seeping away and the Premier League champions
still have work to do ahead of Saturday€™s trip to
West Bromwich Albion.
Craig Shakespeare, who took over as manager following
title-winning boss Claudio Ranieri̢۪s sacking in
February, has lost just three of his 11 games in charge.
Yet the third of those defeats, at Arsenal on Wednesday,
left the Foxes still with just 37 points and glancing over
their shoulders at potential relegation problems with
five games remaining.
One more victory should allay any lingering fears, but
until the 40-point barrier is passed, Shakespeare knows
his own long-term future is unlikely to be resolved by
Leicester̢۪s Thai owners.
"When they first appointed me I said if they want to
(talk) that is fine," he said. "I am quite comfortable,
but my remit was to the end of the season.
"I said before we need some more points on the board
and we are disappointed not to get them, but we move
on now to Saturday."
Shakespeare will be keen to restore Wes Morgan to the
heart of his defence for the trip to Albion, where the
Leicester manager played as a midfielder and cut his
teeth in coaching.
Morgan returned from a back injury for the second leg
of the Champions League quarter-final defeat to Atletico
Madrid, but the centre-back then suffered a hamstring
problem that forced him to miss the 1-0 midweek loss
at the Emirates Stadium.
- Missing Morgan -
"I am hoping he can train fully with the lads who
haven't played at Arsenal," said Shakespeare. "It is a
quick turn around and we need to dust ourselves down
very quickly and it doesn't give us much recovery time.
"We are disappointed in the dressing room but we
have another game against a tough opponent on
Saturday."
Yohan Benalouane has deputised impressively during
Morgan̢۪s absence while the pair played together
against Atletico when Robert Huth was suspended.
That would give Shakespeare a difficult selection
decision if Morgan is declared fit, although the captain
would be favourite to start ahead of the French-born
Tunisian.
"Anybody out of the side, whether they are the captain
or not, will have a tough job to get into the team,â€
said Shakespeare.
"But I will pick the side accordingly."
For West Brom the mantra of recent weeks has not
been backed up by results.
Having reached their initial target of 40 points in late
February, Tony Pulis's men have won just once since
and remain on 44 points with five games still to play.
That win gave them the notable scalp of Arsenal, but
Baggies captain Darren Fletcher is still looking for more
from the squad.
"We want to get the points ourselves, we don't want
anybody to do us any favours," he said. "We're
disappointed with our form just now, we're having a
down period, but it's probably just about lifting the
confidence and reiterating we̢۪ve had a great
season."
The former Manchester United midfielder added: "We
need to remember what we've done for the last six or
seven months, how good it's been and get back to that.
"Nothing's changed really, the intensity levels are still
the same, but it's just not happened for us.
"We're still eighth in the league and we want to finish
eighth, that̢۪s the target. We want to get to 50
points."
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