Jamie Vardy and Demarai Gray give Claude Puel perfect start as Leicester manager against Everton
Leicester City 2 Everton 0: Caretaker manager David Unsworth suffered his first defeat
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Your support makes all the difference.It might be stretching a point to say the appointment of Claude Puel has got Leicester City supporters’ pulses racing. The quietly spoken Frenchman’s arrival as manager is probably one of the more underwhelming events the club has witnessed in its recent roller-coaster history.
And yet, against an Everton side desperately seeking fresh direction after Ronald Koeman’s sacking, Puel began his reign with an encouraging victory which lifted the Foxes into mid-table and left the visitors stuck in the bottom three.
It was Leicester’s first home league success since August and it owed plenty to one excellent call by the manager in his first team selection. Puel might have raised eyebrows by dropping Shinji Okazaki and Marc Albrighton to the bench but his decision to give Demarai Gray only his second league start this term brought rich reward. Within half an hour the England Under-21 winger had set up a terrific opening goal for Jamie Vardy and scored the second himself, albeit with the unwitting help of Everton full-back Jonjoe Kenny.
It was Leicester’s reward for a fast, vibrant start. Puel took Southampton to a cup final last season but was seen by some fans at St Mary’s as a man out of time, a grey personality in this age of celebrity-managers. “A mistake” is how he describes that perception – “We played good football with a lot of chances created but without a clinical edge,” he said of his Southampton side – and this was certainly a bright start.
It was certainly too much for Everton who post-Koeman showed all the bounce of a burst Carabao Cup Mitre Delta in the first half. A visitor to the club’s training ground on Friday said it felt like a cloud had lifted after the departure of Koeman. Yet grey skies hover over Goodison still. A place in the bottom three entering November was not the plan when Farhad Moshiri, the club’s majority owner, sanctioned that £150m summer spending spree. “All that money and you’re going down” chanted Leicester’s supporters.
Caretaker manager David Unsworth, coach of Everton’s title-winning U23 side, was promised at least until the international break to stake his claim for the vacant position but this was his second defeat following Wednesday’s Carabao Cup loss at Chelsea. Everton have lost nine of their last 13 in all competitions. When asked if they faced a relegation fight, Unsworth said: “We have to be honest, we are where we are and if that continues, the answer to that is yes.”
Unsworth’s attempted solution, as against Chelsea in midweek, has been to bench some of the club’s high-profile summer signings. The £45m Gylfi Sigurdsson did not enter the fray until the 74th minute; teenage academy product Beni Baningme got on the pitch ahead of him when Unsworth added another central midfielder at half-time. Other summer arrivals – Sandro, Davy Klaassen – did not even make the bench, though defender Michael Keane’s absence was down, Unsworth explained, to an infection in a foot wound sustained against Sunderland last month, which spread up his leg and led to his hospitalisation.
For the first half-hour, Leicester overran a wide-open Everton. Wes Morgan and Ben Chilwell had already gone close when Gray instigated the opening goal with a dazzling run after 18 minutes. He picked the ball up five yards outside his own penalty box and sped past Tom Davies, Idrissa Gueye and Wayne Rooney before sliding in Riyad Mahrez whose brilliant first-time cross brought a Jamie Vardy tap-in.
“He has the quality to become a great player,” said Puel of Gray. Opta awarded him the second goal though it was one that Kenny, Everton’s young right-back, will relive in his nightmares. Captain of Unsworth’s U23 side last season, Kenny swung a foot at Gray’s cross and the ball flew up behind him and over the head of his goalkeeper, Jordan Pickford.
Aaron Lennon might have equalised before that when, played in by Rooney, he drove the ball across the six-yard box, rather than shooting with just Kasper Schmeichel to beat. Lennon also had a strong penalty appeal turned down after going down under a Christian Fuchs challenge. Given their lack of a cutting edge, even in an improved second-half showing, it was their only hope of scoring.
Leicester: Schmeichel; Simpson, Morgan, Maguire, Fuchs; Ndidi, Iborra; Gray, Mahrez (Okazaki 75), Chilwell (Albrighton 83); Vardy (Iheanacho 90).
Subs: Hamer, Dragovic, King, Slimani.
Everton: Pickford; Kenny, Jagielka, Williams, Baines; Davies, Gueye; Lennon (Baningime 46), Rooney (Sigurdsson 73), Mirallas (Niasse 46); Calvert-Lewin.
Subs: Robles. Schneiderlin, Holgate, Lookman
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