his debut against Millwall in October 2013. From the next season, he started to feature on a more regular basis. He made a total of 78 appearances for Birmingham City, scoring 8 goals and assisting 4 more.
Leicester signed him in 2016 and became an immediate first-team player. He was given more and more game time as the seasons progressed. To date, Gray has made 168 appearances for Leicester, scoring 13 goals and assisting 17 (source – Transfermarkt). The winger has been a common name in the England youth teams but is yet to receive a call-up to the senior side.
Why Leicester need to cash in on Gray
Demarai Gray is in the last year of his contract and will be free to talk to clubs in January next year regarding a free transfer in the summer. That would leave Leicester empty-handed and a player less. It’s not to say that Gray has not been a good player for the club but he’s shown flashes of brilliance on a few occasions.
Another factor is the emergence of local lad Harvey Barnes. The wide man has made the left-wing his own and is also in line for a new contract (h/t The Telegraph). This shows that Barnes is clearly Brendan Rodgers’ first choice in that position.
At 24 years of age, Gray needs to be playing on a regular basis and not second fiddle. That looks a bit hard to come by at Leicester. The club also needs to review the situation and think of possible solutions. The most feasible one, however, looks like sanctioning a sale by today, or before the end of the domestic window.
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Gray will command a decent fee given his age and talent. Plus, with so many wingers in the squad such as Rachid Ghezzal, Cengiz Under and Ayoze Perez, it wouldn’t seem too bad a decision to let Gray leave.
