Leicester City U23 manager Steven Beaglehole has revealed that Calvin Bassey used to hate playing as a center back during his days at the Foxes Academy.
Predominantly a left-back, the Italian-born Bassey was mostly used as a central defender in his final season at Leicester City, 2019-2020, and it is unclear whether it contributed to his decision to leave the Foxes for Glasgow Rangers at the end of the season.
In search of a left-footed central defender, Nigeria manager Gernot Rohr handed a maiden call-up to the Rangers starlet for this month's games against Central African Republic after failing to land his primary targets Jordan
Torunarigha (Hertha Berlin) and Felix Uduokhai (Augsburg).
Manager of the Light Blues, Steven Gerrard has asked Bassey to deputize at center back and he has not done badly in his less preferred position on the pitch.
In quotes relayed by The Sun citing The Athletic, Beaglehole stated : "He was a left-back. He rebelled early on about playing centre-back.
"He didn’t start the season particularly well a couple of years ago and got injured. Luke Thomas had come up and was knocking the door down and I said (to Bassey), ‘Listen, he’s staying in there. I’m going to play you at centre-back’.
"He said he didn’t want to so I said he could be on the bench then. He didn’t like it as he’s a strong character but he played centre-back anyway and was outstanding.
"He didn’t start the season particularly well a couple of years ago and got injured. Luke Thomas had come up and was knocking the door down and I said (to Bassey), ‘Listen, he’s staying in there. I’m going to play you at centre-back’.
"He said he didn’t want to so I said he could be on the bench then. He didn’t like it as he’s a strong character but he played centre-back anyway and was outstanding.
"I said, ‘You played well there’, and he said, ‘Yeah, but I still hate it!’."
Bassey remains eligible to wear the colours of Italy and England as he wasn't cap-tied by the Nigeria Football Federation in the recent World Cup qualifiers against Central African Republic.
Ifeanyi Emmanuel
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