Leicester City manager Gary Rowett felt referee John Busby may have been influenced by earlier penalty claims when he failed to award the Blues an injury time spot-kick after Cedric Kipre was bundled over by Hamza Choudhury.

Rowett was pleased with his side’s third away stalemate against tough opponents having drawn 2-2 at Stoke and 1-1 at Middlesbrough with his only defeat in his four games in charge a 2-0 home loss to Norwich City last weekend.

“I think first and foremost, we knew we had three tough away games out of the first four fixtures and against really in-form teams and at tough places to go,” he said.

“To go to Middlesbrough and do what we did there, and we know we probably should have won the Stoke game at the end, and then to come here and do what we did here, I think is a testament at least that the players are really trying to buy into a structure and the hard work that we’re demanding and require.

“I thought in the first half, our shape was excellent. I thought we got in some brilliant, brilliant positions and maybe should have done a little better. I think Winksy [Harry Winks] has shot a couple of times and we’ve just flashed shots wide, and from really promising positions which have come from a really well structured shape out of possession.

“I liked the look of us in the first half, I thought we looked really, really composed as a football team and then to go a goal ahead from a set piece, another well-worked set piece and get in ahead at half-time, we’re really pleased.

“Second half, you know they’re going to come out, you know they’re going to push, they score a lot of late goals.

“Ipswich are an incredibly demanding team to play against. You step out and stop one thing and there’s a runner. They play with an incredible energy, they’re really well coached by Kieran [McKenna].

“And we were under pressure in the second half. We were backed up, we didn’t use the ball well enough. Maybe a little bit of nervousness because we haven’t won a game for a while, maybe the players are trying to overprotect that and that’s something we certainly need to work on.

“Disappointed to concede but I couldn’t complain that Ipswich didn’t deserve something for their efforts. But pleased we then defended the box when we needed to late on.”

Reflecting further on his team’s performance as Town stepped up their display after the break, he added: “We needed to use the ball better in the second half. Sometimes you’re happy to just put your foot through it.

“There were a couple of times where we clear our lines, it goes out for a throw-in and we’re still sat in our own half waiting for them to throw it and it come back to us.

“Sometimes you’ve got to play the game, squeeze up, try and lock them in, try and have some pressure there.

“Again, a couple of times when we turned the ball over too cheaply, maybe because we were working so hard out of possession to do what we wanted to do, maybe we didn’t quite have the energy late on in the game to then go and go and play. But sometimes we just gave the ball away.

“That’s something we definitely need to improve, but I don’t think there will be many teams that come to Ipswich, will be 1-0 up and not have to defend really, really stoically second half if they want to go and get a result, so I don’t think we’re any different in that.”

Regarding the penalty incident at the end, he said: “The only thing I would say with that, just from my observations, it looked like two penalty shouts earlier in the game, I think it was the striker [Ivan Azon] and then [Anis] Mehmeti, but it looked as though they went down a little bit easily for them.

“I’m not suggesting that means it shouldn’t have been a penalty at the end, I don’t know, I haven’t seen it, but maybe that was in the referee’s mind. I don’t know.

“Obviously at that stage of a game, it’s such a huge call to give, there’s so much pushing and pulling in the box. Every time they had a corner, we’re getting players held at the back post to open up the space.

“I’d have to watch it again, Kieran might well have been right, that was just my observation, maybe in the referee’s mind, he’s looking at some of those moments.

“And, of course, when everybody jumps up and everybody’s desperate, it’s hard in that moment to be sure. And if you’re not sure, you can’t give it. Clearly he wasn’t sure, whether that was right or wrong, I’ll have to see when I watch it back.”

Photo: TWTD