PL: Jota brace seals 2-0 Liverpool win over Leicester City as Salah returns

Premier League title challengers Liverpool beat Leicester City 2-0 on home turf on Thursday to remain in the race for the league title, after reigning champions Manchester City secured a 2-0 win over Brentford a day earlier.

Liverpool started their £37 million January signing, Colombian forward Luis Diaz, for the first time. The sublime Mohamed Salah, who is back from his AFCON campaign with Egypt, started on the bench for the Reds.

Liverpool started the game with their signature intensity but were met by a stubborn Leicester defence that refused to yield: it took the hosts over well over 30 minutes to find the breakthrough against Brendan Rogers side.

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Liverpool’s breakthrough came from a corner when Virgil Van Dijk headed a Trent Alexander Arnold ball towards the net. Leicester keeper Kasper Schmeichel parried the initial attempt by the big centre back, but was helpless when Diogo Jota pounced on the rebound to hand Liverpool the lead.

The match remained 1-0 at half-time despite some good chances at both ends.

Liverpool began the second half with a strong display but could not add to their lead immediately. With two-thirds of the game gone, the Reds brought on Salah and 18-year-old Harvey Elliott, who returned from injury to bag his maiden senior Liverpool goal in the weekend.

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Both Diaz and Elliott looked sharp on the ball and Mohamed Salah looked keen to increase his goal tally, but Leicester held on for much of the second half to deny Liverpool a second goal.

The Reds got a major scare in the 75th minute when Salah went down while attempting to convert from a counter attack, but the Egyptian got up and went on with the game to the Kop’s relief.

The Egyptian hit a curled shot minutes later after cutting inside from the left to open up some space, but missed the target by an agonisingly small margin as the ball hit the crossbar and harmlessly fell to a Leicester defender.

The Liverpool onslaught continued and debutant Diaz almost doubled the Reds’ lead, but was denied by a good save from Schmeichel in the 81st minute.

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Liverpool’s efforts were finally rewarded in the 87th minute when Diogo Jota pounced on a disguised pass by Joel Matip to make it 2-0 to the hosts.

The game ended 2-0 in Liverpool’s favour, taking the Reds’ points tally to 51. While Manchester City sit on 60 points, the Reds have a game in hand over the defending champions, which could see them close the gap to six points.

Leicester, who have managed just a win and a draw in their last five games now, are 12th in the Premier League table with 26 points.