Leicester City boss Dean Smith following loss to Liverpool: ‘It was a very tough night – the best team won’

Leicester City lost 3-0 to Liverpool in their Premier League clash at the King Power Stadium last night.

Their interim manager Dean Smith could not hide his disappointment and admitted that the better team won.

Leicester are 19th in the Premier League and face the prospect of relegation to the Championship after nine years in the top flight.

Curtis Jones opened the scoring following an error from centre-back Wout Faes. The Belgian failed to deal with a straightforward long ball.

Mohamed Salah received the ball and crossed for Jones to finish. Minutes later, Jones doubled his tally with a delightful strike that looped over Leicester goalie Daniel Iversen.

Trent Alexander-Arnold ensured the victory with a gorgeous free-kick. Leicester had their chances but failed to find a way past Alisson Becker.

Smith was disappointed at his side’s inability to keep things tight at the back,

He said (via Leicester’s official website): “It was a very tough night. The best team won. They’re a very good team with talented footballers. But on top of that, they are top athletes as well.

“I thought we matched them for 30 minutes until that first goal.

“Our game plan was to keep the ball in front of us and I thought we did that really well. But, after 30 minutes, the goalkeeper has put a big ball over the back four and they score from that.

“The manner of the goals that we’ve given away, certainly just in the six games that I’ve had, have been disappointing.

“There’s things that we can do about it. Unfortunately, we go behind and we get a bit frantic after that. Obviously, the opposition upped their game a little bit as well and score a second.

“We gave them the second almost straight from the kick-off. That’s the disappointing thing that we weren’t thinking clearly under pressure there. That let us down at times.”

Liverpool took a two-goal lead into the half-time break, but Leicester came out looking for a way back into the game.

However, Liverpool added a third and Smith was unhappy about it. He believes the free-kick should not have been awarded as defender Johnny Evans won the ball.

Leicester are two points from safety with two games left.

They travel to St James’ Park to face high-flying Newcastle United on Monday before their final game against West Ham United.