Leicester City 2-4 Newcastle: 5 talking points from disappointing display
By Nathan Wong
A dire display saw Leicester City fall to a shock two-goal defeat at the hands of Newcastle United. Such a shocking defeat prompts unwelcome reminders of Leicester’s capitulation to Bournemouth last season. After all, both games happened in Gameweek 35 and Leicester’s fixtures afterwards included – Spurs and Manchester United. No Foxes fan needs to be reminded of last season’s events but the similarities are chilling.
Despite the presence of Khun Top Srivaddhanaprabha, who was attending his first game in over a year, LCFC instead put out their worst performance of the season. Having to watch this display must have been a massive disappointment for our Thai owner, who is a much-loved part of the football club.
From an evening where exasperation reigned, here are the best attempts to pick out the bones from a disastrous display.
1. A comedy of errors
No, this is not a review of a Shakespeare play, although the performance for much of the game had hallmarks of the aforementioned comedy.
Slapstick defending was certainly a significant reason for Leicester’s demise with two of the goals, in particular, caused by individual errors from Söyüncü and Castagne. Furthermore, without Evans, the defence, in general, looked as wobbly as jelly, which is another matter in itself.
Although not comedic compared to some of the other goals, the second represented another conceded from a set-piece, with Fofana the latest to lose his marker. Unsurprisingly, the Newcastle scorer Dummett had not scored for five years, continuing Leicester’s unfortunate habit of helping goal-shy players end their barren runs.
Even when taking the Newcastle goals out of the equation, Leicester made far too many errors in possession, not just in the way it was moved too slowly, but also in misplacing passes. Countless times, seemingly simple passes were put out of play or were behind their target. This helped to slow down the game and disrupt Leicester’s rhythm, whilst giving Newcastle’s defence a very easy job.