Leicester City suffered a 3-1 defeat to promotion rivals Leeds United on Friday, cutting their gap to six points at the summit of the Championship table.
The Foxes went ahead through centre-back Wout Faes before Burnley loanee Connor Roberts levelled with 10 minutes of normal time remaining.
Just three minutes later, Archie Gray, the 17-year-old, put the hosts ahead and Patrick Bamford rounded of the scoring in stoppage time after Daniel James’ free-kick deflected off the former England international.
Though, BBC pundit Gary Lineker, speaking on The Rest Is Football podcast, has claimed the East Midlanders were ‘robbed’.
“They should’ve done (beaten Leeds), I mean they were 1-0 up and then they were absolutely robbed of a goal, a terrible offside decision, and they ended up losing the game,” Lineker said.
Gary Lineker has a point after Leeds beat Leicester
Robbed is often a word banded around in the footballing world and usually, it isn’t merited. Football is a subjective game.
But Lineker did have a point. The former Foxes striker made reference to Patson Daka‘s disallowed goal in the second half, which was chalked off due to an offside.
However, replays showed that it should have actually stood. The ball bounced off Georginio Rutter, rather than a Leicester player, inside the penalty area, before Daka bundled it home.
So Lineker’s bold claim certainly had some truth in it and had the goal been rightfully allowed, it would’ve put Enzo Maresca‘s side 2-0 up and surely out of sight.
Leicester must now get back to winning ways
Leicester can’t allow Friday’s frustration to boil over into the next two games. After back-to-back defeats to Middlesbrough and Leeds, they must get back to winning ways.
With fixtures against Bournemouth (in the FA Cup) and Queens Park Rangers coming up, Maresca must find a solution to combat his side’s profligate nature.
Whilst they were on the wrong end of a poor refereeing decision against Leeds, they still missed multiple big chances and ultimately, had themselves to blame for the defeat.
Daka, most notably, missed a sitter. The Zambia international squandered a golden chance in the second half, putting wide a one-on-one.
So, perhaps Kelechi Iheanacho, who has been away at the Africa Cup of Nations with runners-up Nigeria, deserves another run in the side.
With Jamie Vardy out for the foreseeable future due to a muscle injury, the 27-year-old seems the natural solution to Leicester’s issues in attack.