Braveheart Wilfred Ndidi already a leader for Leicester City

The Nigeria international kept his head in Madrid while all around him in blue seemed hopelessly second-rate.

For all that the constant comparisons between N’Golo Kante and Wilfred Ndidi are lazy and presumptuous, there is one trait they both share that the numbers can only cover in a limited way. At every turn, as the level goes higher, they blend right in.

The scene is the quarter final first leg of the Uefa Champions League, and the opposition is Atletico Madrid at the Vicente Calderon, that noisome bear pit over which Diego Simeone presides. Leicester City are already in dizzyingly unfamiliar territory, and it tells: as their ears congest and their balance goes, it is only the gangly Ndidi who seems sure of foot.

The irony though is that, for all that the Foxes were outfoxed, they are still very much in the tie. Antoine Griezmann’s penalty gives Atletico a slim advantage to take to the King Power next week, but it could have been so much worse were it not for Leicester’s prize greyhound.