CRYSTAL PALACE 0 LEICESTER CITY 1

BY AYODELE ODUMADE AT SELHURST PARK

One step along the way Leicester go as they have kept their fans travelling along with them and close in on the title, as they narrowly beat a Crystal Palace side without a win in the league this side of 2016, thanks to a Riyad Mahrez goal.  The fairy tale continues week after week as the Foxes rise to the occasion, chalk off the games and their rivals have continued to flounder.

Just after the quarter of an hour mark Danny Drinkwater played Riyad Mahrez in and he was one on one with Wayne Hennessey. Although Mahrez rounded him, the keeper’s feint touch of the ball allowed Scott Dann to recover and clear the ball to safety. 

Around the half hour mark Yannick Bolasie left his marker in his wake and put a glorious cross to the back post. Unfortunately Wilfried Zaha could not quite get the connection, which would have steered the ball into the net.

In the 33^rd minute Leicester took the lead.  Miles Jedinak’s poor header fell to Jamie Vardy inside the Palace area and his cross, which took out four Palace defenders, fell nicely to Mahrez who side footed the ball past Hennessey.

Palace immediately launched an attack as Bolassie powered into the box and hit a shot, which wrong footed Kasper Schmeichel, but he stuck his hand out and somehow cleared the ball to keep the Foxes lead intact.

After the break Bakary Sako and Martin Kelly replaced Emmanuel Adebayor and Pape Souare respectively.

Shinji Okazaki received the ball with his back to the Palace goal. He turned and shot just wide.

From a long throw by Christian Fuchs, Okazaki ghosted past three Palace defenders and headed the ball just wide.  Palace simply went to sleep and no one went with him.

With time against Palace, Sako let one fly from distance, which caught Schmeichel by surprise but he got enough on the ball to palm it away from goal.

Pundits have wondered when Leicester would drop off but they have showed no signs of easing off.   At the business end of things a familiar pattern seems to be developing as Leicester’s last three wins have been by the same score of 1-0. This is reminiscent of title winning teams down the years who have just done enough at the final furlong. 

The defence marshaled by Wes Morgan has been resolute as was evident here today.  Robert Huth also played his part. However the star of the show today was Danny Drinkwater, who celebrated his England call up with a five star performance.  That is not to take anything away from the consistent N’golo Kante who has often played this season as if he has a spare set of lungs. He is not only a defensive midfielder but has also found time to initiate or join in the attack.

In added time from a corner kept alive by Jedinak, Damien Delaney hit the crossbar and with that Palace’s chance to salvage a point disappeared.   The Leicester fans were understandably jubilant as they sang, “we are going to win the league”.  But what was extraordinary was the Palace fans who stayed behind to applaud the Leicester players as they came off the pitch.  They appear to have the goodwill of the whole country other than their title rivals, to win the league. This was resonated in the Palace Chairman Steve Parish’s comments on the eve of the game when he said: “The bigger clubs are in transition. But I think other clubs can get in there, certainly into the top four. I do not see why not. It is great for everyone in and around us and long may it continue. I am on record last year saying this could be done, though I think we all expected it to be a Swansea or a Southampton that did it.”

Though Pardew was frustrated by the result after a good showing in the second half he said: “They (Leicester) will be worthy champions.  Whenever I have seen them you do not get a load of chances against them. They have done a great job right from the chairman down to the kit man.”

 Claudio Ranieri though was still playing down the fact that they could be champions in a few weeks time. He said: “There are seven matches to go. It is not easy for us.  We are Leicester. We have to fight in every match. Now we are in the Europa league and we are very close to achieving the Champions League. At the beginning the goal was to save the team. Now everybody in the world is talking about us.”

Leicester have taken 27 points from their last 12 games.  Seventeen more points are required.