Shade Happy To Contribute
- Leicester City Under-23s played out a 1-1 draw with Chelsea Under-23s at LCFC Training Ground
- Tyrese Shade scored the Foxes' goal on the night, cancelling out George McEachran's opener
- Shade spoke to LCFC TV after the game, praising the team's performance to take a point despite going down to 10 men
- The 20-year-old hopes the last two results are ones that Leicester can build on in the coming weeks
The young Foxes looked to be up against it when they went behind to George McEachran's opener shortly before half-time in the Premier League 2 clash, but Shade's smart finish levelled the scores.
City then had to show a lot of heart and desire to hold on to the point following Ali Reghba's red card, re-shuffling the pack and battling away in the final 20 minutes. Shade believes the result is the least their hard work deserved.
"There's a lot of excitement and relief [in the dressing room]," he told LCFC TV in his post-match interview. "We went 1-0 down in the first half and we just said keep it as it is.
"We were doing well, we were getting opportunities, it was just unfortunate that it was really late on to concede, but we knew the game plan was just to stick to it and it paid off in the end. I can only applaud the boys, they really stepped it up, the effort was 100 per cent."
The 20-year-old, who captained the side on the night, found the crucial equaliser, guiding the ball into the bottom corner past Chelsea goalkeeper Korb Ziger, netting his second goal of the season in the process.
It has been a frustrating campaign for the midfielder, who has missed a large part of the season due to injury, but is now looking ahead to finishing 2020/21 positively.
"I saw Jake [Wakeling] one-vs-one down the side and he's just cut it back," Shade said, recalling his goal. "I've got a defection and it just felt to me and the first thing I thought as a forward player was to shoot and I've done that and it's gone in.
"It's been a hard season. I got injured early on in the season and it was a really bad one. Four months I was on the sidelines and throughout my injury it was just about getting back involved and I've done that, I've worked hard and I'm really happy tonight.
"Slowly with the minutes I'm hoping I'll be back to full fitness very soon. I've just got to take it game by game."
The result takes Leicester onto 17 points, remaining in 11th position in the Premier League 2 Division 1 table following back-to-back draws, which halted a run of four successive defeats.
"With draws, it's just fine margins," Shade added. "If we keep gong how we are with the training and the games, we're doing well and we'll get another three points eventually.
"Their team (Chelsea's) is a very good team. For us, we've got a very young team and a few of our players have gone with the first team and we haven't sulked or moaned, we've just got on with it and to be fair to the young players, they've really stepped up and been very good."