Arsenal missing out on Jamie Vardy was a blessing in disguise, says Jamie Carragher

Jamie Carragher says it is "a good job" Arsenal missed out on signing Leicester City forward Jamie Vardy and thinks the struggling Premier League champions are simply "not that good". The Foxes slumped to another dismal home defeat at the hands of Manchester United on Sunday 5 February and currently sit just one point above the relegation zone.

Claudio Ranieri's men are completely out of form and Vardy seems to have lost his midas touch in front of goal - the England international had notched 18 goals this time last season; he has just five in the current campaign, with three of them coming in Leicester's 4-2 victory over Manchester City.

Vardy was heavily linked with a move to Arsenal in the summer but in the end opted to stay with Leicester and signed a four-year deal believed to be worth around £120,000 per week. Carragher believes the 29-year-old's rejection turned out to be good news for the Gunners, and criticised the quality of player available to Ranieri at The King Power Stadium.

When reminded that Arsenal were ready to spend £25m on Vardy, Carragher said on Sky Sports, as quoted by The Metro: "Well it's a good job they didn't. Those players are just not that good, they won the league. It was a freak. We all loved it – the story, the celebrations on the pitch – but in reality you know that they're not that good. There's no superstars out there."

Gary Neville agreed with his fellow pundit and singled out Vardy in particular, saying that he needs to become a "non-league centre-forward" again.

"Vardy needs to go back to being a non-league centre-forward again. Run, be horrible and nasty – forget about holding the ball up," said Neville. "Go back to being horrible to play against. That was the strength of his game [last season]. He's lived off shocking service but he needs to be horrible to play against."