Vardy: Foxes targeted Bravo

AS IF his hat-trick had not caused enough anguish, Jamie Vardy highlighted the perils of Pep Guardiola’s ball-playing style by revealing Leicester targeted Claudio Bravo in their rout of Manchester City. The England striker ended a 16-game scoreless sequence for his club in explosive style. Vardy explained how Leicester pressed high to prey on Bravo’s importance in Guardiola’s tactics and captain Wes Morgan admitted the champions saw opportunities to find joy on the counterattack from video footage of City. The 4-2 result saw City slip further behind in the title race to trail Chelsea by seven points. Vardy’s third goal came as he pounced on an under-hit pass back to Bravo from John Stones to slide the ball in from a tight angle. He said: ‘We’d been watching videos and they like to use the keeper. Once you’ve got them in the corner, you have to press the keeper and luckily the ball came across and he wasn’t ready for it.’ Morgan added: ‘They like to build from the back and build through the field and get forward through quick passing football.’ Guardiola insisted his team played well despite trailing 3-0 at half-time and not managing a shot on target until Aleksandar Kolarov made the score 4-1 with a freekick in the 82nd minute. But defensively, City looked confused, put under repeated pressure by running from Vardy and strike partner Islam Slimani, and failed to keep a clean sheet for a 13th Premier League game this season. Clearly there are major issues for Guardiola to solve, given this was only the third time a side managed by him had conceded four goals in a game — the Spaniard having experienced the same once each at Barcelona and Bayern Munich. For Leicester, this was a return to the form that brought them the title, with season-best displays from Vardy, Slimani and Riyad Mahrez, who displayed exquisite touches for two of the goals. Andy King hit a fine strike to put Leicester 2-0 up inside five minutes, before sub Nolito scored in added time to give the score a more respectable look for City. Vardy’s hat-trick was his first for Leicester and the quality of each strike made a mockery of Michael Owen’s claims the 29-year-old is not a natural finisher. ‘I don’t listen to that. He can say what he wants,’ said Vardy. ‘Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I’ll just get on with it.’ He was clearly pleased to have found the net after 741 minutes of goalless action in the Premier League, his last coming at Liverpool on September 10. ‘Obviously with what happened last year, expectations go up,’ he said. ‘We just wanted to get back to basics and make sure we put in a good performance. ‘Although we’ve not been getting the results and a few of the performances have been below par, deep down we knew we were still the team we were last year.’