Leicester City visited the John Smith Stadium in what was a League One fixture just nine years ago, but Craig Shakespeare’s men could only pick up one point against a professional Huddersfield side.
David Wagner gave new signing Laurent Depoitre his first Premier League start, replacing Steve Mounié who is suffering from a minor heel injury. Another new signing Abdelhamid Sabiri was also handed a starting spot in place of van La Parra.
As for Leicester, Kalechi Iheanacho was given his first start for his new club.
For the most part of the first half, Huddersfield were completely in control. The first opportunity of the match fell invitingly to the towering Depoitre, but the ball was tamely headed into the hands of Kasper Schmeichel in the Leicester City goal.
That wasn’t it for the Terriers though – they weren’t just enjoying a hefty amount of the ball, they had substantial possession far into the Leicester half on a number of occasions. Crosses were relentlessly flying into excellent positions from each flank and Huddersfield were threatening to go ahead. This energetic start gave rise to a noisy atmosphere around the John Smith stadium.
Huddersfield’s top player of last season was particularly impressive in the first half. His ball distribution was top class and he was constantly at the centre of things as Huddersfield surged forward.
Huddersfield were ticking all the boxes by attacking well and keeping out Leicester, but a little concerningly had nothing to show for it. The final five minutes of the first period was an indication of what was to come in the second half, as the Foxes started to trouble the Terriers with a free kick on the edge of the penalty box blocked, and Jamie Vardy shooting just wide a few moments later.
The start of the second half brought the game to a new level. 43 seconds after the match had been restarted, the ball was in the back of the Leicester net. Depoitre had swivelled round Harry Maguire after Sabiri had passed forward, and the ex-Porto man neatly sent the ball into the bottom corner.
But Leicester certainly weren’t sitting back as they did in the first half. In the 49th minute, Andy King drew a penalty from Chris Löwe, who slid in clumsily just inside the box. Jamie Vardy stepped up and smashed the ball home to bring the Foxes level.
The rest of the match was a riveting end to end contest, both sides fighting for the three points. One big talking point came in the 62nd minute, when Zanka’s shot ended up in the back of the net, but was controversially disallowed. The reason was seemingly because Kachunga’s foot was centimetres offside, and he was deemed to be interfering with play as the shot flew past him. I’m sure that all the Huddersfield fans around the ground felt hard done by after that decision.
Worryingly for the Terriers, Riyad Mahrez was starting to take a hold in the match in the last 20 minutes and was flaunting his talent around their penalty area. He couldn’t quite crack the Huddersfield defence though.
A big decision went against Leicester around the final minutes of the ninety as Demarai Gray went zooming towards the Huddersfield goal, and looked to be nudged off balance by Zanka from behind. No penalty was given though, and both teams had to settle for one point each in the 1-1 draw.
Huddersfield Town remained strong once again, as they have done for a lot of the season so far, but the result is another disappointing one as far as Leicester are concerned. Both teams have midweek games coming up in the Carabao cup on Tuesday.
Written by Harry Mahon.
