Gary Rowett’s “tough decision” was rewarded with a rare clean sheet, with the Leicester City manager choosing to drop Ben Nelson for Jamaal Lascelles at Watford.
Rowett made four changes to his starting line-up at Vicarage Road, but his biggest call came in defence, where he broke up his centre-back partnership for the first time since his arrival at City.
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Bringing Lascelles in following the 3-1 defeat to QPR was not a surprise, but Nelson making way perhaps was.
The City academy graduate was integral to Oxford’s survival under Rowett last season when he was on loan at the Kassam Stadium.
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But after a couple of big mistakes last weekend, he was the man dropped, with Caleb Okoli remaining in the side.
The new partnership worked well and City limited Watford to very few chances to keep their first away clean sheet in the Championship for seven months, since the 1-0 win at Charlton in August.
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Discussing the defensive improvements, Rowett said: “Jamaal came in with experience. I’ve got to make tough decisions at the moment. I love Ben and I think he’s going to be a top player. He’s got the potential to be a top player.
“Sometimes I’ve got to make a call based on what I think. And I felt today we needed a bit of experience, a bit of know-how, a 7/10 performance, a bit of leadership and a voice.
“Then I just went with Caleb instead of Ben. But I thought Ben did really well when he came on.
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“Jamaal played the first 75 minutes excellently. We knew he’d struggled to last the whole game. I thought he did really well.
“We defended the box a lot better today. There was a lot of direct play and big strikers on at the start and off the bench. They sensed an opportunity to hurt us but we stood up to it pretty well.”
City have the third leakiest defence in the Championship this season, although their record has vastly improved under Rowett.
Their nine goals conceded in seven matches under the new manager is fewer than 11 sides in the division over the same period.
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