Midfield general Drinkwater waits for Leicester offer

STEGERSBACH

Leicester City midfielder Danny Drinkwater admits he is still waiting for a new contract offer despite the Premier League champions moving to secure the futures of other stars.

The 26-year-old England international, who played a pivotal role in last season's remarkable title success, has seen contracts offered this summer to key trio Jamie Vardy, N'Golo Kante and Riyad Mahrez.

Vardy has already signed his four-year deal — a second new contract in the last year — after rejecting a move to Arsenal.

Drinkwater says he would also like to commit his future to the East Midlands club.

"I am not going chasing the club," said Drinkwater.

"It is up to them to approach me.

"I would love to commit but I just want to play football.

"I still have two years left on my contract so it is not a be all and end all if I don't sign a new one in the next few weeks.

"I'm still under contract so I can't really say too much but I'm a Leicester City player at the minute.

"It's up to them how they handle it."

Winger Marc Albrighton and captain Wes Morgan are among other players still waiting for offers after Vardy's future dominated the agenda in the close season.

"Arsenal are a massive club and a club a lot of people would love to play for so 'Vards' committing his future to Leicester must put the club in a good light," said Drinkwater.

Leicester are globe-trotting this summer to gear up for the new season, with this week's training camp in Austria followed by friendlies in Glasgow, Los Angeles and Stockholm against Celtic, Paris Saint Germain and Barcelona respectively.

That is ahead of their first ever Champions League campaign and Manchester United fan Drinkwater admits he used to watch his own heroes in the competition, even paying for a tour of Barcelona's Nou Camp stadium.

"As a fan you just look at the players walking out and you are buzzing for them," he said.

"So if I'm the one they're buzzing for that adds a bit more excitement.

"I remember in Moscow, when we beat Chelsea in the final, they kept us in the stadium for about two hours afterwards and I was raging.

"We nearly missed the flight home because of it but we were celebrating so it wasn't too bad!"

Now Drinkwater is targeting European glory and an England place after missing out on Roy Hodgson's final Euro 2016 squad.

"If there was something I could have done more to get in the squad I would have done it, but I am not sure there was," he said.

"Roy pulled me into a room and explained the situation and I understood what he was saying.

"I was disappointed but there was nothing I could have done by that stage."