Leicester City v Southampton: Premier League – live!

73 mins: Southampton hit the bar! Armstrong’s 22-yarder dips over Schmeichel and smacks the crossbar. It loops back to Long, who goes down over Evans’ challenge as he waits for it to come to earth. The referee’s whistle sounds, and the defence must have been braced for a penalty, but in fact the call is offside, against Long.

71 mins: Vardy has another half-chance, and then Bertrand nips in front of Maddison as he prepares to shoot from a Vardy pass. Leicester are knocking on the door.

68 mins: Two Vardy efforts in quick succession both clear the bar, first an attempted chip from wide on the left – it would have been a fabulous goal had it gone in, which it was not remotely close to doing – and then a header from Barnes’ cross.

66 mins: The wind appears to have drained from Southampton’s sails, and Leicester are looking more likely at the moment.

63 mins: Leicester break, and Maddison has the chance to play Vardy through. But his pass is poor, forces Vardy wide to the left, and the chance goes with it.

62 mins: If N’Lundulu finishes this game it will more than double his season’s total number of league minutes. Ralph Hasenhuttl’s decision to bring him on instead of Shane Long says something about Long’s current position in the Saints striking pecking order.

60 mins: Smallbone goes down again, this time after colliding with Maddison and this time he will go off. N’Lundulu comes on to replace him.

58 mins: Bertrand is booked for falling over, accidentally handballing on his way, knocking the ball out for a throw-in, and then leaping to his feet to stop the throw-in being quickly taken. That’s his fifth booking of the season and he will now miss Southampton’s next game.

55 mins: Smallbone tries to stop Castagne passing the ball, but as the players’ legs touch his knee twists awkwardly, and he goes down looking in considerably discomfort. And he didn’t even stop Castagne passing the ball.

53 mins: The night’s first substitution sees Soyuncu replace Fofana for Leicester.

50 mins: Southampton continue to press and probe. A long diagonal pass dips onto the foot of Bertrand, whose volleyed cross is shanked straight to Schmeichel rather than to the unmarked Adams.

46 mins: Chance for Southampton! Smallbone’s curling shot is pushed out by Schmeichel straight to Walcott, who had a fraction of a second to prepare for the ball’s arrival, with a gaping goal ahead of him, and didn’t.

“I don’t know which was more impressive about Maddison’s goal,” writes Peter Oh, “the way he overcame a tight angle with a thumpingly precise shot, or the restraint he showed to celebrate in the (relatively) physically distanced style.”

The finish was phenomenal, from a very acute angle. Overall it’s been a very enjoyable game between two pretty well matched teams, but where Southampton have had a few chances without producing a particularly good shot, Leicester have had the Barnes effort and the goal and thus, by the waferthinnest of margins, probably deserve their slender lead.

45+3 mins: And that is half of the time. Key stats: Leicester wins after taking the lead this season: 10 out of 10. Southampton wins after falling behind this season: one out of six.

45+2 mins: Barnes runs onto Albrighton’s pass and to the byline on the left, before pulling the ball back just behind Vardy.

45+1 mins: And we roll gently into stoppage time, of which there’ll be a couple of minutes.

45 mins: Now Albrighton is himself booked, slightly harshly, for fouling Bertrand.

44 mins: Diallo, who was booked in the build-up to the Leicester goal (not given), gets booked for bringing down Albrighton.

41 mins: Save! Another excellent first-time pass from Ward-Prowse, this time releasing Bertrand. He runs into the area, looks up, slows down, takes his time, and then lashes a shot a bit too close to the keeper, which Schmeichel deflects over the bar.

39 mins: Maddison’s celebration is very Covid-friendly, shooing away his teammates and miming some long-distance hand-shaking.

That’s a fabulous finish! Bednarek does a poor job of tracking Maddison’s run, but the Leicester player runs through to the right of goal before smashing a shot high past McCarthy and into the roof of the net!

37 mins: Albrighton tries another low pass infield to Vardy, who this time takes the shot and … completely misses his kick.

30 mins: Ward-Prowse wins the ball in midfield and plays an instant pass over the Leicester defence to Adams, but Schmeichel comes out to clear the danger. A good pass, run and clearance there, excellent from all three players.

28 mins: Adams and Walcott combine nicely, and not for the first time, but Evans stretches to stop the latter running clear into the area.

23 mins: Save! Adams shoots from an acute angle on the right, and Schmeichel pushes it round the post. Meanwhile Fofana appears to have suffered a broken heart, and then had a haircut to prove it:

19 mins: Save! Albrighton passes across the area to Vardy, who lets the ball run between his legs for Barnes to run onto, and his first-time drive is pushed away by McCarthy!

17 mins: Southampton win the ball back midway through their half and Adams is played through on the right. Had the ball allowed him to run through the middle Southampton would have been in real trouble, but as it is he has to cut infield and thus Evans has time to get back and hassle him, and then Schmeichel blocks his crossing channel, and the chance is gone.

15 mins: Walcott gets the ball, sprints into the Leicester half, and pretty cynically runs into Fofana when he had no hope or for that matter intention of keeping the ball. The referee laps this up, gives him a free kick, and books Fofana.

13 mins: A good start for Southampton, who are bravely pushing up, compressing space, generally making life difficult for Leicester, and hoping that McCarthy can mop up anything played in behind, which thus far he has.

10 mins: The corner was headed clear by Justin, and now Fofana has won a free-kick for Leicester, which Maddison sends into the area only for McCarthy to race from his line to executive a fine and really quite eye-catching diving punch.

7 mins: Full marks for tempo so far, if not for attacking-third precision and incision. Walcott has just won a corner for Southampton.

3 mins: Walker-Peters goes on a nice run down the right but undoes his good work by playing a blind pass infield to nobody.

2 mins: Leicester have already tried two early long passes behind the Southampton defence for Vardy to run onto, both of which have been cut off by McCarthy.

1 min: Peeeeeeep! The away team, all in white but for a red sash across their shirt, and also a couple of other minor red bits elsewhere that I should mention for the sake of accuracy, get the game going.

The players walk out, and the football is so close you can almost smell it.

Pre-match reading: here’s a report on Fulham 0-1 Chelsea:

Sky think it’s Schmeichel’s 401st game for Leicester, but the Foxes count the Community Shield as a friendly so 400 is the right number.

I’m not sure how any fans have snuck into the King Power Stadium to put up a sign to mark Kasper Schmeichel’s 400th appearance for Leicester, and if they haven’t who is responsible for it, but the main thing is that it will be his 400th appearance for Leicester.

Leicester make two changes to the team that beat Stoke last week, with Vardy and Maddison coming back and Perez and Praet stepping down.

Southampton make three changes, with Ings coronavirused, Djenepo injured and Forster dropping to the bench to allow McCarthy, Smallbone and Adams to return.

The team sheets are in, and tonight’s selections look like this:

Leicester: Schmeichel, Justin, Fofana, Evans, Castagne, Tielemans, Ndidi, Albrighton, Barnes, Maddison, Vardy. Subs: Soyuncu, Ward, Iheanacho, Perez, Amartey, Under, Ricardo Pereira, Mendy, Thomas.
Southampton: McCarthy, Walker-Peters, Stephens, Bednarek, Bertrand, Armstrong, Diallo, Ward-Prowse, Smallbone, Adams, Walcott. Subs: Long, Valery, Vokins, N’Lundulu, Forster, Chauke, Ferry, Tchaptchet, Watts.
Referee: Stuart Attwell.

That Leicester are in the top four at the moment can’t be considered an enormous surprise, given their long-term improvement under Brendan Rodgers. That Southampton will end the day there instead if they win this game by more than one goal verges on the astonishing. They’ll be hampered by the absence (probably) of Danny Ings, who scored the winner here last season, after a positive Covid test, while Jamie Vardy and James Maddison will be back for Leicester after missing the FA Cup win over Stoke. Anyway, hello!