Shakespeare coy on Foxes future

Craig Shakespeare insisted he is not taking a contract extension as Leicester manager for granted despite enhancing his claims with a 3-0 home win over Watford.

The Foxes guaranteed their Premier League safety as Shakespeare took his tally to 22 points in 10 league games at the helm since replacing the fired Claudio Ranieri in February.

Shakespeare also led Leicester into the Champions League quarterfinals after a last-16 victory over Sevilla.

But Ranieri’s 53-year-old former assistant, whose initial contract as boss is due to expire at the end of this campaign, claimed he is not counting on the club extending his deal for next season.

“I don’t think you can take anything for granted,” Shakespeare said.

“I have an assistant manager’s contract after the end of the season so I have to make sure I do everything professionally.

“As long as you’re professional, that’s the way you have to be.

“The contract states ‘until the end of the season’. I have said about eight times this afternoon I will sit down at the end of the season, which I’m quite comfortable with.”

Goals from Wilfred Ndidi, Riyad Mahrez and Marc Albrighton ensured a comfortable win against the Hornets, who have lost five successive away league games without scoring.

Leicester’s three points ended any lingering worries about relegation for a team which was just a point clear of the bottom three when Shakespeare took charge.

“It’s one we can look at now, the whole club, and we can be very pleased we have managed to secure Premier League survival,” he said.

“The result was always going to be important, there hasn’t been any points target and we just want to finish as high as possible.

“To do that you have to beat the opposition, we have three games left — two at the King Power and one away — and I want to finish on a high and I’m sure the supporters want us to finish on a high.

“I’m really pleased with the result. I’ve spoken on many occasions about the importance of the first goal, with our home record and their away one it was always going to be important.

“It’s pleasing to get a clean sheet. It was a bit of an indifferent performance in the first half but in the second half we were more of a threat.

“We had more pace about us when we needed to. It felt at the end of it like a comfortable victory.”