Hull 0 Leicester 1
Report by Kate Thompson
After a dreadful three months for the long-suffering Leicester fans, not to mention the club, we at last saw a win. Despite some good performances, where the result did not reflect the effort and skill on show, we managed a scruffy win against a team struggling nearly as much as we are.
Pearson made two enforced changes, for Andy King (who went off injured in the Boxing Day game against Spurs) and Jamie Vardy (who picked up a fifth yellow card and therefore missed the game against Hull). In came Cambiasso and Vardy, with the rest of the team the one that started against Spurs.
City were the more dominant for much of the first half and Mahrez scored the only goal in the 32nd minute and to everyone’s relief Hull were unable to get on level terms, or even go on to win. City rode their luck, especially towards the end of the game, when the ball was pinging in and out of the penalty area for what seemed like several lifetimes! In the first half, Elmohamady missed what looked like a certain goal and Hull had several other chances which fortunately were not taken.
The goal started with Ulloa’s incisive pass to Nugent who laid the ball off to Mahrez, who cut inside and scored in the left-hand corner of the goal. There didn’t seem to be much power on the shot, but it beat the Hull goalkeeper, McGregor quite easily – cue pandemonium in the away end.
Cambiasso was showing his class and demonstrated that you can influence a game without running yourself ragged; he alone gives me some hope that we will survive.
Despite his part in the goal, I thought that David Nugent had a poor game but played the whole match, probably because Ulloa was substituted by Chris Wood in the 55th minute; apparently he is OK, but had run himself into the ground. Drinkwater and De Laet came on in the 71st minute for Cambiasso and Mahrez, but none of the substitutes made much of an impact on the game.
I thought that Konchesky went some way to answering his critics, but he was given two bookings, leading to a red card right at the end of the game. Seeing his apparent offence for the second booking later on ‘Match of the day’, there didn’t seem to be much wrong with it, but as Vardy discovered on Boxing Day, much smaller infringements appear to be punished in the Premier League.
Hull’s Quinn got a straight red shortly afterwards for handling the ball when he was the last man; this seemed equally harsh as, despite Nugent’s protests, I couldn’t really see him scoring. Danny Simpson was also booked in the first half.
The final 15 minutes were largely played at the end furthest away from the Leicester fans and again I had to rely on the television to see what happened. There were two shots which hit an upright and numerous blocks, tackles and goal-line clearances. But this time the players showed their determination to see out the game and earn a precious three points. Whether this will turn out to be a turning-point remains to be seen, and is in the lap of the gods.
Leicester: Hamer, Simpson, Wasilewski, Morgan, Konchesky, Mahrez (De Laet 71), Cambiasso (Drinkwater 71), James, Schlupp, Nugent, Ulloa (Wood 55). Subs not used: Hammond, Moore, Knockaert, Smith
Hull City: McGregor, Livermore, Bruce, Davies, Rosenior, Elmohamady, Meyler (Ince 61), Quinn, Brady, Aluko (Hernandez 62), Ramirez (Jelavic 46). Subs not used: Figueroa, Maguire, Sagbo, Harper
Attendance: 23,809 Referee: Phil Dowd
The views expressed in this report are the opinions of the Trust member nominated to file the report only and do not represent the views of the Foxes Trust organisation