Gary Rowett’s quest to avoid Leicester City’s second ever relegation to the third tier began in Stoke at the scene of the first.
It had nearly happened in 1991 but Leicester beat Oxford United 1-0 on the final day of the season to preserve a proud record of never playing beneath the second division, instead condemning West Bromwich Albion to the drop.
For a number of weeks, these have seemed the two teams most likely to save us this time around.
Now we can add Portsmouth to the mix, who may have beaten Leicester 6-1 to hasten Paulo Sousa’s departure in 2010 but took a 6-1 beating of their own this weekend.
The only other horse in the race, Blackburn Rovers, lie in wait on the final day of the season. The only other Premier League winner to have descended to the Championship, they remain four points above Leicester after a steely performance on Saturday lunchtime in holding promotion-chasing Middlesbrough to a goalless draw.
Leicester travelled to Vicarage Road and emerged with a goalless draw of their own, but the narrative was very different and the parallel with the past obvious.
As in the same part of the same pitch in the notorious 2013 play-off semi-final second leg, Leicester’s mercurial right winger drove into the penalty area and was taken to the turf. As in 2013, the subsequent spot kick was saved. Whether any of Leicester’s substitutes will go on to become England’s leading goalscorer remains to be seen. At least this time Watford didn’t go straight up the other end to score.
An afternoon that ended in an element of frustration had begun with an element of celebration, Jordan Ayew benched. Of course, the endless unimaginative rotation of two of Leicester’s worst centre-forwards of all time meant a recall for Patson Daka. But we’ll come to him later.
Elsewhere, there was a start for Jamaal Lascelles in place of Ben Nelson, Ricardo Pereira came back in for Hamza Choudhury and Harry Winks replaced Bobby Decordova-Reid with Jordan James pushed forward into the attacking midfield role. You could quibble about the inclusion of Caleb Okoli or Stephy Mavididi but there was a sense that this was the closest Leicester have been to their best XI for some time.
That was partly because there was no Ayew or Decordova-Reid, meaning there was instantly more energy going forward. It was also because Lascelles brought a calmness and authority sorely lacking for months, if not years. Not that we can get carried away with one performance from anyone in this team.
In the fifth minute, Lascelles flattened Watford danger man Imran Louza in the process of winning a routine header. It was the kind of early statement none of our other defenders have seemed capable of making, and set the tone for a relatively comfortable afternoon for the visiting defenders.
If Leicester can consistently shore things up at the back then we already know there are star attackers who can dazzle at the other end of the pitch. Twice in the space of three minutes, Abdul Fatawu produced moments of brilliance to put Watford on the back foot. First he nutmegged his marker Marc Bola before winning a corner in front of the travelling fans, then he was taken out by Formose Mendy to end a slick move with the Watford centre-back yellow carded and then removed at half time.
The Leicester gameplan was clearer than it has been for much of the season. Lascelles and Okoli were given licence to enact no-nonsense defending, there was neat interplay in midfield with Ricardo joining from right-back and the idea was to release either Fatawu or Daka into the channels.
Leicester probably would have benefitted from an end-to-end game but they were frustrated by a typically stop-start encounter with various head injuries and technical issues for the officials, leading to eight minutes of first half stoppage time.
Leicester played out those eight minutes having just missed a penalty. Another electric Fatawu burst saw him get past Mendy only to be sent sprawling when feeling contact from behind. Both sets of players complained lengthily to referee Joshua Smith, Watford at the award and Leicester at the lack of a second yellow.
When the fuss eventually died down, the man clutching the ball, like a sub-standard action hero emerging from the wreckage, was Patson Daka.
Leicester aren’t blessed with natural penalty takers but it seems inconceivable that Daka could be the best choice among the eleven that started at Vicarage Road. Jordan James is the best finisher, Fatawu had just received the Championship goal of the month award for thrashing the ball past Birmingham’s goalkeeper before he could see it and Ricardo Pereira is an experienced technician.
Yet Daka is the striker, which seems to be the amount of thought that went into the identity of the taker, and Daka it was whose effort was pushed onto the post by Watford goalkeeper Egil Selvik.
While Fatawu could not have done much more, Leicester have a problem on the other wing. Stephy Mavididi has been a shadow of his former Championship self all season. His shot six minutes into the second half was weak and too close to Selvik who saved comfortably.
Those failures usually lead to an inevitable opener at the other end once the opposition start trying, but Lascelles was untroubled and his display seemed to elevate the worrisome Okoli. There was nothing extraordinary from Lascelles but standard excerpts of defending stood out: a strong shouldering of an opponent off the ball; playing back to Jakub Stolarczyk before any pressure came.
We’ve also seen a general improvement in Luke Thomas’s performances under Rowett, even if that just means an error-strewn display every other game instead of every single game. He dealt capably with Nestory Irankunda, who was switched to the other flank during the second half.
In fact, the extent to which Leicester minimised the Watford threat was scarcely believable for those of us who have sat through this season. And last season.
Stolarczyk was called into rare duty after an hour to slap a set piece clear with Matthew Pollock steaming beyond him into the net. Soon after, a Louza shot from distance sailed well over in a clear sign of frustration.
It was time for changes with Decordova-Reid and Divine Mukasa replacing Mavididi and James.
Mukasa re-energised Leicester’s attack, taking up good positions and seeing an early shot turned behind by Selvik after Fatawu’s initial effort had been deflected back to him.
Two minutes later, Daka sent a point-blank header off target from a Decordova-Reid cross. It’s unquestionable that Leicester are better as a whole when Daka plays rather than Ayew, but he brings so little goal threat at the end of it that the quality of play seems moot. Rowett has to think innovatively about the striker situation before it’s too late.
Watford had two shots on target in the entire game, in the 70th and 71st minutes. First, Irankunda danced inside from the left and his fierce shot at the near post was beaten out well by Stolarczyk. Then Luca Kjerrumgaard saw a shot from a similar position saved more comfortably. The hosts ended the game with an xG of 0.25. As poor as they were, Leicester have to see this as something to build on ahead of what looks like a short run of, dare we say, more winnable games.
Leicester kept pushing, Mukasa and Ricardo both seeing efforts go across the face of goal and wide. With 11 minutes left, Nelson and Joe Aribo replaced Lascelles and Oliver Skipp. The Winks-and-Skipp combo were ascendant without being entirely dominant, but that was more down to Leicester being quicker to get the ball wide to Fatawu than previously this season.
Nelson’s introduction in place of the tiring Lascelles provided the main point of interest in the dying minutes, given his horror show against QPR the previous weekend. He prospered at the day job, relieving a short spell of pressure when stepping in well twice after Okoli missed a rare header. But in the final minute of the game Nelson joined Daka in the what-might-have-been club by failing to turn a Fatawu cross past Selvik when it almost looked easier to score.
Leicester’s final xG tally of 2.22 was their highest since the opening-day win over Sheffield Wednesday. But as the legendary manager Jimmy Sirrel once said: “if ye dinnae score, ye dinnae win”. And if you’re choosing between a striker who can’t run and a striker who can’t shoot, you’re not going to score many goals.
Under Rowett, Leicester have scored just seven goals in seven games. While a second clean sheet in three games and a much-improved defensive display was welcome, the story of this match was undoubtedly the inability to turn one point into all three.
During the televised lunchtime game between Blackburn and Middlesbrough, the Sky co-commentator remarked: “I don’t think Leicester City are relegation candidates”. With seven games remaining, Leicester City are in the relegation zone.
The Fosse Way 