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Asharq Al-Awsat
Asharq Al-Awsat
Sport
Asharq Al-Awsat

Leicester’s Maddison Praises Fofana for Impressive Performance While Fasting

Leicester's James Maddison and Wesley Fofana celebrate their win against PSV during the quarter-final, second leg, Europa Conference League match at Philips stadium in Eindhoven, Netherlands, Thursday, April 14, 2022. (AP)

Leicester City's James Maddison heaped praise on defender Wesley Fofana on Thursday after he delivered an impressive performance in the Europa Conference League quarter-finals against PSV Eindhoven while fasting for Ramadan.

After a goalless first leg, Maddison and Ricardo Pereira scored as Leicester came from behind in the return match to beat the Dutch club 2-1 and reach their first European semi-final.

They will play AS Roma for a spot in the final of Europe's third-tier competition.

The 21-year-old Fofana, who recently returned from a serious leg injury, showed excellent pace and broke up several dangerous PSV attacks in the second half.

"The togetherness of the boys is unbelievable," Maddison said. "For example, Wesley Fofana is fasting at the minute - he's not eating or drinking anything all day and he puts in a performance like that.

"He's stopping all the counter-attacks by sprinting. That epitomizes what we are about in terms of courage."

Leicester manager Brendan Rodgers was happy with the response of his players in the second half.

"We're a team that's young in terms of European football. We come to PSV Eindhoven with a great history in winning the European Cup in 1988. For us, we're so young in it," Rodgers said.

"These are great experiences for us, we showed great personality and I'm so happy for the players and it's the first semi-final in our history."

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