Leicester City’s three forwards have managed just one goal between them across eight fixtures but boss Marti Cifuentes has insisted that it’s not an issue.
Jordan Ayew, who had started every Championship clash before Tuesday, has a single goal to his name, while Patson Daka and Julian Carranza are yet to find the net from their mostly cameo outings so far.
Aside from Charlton, Portsmouth and Blackburn, every other side in the Championship either has a striker on at least two goals for the campaign, or their centre-forward options combined have a minimum of two goals between them.
But the absence of a prolific finisher leading the line is not a worry for Cifuentes. He is unconcerned about who scores as long as City create and convert enough as a group.
City’s tally of 10 places them joint-eighth for goals scored, although their overall expected goals figure of 8.6 ranks joint-17th.
Cifuentes also highlighted deadline-day arrivals Jordan James and Aaron Ramsey as potential contributors, with James netting his first for the club on Tuesday night and Ramsey back from suspension for this weekend’s trip to Swansea.
“The first problem would be if we are not creating chances,” Cifuentes said. “That would be a problem. We can get much better on this, but definitely we are creating enough chances to score.
“The second problem would be if we were not scoring at all. That would be a huge problem. But that’s not the case either. We need to score more goals, that’s the reality, but who scores is not that important.
“I understand that everybody wants a striker who can score 35 goals in a season, but it’s not that easy, for Leicester or for any club in the world.
“We try to use their strengths in different ways. It’s not the same when we play with Jordan (Ayew), who has played a lot of minutes in this nine position, and we perhaps ask other players around him to do certain things. It might be different if it’s Pato, who played on Tuesday.
“We try always to adapt. Then the way to attack, it’s not the same against a back five, it’s not the same against a back four.
“Definitely we want them to score goals. We definitely think they have the capacity to score goals. From them we need a certain amount of goals during the season.
“This certain amount, whether it’s 10, 20, or 30, it depends on how we attack and how other players can contribute.
“That’s one of the reasons we brought in Aaron Ramsey and Jordan James because they can score from the second lines, they have this capacity to help us.
“Set-plays are an important part of it. So we can score as well from set-plays. I don’t care who scores, the important thing is we create chances and we score.”
With Daka starting against Wrexham, City carried more threat inside the penalty area than when Ayew features, with the Ghanaian tending to drop deeper to link play.
Cifuentes’ mention of consistency indicates Daka could start again when City head to South Wales.
The manager added: “What we try to do is analyse how they train, who we play against, whether we’re playing against a high or a low block, whether we’re playing against a back five or a back four.
“Then it’s about how they defend, how Swansea defend the box, it’s different to how Coventry defend the box. We try always to analyse this and then taking the right decision.
“Plus, it’s about giving continuity as well. Sometimes it’s very harsh to judge a player when they play just 20 minutes or 30 minutes there or start just two or three games in a row.”