Rodgers hails Iheanacho’s ‘brilliant’ goal, expects Ndidi back for Wolves clash

LEICESTER City manager Brendan Rodgers has praised his goalscorers in Wednesday night’s 2-0 Premier League win over Fulham for the quality of their strikes.

Nigeria forward Kelechi Iheanacho marked a rare start with his first Premier League goal of the season, a controlled header from a cross that was slightly behind him.

The Super Eagles star then started the move for the second with a smart turn from halfway before laying the ball off to James Maddison, who then set James Justin up for a simple finish.

“I thought that the two goals were real goals of quality,” Rodgers told LCFC TV in his post-match interview. “We knew this was going to be a real test for us coming to here.

“I think if you look at Fulham’s results over the last 10 games or so, they’ve been really strong, in particular [against] the big teams, and did very well against them.

“We knew we had to play well, and I thought in the first half, we scored two brilliant goals – different types of goals.”

Fulham, parading three Nigerians in Ola Aina, Tosin Adarabioyo and Ademola Lookman, struggled to open up a well organised Leicester side in the second half after conceding two first-half goals. Rodgers was impressed with how his team kept them off.

“In the second half, we could close the lines and control the game more without the ball, and not give away so much,” he explained.

“We managed the game really well over the course of 90-odd minutes, and a clean sheet and three points is nice.”

The former Liverpool manager added: “We want to score goals and create opportunities, but we didn’t have to. We had control of the game. They’re a dangerous team if you give them space.

“We were two goals up, we didn’t need to chase it and what was important was responding from the weekend. The players did that magnificently.

“We always want to deny the opposition space, but we felt we could just drop it back in onto the half-pitch and close the gaps, and then make it difficult for them to play through.

“Then, we know we could then play through that pressure if we had to. We were two goals up, we didn’t need to chase it and what was important was responding from the weekend. The players did that magnificently.”

Wolverhampton Wanderers, who ended a miserable run of one win in nine games by beating Arsenal on Tuesday, are Leicester City’s next Premier League opponents on Sunday and Rodgers hopes Jamie Vardy and Wilfred Ndidi will be available after missing the last three matches.

“They should be available for the weekend, so it’s great news for us,” he offered. “They’ve responded really well.

“We’ll see how they are over the next couple of days and they’ll hopefully be back in the squad and available for the weekend.”

With the win, Leicester City leapfrogged Liverpool to third place in the table with 42 points from 22 matches.