Leicester finally shake off persistent Brighton to honour late chairman
On a night of real emotion, Leicester progressed in the Carabao Cup with a perfectly executed penalty shootout win against Brighton, a victory achieved on a poignant anniversary, the third since the club’s benefactor, Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha, and four others were killed when his helicopter crashed at the King Power.
“We had a lunch yesterday to celebrate his life, some stories of what he brought,” said head coach Brendan Rodgers of Vichai. “Actually, the modern-day Leicester City is what he brought. Purely through him is where we stand now.”
A banner flourished in the home end read: “1964, 1997, 2000”, the years Leicester won the League Cup, but despite the club’s pedigree in this competition Rodgers was never going to play his first-choice team, not with Europe on his schedule. He gave starts to four academy graduates and a sprinkling of fringe players. Graham Potter, too, took it as an opportunity to test the strength of his Brighton squad.
The Leicester faithful had the chance to see Patson Daka, who scored four goals in the Europa League victory over Spartak Moscow, up close and they must have liked what they saw. Barely five minutes had elapsed before he chased a long ball. Goalkeeper Jason Steele cleared, but Harvey Barnes snapped in ahead of Adam Webster, snaffled the ball and scored.
But Potter’s side are not built to crumble. Gradually they worked their way back into contention.
Duffy sent a sharp header into Danny Ward’s arms, Pascal Gross just failed to connect with Joel Veltman’s cross, then, in an eventful end to the first half, Alexis Mac Allister had a swerving shot brilliantly tipped over. From the resulting corner, the ball fell to Webster who made amends for his earlier error by sweeping home. Parity lasted only a minute, however, before an underhit back pass from Jeremy Sarmiento was seized upon by Ademola Lookman, who scored with ease.
Second-half chances fell to Caglar Soyuncu, who got in ahead of Jurgen Locadia, and sub Enock Mwepu, who had a shot deflected behind.
Rodgers sent on James Maddison in order to secure progress. Potter, too, decided to go first choice, bringing on Lewis Dunk, Neal Maupay and Yves Bissouma. But it was Marc Cucurella who made the difference when he came on, immediately producing a precise cross from which Mwepu headed the equaliser.
The match went to penalties and, after all their strikes found the net and Ward had saved Iwepu’s tame effort, Leicester’s League Cup collection remains on course for being enlarged.
“Now we’re three games from picking up a trophy,” said Rodgers. “You’d like to do that.”