Leicester City faced relegation rivals AFC Bournemouth at the King Power Stadium in the hopes of recording their first win after going seven games without a victory. The Foxes were hoping to kickstart a turnaround of form with their result placing them anywhere between 14th and 20th.
Bournemouth had only won two of their 15 away games and City hadn’t won a home game, in the Premier League, since February. With relegation looming the pressure was on for both sides.
Adam Sadler made three changes to his City side that lost 2-1 to Aston Villa in the Premier League on Tuesday evening. Daniel Amartey came in for Harry Souttar, who was dropped to the bench. Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall was suspended after being sent off against Aston Villa on Tuesday as Boubakary Soumare and Ricardo Pereira returned to the side.
Leicester got off to a very slow start but, Bournemouth didn’t look much better. A costly mistake from James Maddison allowed Philip Billing to go through with Iversen and plays the ball past Iversen with ease. After an uninspiring first-half, it didn’t get much better until Daka and Iheancho came on as substitutions. Although the substitutions made an impact they weren’t enough to get Leicester back into the game. The crowd were up for the game, but the players looked passionless and like a team that had given up. The match finished 1-0 to Bournemouth on a sunny Filbert Way.
Leicester City goalkeeper and defenders
Daniel Iversen: 7 – Made a lot of good saves, kept Leicester in the game and prevented it from being a higher scoreline. He dived down well to save Billing’s shot from outside the box in the first 25 minutes, his goal kicks weren’t great at times with a few going out for throw-ins.
Timothy Castagne: 4 – Caught out of position, gave his man too much room and too much time on the ball. There were too many Bournemouth chances created down his side of the pitch.
Daniel Amartey: 5 – Made some good defensive headers and clearances. Did look panicked with the ball at times, tried to stand his ground, but Solanke was all over him.
Wout Faes: 6 – Made some strong defensive tackles, in particular he made a goal-saving tackle as Solanke goes to shoot, Faes flew in from nowhere to block it. He played a nice ball to send Barnes chasing after it up the wing, but there was too much on it and it went out of play.
Victor Kristiansen: 5 – Gave Bournemouth a foul on the edge of the box, crossed a nice ball into the box, but Vardy couldn’t connect with it.
Midfielders and striker
Wilfred Ndidi: 6 – Came across to make some good tackles, tried to get himself between his man and the ball.
Boubakary Soumare: 6 – Struggled to control the ball at times and at one point even passed it out of play, made poor decisions with the ball in the in the first half. Looked like a much better player in the second-half with more confidence.
James Maddison: 4 – Gave the ball away in front of the Leicester box. He was completely at fault for the goal, he played a short back pass, which is cut out by Billing and played it past Iversen.
Ricardo Pereria: 4 – Made a silly pass to allow Bournemouth to make a dangerous attack, made some good forward runs, but didn’t have a lot of support.
Harvey Barnes: 4 – Let Bournemouth player get hold of the ball after not playing Kristiansen in first time and allowed the Cherries to run down the wing. Couldn’t keep the ball when under pressure.
Jamie Vardy: 4 – Did jump in defensively to stop a shot, closed and chased players down in the first-half and communicated well. Caught offside too many times, wasn’t a goal-threat.
Substitutions
Patson Daka: 4 – Gave away too many fouls, there wasn’t a lot of space for him to make runs and create any opportunities.
Kelechi Iheanacho: 5 – Made an immediate impact, is able to hold the ball up and create space.
Tete: 4 – Didn’t hold his position on the wing and kept coming too deep for balls.
Dennis Praet: N/A – Wasn’t on for long but didn’t have an influence and disappeared into the game.