Brendan Rodgers can implement Leicester City plan against Manchester United after year-long wait

James Justin is close to completing his third season at Leicester City and in that time he has started just four games with Ricardo Pereira.

There are obvious reasons for that. Not only do they principally play in the same position, at right-back, but they have tended to pick up injuries just as the other is returning to fitness.

However, they both have other roles they can play that makes it a possibility they could feature together. In their four matches alongside one another, Ricardo has been at right-back, while Justin has been at left-back. In the one game they won when they both started, at Fulham last season, Justin even got on the scoresheet.

But in those four games, Timothy Castagne was not fit. In fact, since all three have been at the club, there have been just three fixtures in which they have all been in the matchday squad, the 2-0 home win over Chelsea and the 3-1 home defeat to Leeds last January (Castagne got injured in latter and was replaced by Ricardo), and then the win over Brentford last time out in which Ricardo was an unused substitute.

This weekend’s match against Manchester United could be the fourth. But is there a way to get all three in the starting line-up? After all, the trio rank among City’s best players, and it feels like an opportunity missed to leave one out.

Well, there are two ways. If Brendan Rodgers was to opt for a back three, Justin could play with two centre-backs in the middle and then Ricardo and Castagne could operate as wing-backs.

The other option is something Rodgers suggested more than a year ago, and tried for the final 15 minutes of that Chelsea game. When Ricardo first returned from his long knee ligament injury, he was coming back into a side where Justin was the