Claudio Ranieri acknowledges Daniel Amartey’s contribution in Leicester success

Leicester defeated Swansea to earn their first win of the season, but Ranieri acknowledges more work needs to be done – especially between new forward pairing Jamie Vardy and Ahmed Musa, who came on as substitute after 75 mins.

However, while there were mixed fortunes for City’s usual suspects, with goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel also set to go under the knife to fix a hernia, there was a huge positive to come out of the game for Ranieri, beyond the obvious three points.

The Leicester ‘keeper limped off in the second half, prompting concerns that he could miss the club’s first ever foray into the Champions League, which starts next month with a trip to Club Brugge.

Claudio Ranieri said that the three points were very important for Leicester City.

Without him, the Foxes lacked something of the intensity and tenacity that characterised their performances during their title-winning campaign and took just one point from their opening two matches, losing against Hull City in their opener and drawing 0-0 with Arsenal in their second match. It was also Ranieri’s 100th Premier League win as a manager.

Vardy has become the third Leicester player to score 30 Premier League goals, after Muzzy Izzet and Emile Heskey (both 33).

“Though now extremely early, their first victory as defending champions therefore can not come soon enough, particularly as Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea and Tottenham all lie in wait before the end of October – a testing two months which also includes the opening three matches in the Champions League”.

“Some seasons a little more and some seasons a little less, but the goalscorer never forgets the way”. It is important for strikers to score a goal because it is their life.

“We complicated our life a little bit”, his manager said.

The 22-year-old is close to a switch to the Liberty Stadium and after the 2-1 defeat at Leicester Guidolin said: “We are working to sign a player – a central defender. It was water polo”.

“Amartey played very, very well. I’m very, very happy”.

“In the first half they played very, very well”.

Leicester recorded seven goals without reply against Swansea last season and were looking in the mood for another rout, with Shinji Okazaki testing Lukasz Fabianski from distance before half-time.

“We prepared another kind of game but in the first half we didn’t play well”.

“In the first half we didn’t play well but in the second half something we change”. To go two goals up and then hang on at the end, we got what we deserved.