Leicester City were still searching for their first win in the Premier League since the winter break, after losing 2-0 to East Midland rivals Nottingham Forest last Saturday at the City Ground. This time their opponents were high-flying Brighton & Hove Albion, who have enjoyed a good season so far and had beaten Liverpool 3-0 in their last Premier League game. Here are Foxes of Leicester’s player ratings for the match.
Brendan Rodgers made two changes to his Leicester side that lost 2-0 to Nottingham Forest last weekend: Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall replaces Wilfred Ndidi and Dennis Praet for Marc Albrighton. Palms were on LCFC fans faces when Brighton went 1-0 up as Leicester haven’t won a game when the opposition scores first.
However, hope was restored when super-sub Albrighton slotted home for the Foxes with fans commenting they’d forgotten what the ‘goal-music sounded like’, City haven’t scored a goal at home since the 20th October against Leeds United. It all started to look like the east Midlands team would take all three points when Harvey Barnes slotted in at the back post from a corner to put the Foxes 2-1 up, but in true Leicester fashion the Seagulls scored with just two minutes to go and managed to snatch a point. It ended 2-2 on a cold Saturday afternoon at the King Power Stadium.
Leicester City goalkeeper and defenders
Danny Ward: 7 – not much he could do about Brighton’s first goal, made a few important saves to deny Brighton including one with his thigh to deny Mac Allister.
Timothy Castagne : 6 – allowed Kaoru Mitoma to cut inside too easily for the goal, provided some nice flick ons to Praet after goal kicks.
Daniel Amartey: 5 – let the Seasiders’ players beat him too easily, won headers easily while under pressure but lost self-control towards the end of the game, watched Evan Ferguson head the ball into the net for the second goal.
Wout Faes: 5 – played a few nice balls out from the back, dived into balls too recklessly at times.
Luke Thomas: 5 – allowed his man to run past him too many times, was lucky that Danny Welbeck’s penalty appeal wasn’t given, his flick on was important in setting up Barnes’ goal.
Nampalys Mendy: 7 – made some good passes to help Leicester out going forwards, good defensively and was always picking up balls in the middle of the park.
Midfielders
Youri Tielemans: 5 – played a nice ball up to Praet which ended up with a Leicester corner, sliding defensive tackles, won the ball off a BHAFC player but unfortunately there were no Leicester players in front of him to pass to.
Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall: 6 – made things happen going forward for Leicester by moving around the pitch to create space and by picking balls up in Brighton’s half.
Dennis Praet: 6 – made a nice run in on goal during the first-half but was unlucky that KDH hadn’t spotted him, was involved in Leicester’s first chance of the game and ended up winning a corner, he was doing really well before he went off injured.
Harvey Barnes: 5 – stood in space watching the ball rather than following his man too often and left Luke Thomas to deal with two men because of this, wasted a good chance in front of goal by providing a poor pass to Vardy rather than going for goal himself, he lost possession of the ball too easily, good finish for Leicester’s second goal.
Strikers
Jamie Vardy: 5 – looked slow, made some runs to pull the opposition players out of position and create space but didn’t impact the match that much.
Substitutions
Marc Albrighton: 6 – calmly slotted the ball past Sanchez for his goal and first involvement in the game, helped out defensively and would bust a gut to get back and help Castagne out.
James Maddison: 6 – was nice to see him back on the pitch after two months, his footwork was just as good as before, did lose the ball a few times.
Patson Daka: N/A – didn’t play for long enough to have an impact on the game.