Ipswich Town 1-1 Leicester City: Jannik Vestergaard own goal gives Tractor Boys late draw

An injury-time own goal from Jannik Vestergaard handed Ipswich Town a fortuitous draw in their top-of-the-table Championship showdown with Leicester City.

A deflected Leif Davis shot in the 65th minute was the first effort the Tractor Boys managed on target, in a match where few clear openings were allowed to be carved out by the fierce defensive efforts of the league’s top two teams.

Ipswich’s Conor Chaplin then had a chance punched away by Mads Hermansen, while the Foxes were frustrated to see penalty appeals waved away late on when Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall was bundled over by Cameron Burgess in the area.

Leicester failed to survived a frantic finish by the hosts, with Sam Morsy rescuing a point with a shot that deflected off both Ricardo Pereira and Vestergaard before beating goalkeeper Hermansen.

The draw means the Foxes remain six points clear of Ipswich, with third-placed Southampton cutting the gap to second to five points after their 5-0 win over Swansea.

With Ipswich’s home form of nine wins and just a solitary loss from 11 games mirrored by Leicester’s run on the road, the festive meeting of first and second promised much.

Both sides wasted early chances, starting with with Wes Burns hammering a header from a corner off-target for Ipswich, before Wilfred Ndidi scuffed a shot at the top of the box and ballooned a header over the bar in quick succession.

Abdul Fatawu’s diligence in getting back in defence denied Davis a free header at the back post after 15 minutes as the hosts – who were thrashed by fellow promotion hopefuls Leeds 4-0 just three days earlier – pressed for the opener.

Ex-Foxes forward George Hirst, the striker who helped fire Ipswich to promotion from League One on loan before completing a permanent summer move from Leicester, had his hopes of making an impact against his former side dashed soon after by injury.

The evening quickly got worse for the hosts as Patson Daka spotted Mavididi in space on the left, allowing the winger to bend his shot from the edge of the area beyond the diving clutches of Vaclav Hladky.

Both Burgess and Harry Clarke then came up with almost certain goal-saving tackles to ensure it remained 1-0 at the break, with Dewsbury-Hall and Mavididi the ones foiled as they bared down on goal.

Hladky was then tested by Daka as the visitors went in search of a second, but it took an excellent backtracking tackle from Leicester’s Wout Faes to deny Burns a sight of goal in first-half injury time.

Ipswich started the second half brightly in front of an expectant crowd, with Burgess squandering a header before Fatawu blocked a Davis effort at one end – then sending an acrobatic attempt over at the other.

It took more than an hour for Ipswich to call Hermansen into action, but he was equal to their best chance from Chaplin, while the inactivity of referee Samuel Barrott ensured the result remained in the balance until the end after he failed to punish Burgess for bringing down Dewsbury-Hall.

Leicester were closing in on a win that would have sent them nine points clear at the summit, but Morsy’s hopeful shot from outside the box left Hermansen stranded – after the ball took two heavy deflections on the way to the back of the net in the 93rd minute.

Ipswich ‘take confidence’ from draw – reaction

Ipswich Town boss Kieran McKenna told BBC Radio Suffolk:

“On the balance of play it would be clear for anyone to see [that Ipswich deserved a draw].

“I thought it was a good performance, I enjoyed the game. It was two good teams and a really strong opponent for us to measure ourselves up against. And I thought we measured up well.

“It was nice to get the goal at the end to reward a lot of good work that went in.

“It’s a point at the end of the day but we’ll certainly take confidence from the performance and really try to build on that.”

Leicester City boss Enzo Maresca told BBC Radio Leicester:

“I’m not disappointed, to be honest. Overall I’m quite happy.

“Playing every three days with the same intensity is not easy, so we knew that at some moment in the game we could drop a little bit.

“In the first half we created three or four clear chances, and scored a goal. In second half we had some moments and the moment of the penalty [appeal], that for me was crucial.

“Then the last 10 or 15 minutes we conceded the control of the game to them.”