Maresca lauds 'improving' Foxes with third successive win

Enzo Maresca praised his “improving” Leicester side after they edged out a narrow 1-0 victory at Huddersfield.

Summer signing Stephy Mavididi opened his account for the club midway through the second half for what proved to be the winning goal.

The £6.4million recruit from Montpellier unleashed a venomous strike from an acute angle which squeezed past Lee Nicholls at his near post.

Leicester enjoyed the majority of chances with Dennis Praet missing from a one-on-one position and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall lively throughout.

But it was Mavididi who was the match winner to secure new boss Maresca a third successive victory in all competitions this season since taking charge of the relegated Foxes.

“One of the things that we need this year is to not get frustrated and to be patient, because the chance will arrive,” Maresca said.

“We had at least five or six clear chances to score and, in the end, we completely deserved to win and have the three points.

“I said to the players that I need to know them and they need to know me.

“We started 40 days ago and I need to give them lots of information, but you can’t give it all in 40 days.

“Even defensively, we’ve already improved a lot against a team that are well-organised and created chances from throw-ins, corners and long balls.

“I’m very pleased with all the team and the effort that they did over the last week with three games and three wins.

“Especially today. It was exactly as I expected in terms of against a well-organised team that defended deep, so it was complicated.

“I’m pleased with Stephy, he scored and gave us three points. He’s working well and was very good against Coventry City last week.

“The reason why we brought him to the club was exactly for that today; good in one-v-ones who scores goals and give assists.”

It was a frustrating afternoon for hosts Huddersfield, who slipped to a third defeat in a row to start the campaign.

Michal Helik spurned a glorious opportunity in the first half to open the scoring when he blazed over from point-blank range.

And his defensive partner Matty Pearson missed an inviting chance to equalise as he headed straight at Jakub Stolarczyk.

“I enjoyed it,” said boss Neil Warnock. “The last thing I wrote on the board was ‘enjoy it’ and I think we did today.

“We covered every blade of grass and couldn’t give anything else; we’re just disappointed to lose to a goal like that because I couldn’t see them scoring.

“I thought their goalie made a couple of good saves in that first half and whenever we could, we tried to create things and we were on the front foot.

“I love having a go at them. They’ve got a good squad and two teams who can get promotion but thankfully we were only playing one!

“I think we’ve got to look after ourselves and we’ve shown today that we can go anywhere and have a really good game.

“Yes, the lads are disappointed but there’s nothing to be ashamed of today. There’s nothing but positives apart from the goal.

“It’s not easy to score goals, you need a bit of luck sometimes and they’ve had a bit today.

“Let’s hope it evens out a little bit. They say it does over a season but I’m not so sure, so we’ve got to make our own luck as well.”