Leicester City’s unlikely English Premier League title challenge faltered with a 2-2 home draw with West Bromwich Albion on Tuesday, offering Tottenham Hotspur the chance to go top in another twist to the most unpredictable race for the championship in years.
Moving three points clear of the world’s richest league was nothing to celebrate for Leicester’s despondent players, who wasted a slew of late chances to open a provisional five-point gap over Spurs.
“Just sometimes, you can do everything, but the ball does not want to go in,” said Leicester coach Claudio Ranieri, who has turned a team that narrowly avoided relegation last season into title contenders.
Photo: Reuters
Resurgent Chelsea moved into eighth place and within sight of the European places by beating Norwich City 2-1, extending their unbeaten league run since Jose Mourinho was fired in December last year to 12 games. Young Brazilian leftback Kenedy scored after 39 seconds — the quickest goal of the season so far — to set Chelsea on their way to victory.
At the bottom, Aston Villa’s fans staged a mass walkout after the last-placed team sunk nearer relegation with a 3-1 home loss to Everton. Villa Park had already started to empty when thousands of fans departed in the 74th minute — when Villa were 3-0 down — to mark the year the club was founded, 1874.
“The situation is difficult, but we have to fight until the end,” said Villa coach Remi Garde, whose team are eight points from safety, with 10 games left.
Sunderland grabbed a 90th-minute equalizer to draw 2-2 with Crystal Palace and provisionally climb out of the bottom three, while AFC Bournemouth beat south-coast rival Southampton 2-0 to further ease their relegation concerns.
The fourth official for the Bournemouth-Southampton match, Kevin Friend, was taken to hospital after collapsing and hitting his head on a dugout near the end of the first half.
In their past three games, Leicester have lost to Arsenal, won scrappily against Norwich and drawn at home to a West Brom side owning a poor away record. However, in no way are Leicester suffering a case of the jitters, as they bid to become the most unlikely title winners in the history of England’s top league.
Leicester were excellent for the most part, but were undone by a 50th-minute free-kick from Craig Gardner that made it 2-2. Salomon Rondon put West Brom ahead before central midfielders Danny Drinkwater and Andy King scored in the 31st and 45th minutes respectively.
Shinji Okazaki and Jamie Vardy both struck the bar from headers with two of Leicester’s best chances.
“Nothing negative,” Ranieri said. “We tried to do everything and well done to my players. I love this — we never, never give up.”
Diego Costa scored from a seemingly offside position for what proved the clinching goal for Chelsea, who are in the top half of the standings for the first time since week one of the season — a testament to the turnaround sparked by Hiddink.
“We were almost in the relegation zone and had a target to get out of there as soon as possible,” Hiddink said. “We are now winning games in a row and that is encouraging.”
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