Nigel Pearson admits pressure is on Leicester to beat Crystal Palace

Leicester City manager Nigel Pearson admits his team is under pressure to beat Crystal Palace on Saturday.

Palace won their first four games after appointing Alan Pardew as Neil Warnock’s replacement on January 3 but were beaten at home by Everton last time out.

Despite Palace’s progress under Pardew, Pearson still has the weekend game marked down as one he would hope to win and that factor increases the pressure on his players.

"People would look at a game like Saturday, whatever camp you sit in, and hope your team is capable of winning," he said.

"In some ways that puts more pressure on games like this. Ultimately, at our best, we are going to be a difficult team to play against.

"We have a healthy respect for people and on their day Palace are a very capable side. We have to make sure we're getting our home form right and pick up three points.

"We have been in the bottom spot for a while so it's always an incentive to know three points gives you a chance to progress."

Pearson has this week reinforced the importance of personal sacrifice to his players as they bid to put the disappointment of back-to-back Premier League defeats behind them.

"Players are going to have to deal with personal disappointment for the good of the team," said Pearson, whose side were beaten 3-1 at Manchester United last Saturday.

"All in all we have an available squad, which is very nice for us but on the other hand you are going to have one or two players disappointed as well.

"They are going to have to deal with that because the important thing for us is we still have our future in our own hands.