Brighton 0 City 2
Report by Kate Thompson
Like the Crystal Palace game, this was one where I thought we might come unstuck, but as most pundits went for a Brighton win, I was happy to be proved wrong.
City started strongly and could have scored within minutes of the start; Barnes hit a shot just over the bar, Perez hit the bar and Vardy had a header saved by Ryan. At this stage it was looking good and the awful weather reminded us of games against Newcastle and Southampton in the pouring rain – and they both turned out well!
As the game went on and City dominated without scoring, some doubts started to creep in. Brighton finished the first half the stronger and carried on in the second half; despite this it turned out that they didn’t have a single shot on target.
Finally, in the 64th minute City broke the deadlock. From a Brighton corner, the players broke quickly with Vardy, as ever, spring-heeled and leaving the defenders for dead. Very unselfishly, considering an almost identical move only minutes before broke down when Perez took too long, he squared the ball for a simple tap-in for the Spaniard. How many players in a similar situation would have thought ‘Well he messed it up last time, I am going to have a go myself now’.
Only minutes later Vardy was one on one with Ryan but the goalkeeper made a good block. Brighton had their chances and might have had a penalty; fortunately, Mike Dean waved away any appeals and it seemed that the Brighton player had made a meal of it.
In the 82nd minute Gray was fouled just inside the box, for what seemed a rather soft penalty. Vardy struck the ball well as ever, but Ryan guessed the right way and pushed it away, only for Maddison to follow up with a good header.
Then VAR came into play and it appeared that several players had encroached into the box before Vardy took the penalty, so it was taken again and this time he made no mistake.
So that is five games on the bounce for him – is he going to beat his own record?! Incidentally, is that the first time that Dean has been kind to Leicester?
Maddison later tweeted that it was not the 23rd birthday present he hoped for and it was ages before the scoreboard removed the goal symbol next to his name.
Despite Brighton’s lack of fire power they worked hard but the defence held firm, with Soyuncu continuing his impressive season. Evans had to go off in the 62nd minute and was replaced by Morgan; Rodgers said afterwards that it was only cramp and that Johnny had not been able to train fully after a few days in hospital for an undisclosed stomach problem.
Praet replaced Perez in the 70th minute and Gray came on for Barnes in the 78th.
Once again Leicester proved that a team who play for each other can beat 11 so-called super stars any day of the week. The one player who was somewhat below his normal excellent standard was Tielemans, but it hardly mattered. So we continue to dream.
Brighton: Ryan, Montoya, Duffy, Webster, Burn, Mooy, Propper, Stephens, Trossard, March, Maupay. Subs: Balogun, Schelotto, Button, Murray, Jahanbakhsh, Bissouma, Groß
Leicester: Schmeichel, Pereira, Evans, Soyuncu, Chilwell, Ndidi, Perez, Tielemans, Maddison, Barnes, Vardy. Subs: Ward. Morgan, Iheanacho, Gray, Albrighton. Praet. Justin
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