Barnes: A Game We Controlled

- Leicester City beat Tottenham Hotspur 4-1 in the Premier League on Saturday
- Winger Harvey Barnes was among the scorers on Filbert Way
- Papy Mendy, James Maddison and Kelechi Iheanacho also netted
- Barnes gave his verdict on another fine performance to LCFC TV

A 4-1 triumph over Tottenham Hotspur at King Power Stadium saw Brendan Rodgers’ men continue the momentum gained by defeating Aston Villa seven days earlier, with the Foxes once again able to bounce back from conceding to Rodrigo Bentancur’s early opener.

“It’s a good day for us,” Barnes reflected in his post-match chat with LCFC TV. “I thought a lot of the game we controlled really well; we looked really dangerous going forward and scored some great goals.

“I think even when we did go behind, we were playing well at the time. It was a bit of an unfortunate goal, it took a ricochet and went to their player. Sometimes you can't do anything about that, but we responded really well.

“You saw how high we were pressing in the first half and winning the ball in good positions. They were open. We took advantage of that and got our goals in the first half and got ourselves in a really good position.”

Once Papy Mendy’s first-ever LCFC goal had lifted the roof off King Power Stadium, Leicester wasted little time completely turning the game on its head, via James Maddison’s neat finish two minutes later.

The timing of the third goal from Kelechi Iheanacho was crucial, coming on the stroke of half-time and opening up a two-goal cushion that the hosts never looked like relinquishing.

“It was some goal,” the Academy graduate said on Mendy’s equaliser. “He probably won't hit many better than that. But Papy's such a good character in the changing room, everyone was buzzing for him when that flew in. It was a hell of a strike, and it got us right back in the game.

Photos 11 Feb 2023

In Photos - Leicester City 4 Tottenham Hotspur 1

36

Photos

“Going in at 2-1, you're ahead, but know they're still going to come out in the second half firing, and we've only got that one-goal lead. At 3-1, you don't want to get too comfortable, but you've got that little bit of a gap and leeway where you can sort of control the game a bit from there. That was an important goal for us.”

After the frustration of seeing a goal ruled out by VAR for offside, the 25-year-old eventually got his reward to cap off a fine performance when he found the net with 10 minutes to play, ensuring the three points would be staying in Leicester.

The winger continued: “I was desperate to get one after that one got chalked off. It was a great team goal, we worked it really well and when you see it chalked off by whatever it was, millimetres, it's tough, but then obviously to go and get the goal in the end, it was important.

“We said 4-1 would have put us in a really good position. It would have made it comfortable. We were back to 3-1, but then we responded well, went and got the fourth goal, and saw the game out from there.”

With back-to-back wins and eight goals in those last two games, Barnes believes there is a clear confidence running throughout the team as they turn towards preparing for another tricky assignment away to Manchester United on Sunday.

He added: “We knew we had a tough little run of games coming up and so far we're two out of two in them, which is a real confidence boost going into the game next week. We’ve two more tough games, but we've got ourselves in a good position now, a really good bit form and hopefully we can just continue that going forward.

“We've won those games, we've scored goals in them games, so as a team, we're full of confidence. The attackers are scoring goals, they're in good form, it's a good time to go and play the bigger teams. Going into next week now, we're going to be full of confidence.”