The unspoken error Leicester’s board made last summer which is costing them Premier League safety

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Leicester City endured a pretty miserable winter transfer window.

Ruud van Nistelrooy had hoped for at least four new additions through the door but ultimately, Woyo Coulibaly was his only signing.

That leaves Leicester particularly short at centre-back and on the flanks, so at this stage, it’s hard to see a way out of the relegation zone.

The Foxes are currently two points adrift of safety and have an incredibly tough run of fixtures on the horizon.

City’s biggest issue this season has been defensively as they’ve kept just one clean sheet, which came in a 1-0 win against Bournemouth back in October.

With that said, it’s now becoming pretty evident that the Leicester board made a key error last summer that’s gone relatively under the radar.

• READ MORE: How Khun Top truly feels about Leicester’s lack of transfer business

Leicester made an error in loaning Harry Souttar and Ben Nelson

It’s become clear that Leicester made a real error in loaning out Harry Souttar and Ben Nelson, who are both plying their trade in the Championship.

Souttar was sent on loan to promotion hopefuls Sheffield United at the start of the season and was widely regarded as one of the best defenders in the league up until he suffered a season-ending injury.

The same goes for Nelson, who was excelling at Oxford United before sustaining a quad injury which required surgery.

In fact, Oxford fans compared him to John Stones with many suggesting he’s one of the best players to wear the shirt in recent history.

Nelson is continuing his recovery at Seagrave but the hope is that he can return to Oxford towards the latter stages of the season.

Both could’ve played key parts in the first half of Leicester’s campaign and the decision to ship them out in favour of Wout Faes, Conor Coady, Jannik Vestergaard and Caleb Okoli, has proved a bad one.

There’s certainly an argument to be had that Nelson and Souttar are better than the current quartet of City centre-backs.

Ben Nelson will play a big part in Leicester’s future

Nelson is widely regarded as one of Leicester’s most promising young players and will likely play a big part in the future of the football club.

Enzo Maresca was a huge fan of Nelson and even started him over the more experienced Conor Coady on multiple occasions during the promotion-winning campaign last season.

Nelson, who has been capped at youth level by England, is expected to be in van Nistelrooy’s first-team set-up next year, whether that’s in the Premier League or Championship.

The 20-year-old has an exciting future ahead of him.