Foxes pounce on Magpies, inch closer to Liverpool
LEICESTER City striker Ayoze Perez came back to haunt his former team Newcastle United yesterday with a goal and an assist for midfielder James Maddison, as the Foxes eased to a 3-0 victory and cut the gap to runaway Premier League leaders Liverpool.
The win meant that Brendan Rodgers’ second-placed side have 45 points from 21 matches, 10 points behind Liverpool who have two games in hand and host Sheffield United today.
Leicester made light of Jamie Vardy’s absence due to a calf injury as Perez pounced on a poor pass across the back line from Newcastle defender Florian Lejeune and rode a tackle from Fabian Schar before slotting past Martin Dubravka in the 36th minute.
Lejeune was in the spotlight for the wrong reasons again as his poor clearance found its way to Perez who fed Maddison, and the England international blasted in a left-footed shot from distance three minutes later.
The double blow came shortly after Newcastle had missed the chance to take the lead through Brazilian forward Joelinton, who sprinted onto a pass over the top of the Leicester defence but failed to beat goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel with two attempts.
With Newcastle reduced to 10 men after using up their three substitutions and Schar unable to play due to injury, Leicester made it 3-0 in the 87th minute through Hamza Choudhury who curled in a shot from outside the penalty area.
“In the week we worked on having to press Newcastle high and credit to our front two for winning the ball back, which led to our first two goals,” Maddison said after the match.
“I haven’t scored many with my left foot so it was nice to see that go in. Hamza is a very talented boy, his goal was better than mine, it was lovely to see it fly in.”
Rodgers said he was not willing to take any chances by playing Vardy with a busy run of games on the horizon.
“There’s no way on this earth that you can ask players to play at the intensity we want without making a lot of changes.”