Norwich City 1-2 Leicester City.
Championship promotion hopefuls Leicester City are through to the quarter finals of the FA Cup after beating Norwich 2-1 at Carrow Road. Goals from Sean St. Ledger and David Nugent were enough to cause an FA Cup upset against a below par performance from the home side.
Last season in the Championship, Norwich were victorious in both ties against the cash rich blues and proved that it does not take multi million pound signings to earn promotion out of the difficult league. However, the Canaries somewhat underestimated the foxes who are currently struggling to push for a playoff place in 13th position.
The game started with Norwich putting early pressure on the Leicester goal. After a fine cross by Hoolahan, the ball ended up at Steve Morison’s feet, who could only put the early effort into the stands. The away side then really took the game to Norwich and won a flurry of corners giving Norwich’s defence plenty to deal with. It didn’t take long for the away side to take advantage of the corners and took the lead in the 5th minute with a header from Sean St. Ledger scoring his first goal for the club against the teenage goalkeeper Jed Steer. The centre half came up to nod in the inch perfect cross from Ben Marshall.
Norwich were gifted an opportunity to equalise from the Leicester goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel after he needlessly brought down Elliott Bennett. His hopeful protest resulted to nothing as Wes Hoolahan stepped up to take the spot kick. The Danish keeper dived to his left and made a great one handed save only to see the Irishman knock in the rebound to level the tie in the 23rd minute.
Leicester then were unfortunate not to take the lead from another corner. Steer flapped at the dangerous cross and the ball fell to Wes Morgan who hit it against Elliott Ward who, the Leicester players argued, was over the line; however the assistant waved away the appeals.
The Leicester defence limited Norwich’s chances to long shots and half opportunities that they dealt with easily.
The teams went into the break level on 1-1 with the away side looking the most threatening.
Both sides started the second half with great chances to take the lead. Brave defending from Leon Barnett stopped an acrobatic Jermaine Beckford effort, then the Norwich defender nearly put his team ahead, firstly with a volley from a corner that was somehow cleared off the line, then again with a headed effort deflected wide.
With less than 30 minutes remaining, Lambert changed his front line bringing on James Vaughan for his first appearance since September, and Aaron Wilbraham who scored the crucial winning goal at Leicester back in March.
At this point, Norwich were looking the better team with flowing passes, attractive football and plenty of attempts on goal. However, it was the Foxes who took the lead through lively striker David Nugent, who won the Cup four years ago with Portsmouth. The ball was lumped forward and fell to Nugent, who had a lot to do, but took it past the defence with ease and calmly placed his effort to Steer’s right hand side in the 71st minute.
Hoolahan then came close to his second of the game after a weaving run giving himself time to shoot on his favoured left foot from the edge of the box, only to see his effort frustratingly float past the post which would have been a superb individual goal.
It was Hoolahan again who dragged an effort wide after great work from Wilbraham, this left Vaughan frustrated who clearly felt the number 14 should have played him through.
The best chance fell late on to Russell Martin, his powerful header was flying towards goal only to rebound off the line by his own player.
Beckford then had the perfect opportunity to put the game to bed with a left footed effort which hit the bar. The game really was end to end and Norwich may consider themselves unlucky not to take the tie to a replay after Wilbraham forcing a world class save from Schmeichel with Vaughan unlucky not to take advantage of the rebound.
Boos echoed from the home fans following the final whistle after a frustrating result at Carrow Road. Norwich boss Paul Lambert did say in a pre match interview that his priority was to secure top flight survival for his side, though looking safe with 13 games remaining, many home fans would have welcomed the distraction of reaching the final eight for the first time since 1992.
A positive the Canaries can take from this defeat is that big money summer signing James Vaughan returned from a serious long term knee injury and looked sharp.
Norwich will hope to bounce back from a poor performance against current Premier League Champions Manchester United at Carrow Road on Sunday. In the red devils last visit in 2005, they lost 2-0 with goals from fan favourites Dean Ashton and Lean McKenzie. However, Fergie’s men will not misjudge the threat from the Yellows this time.
Article written by James Cossey.
Twitter @JCossey7
