Leicester rout Newcastle to bring Eddie Howe back to earth

Leicester City 4 Newcastle 0

Mired in sluggish Premier League form, reeling from the disappointment of Thursday’s Europa League exit at Napoli and with their squad buffeted by Covid positives and general illness, Leicester needed something to lift them. How James Maddison provided it.

The playmaker had already won the 38th minute penalty from which Youri Tielemans gave his team the lead – a little dubiously, it should be said – when he made a pre-assist of such quality that it not only shredded Newcastle’s backline but broke the collective spirit of Eddie Howe’s visitors.

Addressing a short pass from Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall in the inside-left channel, midway up the Newcastle half, Maddison had already seen the run of Harvey Barnes and made the calculations. With the outside of his right boot, he sculpted a first-time ball that set his teammate racing clear. Barnes squared to Patson Daka, in for the rested Jamie Vardy, and he did the rest.

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Maddison was not finished. Not by a long shot. He took a low cross from Daka after Luke Thomas had won the ball high up before ushering in Tielemans for 3-0 and there was still time for him to get himself on the scoresheet.

The Newcastle support refused to be cowed into silence but their team was broken and it was too easy for Leicester – the substitute, Marc Albrighton, winning the ball off Joelinton and finding Maddison, who swapped passes with Daka, ran around Fabian Schär and shot into the far corner.

For Brendan Rodgers, there was the bonus of a first clean sheet in the league since the opening weekend of the season and, for him and his team, it felt like a trick of the mind that they had laboured for much of the first half. Maddison would depart to a standing ovation when substituted on 88 minutes, plus a bear hug from Rodgers.

Newcastle had won their first game of the league season last weekend – at home to Burnley – and this had felt like a big chance for them, before games against Liverpool and the Manchester clubs. They failed to take it, flattering to deceive up front despite the best efforts of Allan Saint-Maximin before capitulating in alarming fashion.

At the start of play, only three clubs had conceded more league goals than Leicester this season, one of them being Newcastle, and it had felt like being a battle of the dodgy defences. Initially, it was Newcastle who asked the questions and it was certainly not a part of Rodgers’s script to lose Jonny Evans to a muscle strain in the sixth minute. The manager was forced to drop the defensive midfielder, Wilfred Ndidi, back as a makeshift centre-half.

Leicester were nervous at the outset. They gave the ball away cheaply on several occasions and they invited Newcastle to settle. Where was the pressure on the ball? It was easy to hear the knock of opportunity for the visitors and, equally, to wonder whether they had the personnel in the final third to take advantage.

Miguel Almirón shot into the side-netting while Evans lay stricken and Callum Wilson fired across goal after robbing Ndidi. The ball flashed off Calgar Soyuncu’s head and went past the far post. From the corner, Thomas was forced to throw himself into a block to deny Schär and, midway through the first half, Saint-Maximin picked up a stray pass from the substitute, Boubakary Soumaré, and saw his shot blocked. Nothing clearcut but it felt promising for Newcastle. It would be all downhill for them from there.

Leicester measured their first-half threat in set pieces. Maddison curled a free-kick just over while Ndidi’s header from another Maddison free-kick, awarded after a burst by Daka, extended Martin Dubravka. The effort did look to be going just past the far post.

The turning point followed a clumsy attempt by Newcastle to play out from the back, Jonjo Shelvey – put into trouble by Jamaal Lascelles – taking a heavy touch and Tielemans nicking the ball towards Maddison, who was too quick for Lascelles. The penalty award felt soft in real time, Lascelles lunging in but quickly checking out of the challenge; Maddison looking for the contact, feeling it and going down.

The impression was only confirmed by the replays. If the referee, Peter Bankes, had not made the decision, it seemed unlikely that VAR would have intervened. On the other hand, it was one of those that was never going to be overruled by the technology. Tielemans’s conversion was high and unstoppable.

Newcastle’s best bet was Saint-Maximin, who has that priceless ability with his dancing feet to make things happen in tight spaces. But it was Maddison who made the difference just before the hour, his pass that carved open Newcastle a thing of wonder. Barnes drew Dubravka nicely and Daka’s somersaulting celebration was as extravagant as the tap-in was simple.

Newcastle’s only second-half moment came when Timothy Castagne erred with a back pass, failing to spot that Kasper Schmeichel was away from his goal. Schmeichel tore back to slide and scrape off his line with the outside of his boot. It was merely the prompt for Leicester to turn the screw. - Guardian