Harry Maguire insists he did not deserve to be sent off for a challenge on Sadio Mane before scoring Leicester City's equaliser in a 1-1 draw at Premier League leaders Liverpool.
Maguire brought Mane down when the Liverpool winger was running in behind the Leicester back line during Wednesday's game at Anfield, but referee Martin Atkinson opted to only show the defender a yellow card.
England international Maguire then went on to cancel out an opening goal scored by Mane, with Liverpool missing the chance to move seven points clear of Manchester City, who suffered a shock loss at Newcastle United on Tuesday.
Jurgen Klopp suggested Maguire should have been dismissed for denying a goalscoring opportunity but the centre-back did not agree with the Liverpool manager's assessment of the incident.
"I didn't actually see him coming across my body," Maguire said to BT Sport of the Mane foul. "I did catch him, I stood on the back of his heel to be fair.
"I didn't mean to catch him so I thought it was the right decision but you're always worried because it looked like he was going to race through on goal. I'm thankful it was a yellow card."
Inconsistency has dogged Leicester's campaign but, although their performance merited a point, Maguire rued a slow start at Anfield.
"It was a great team performance after the first five minutes," Maguire added. "We've been really sloppy in games in the first 15 minutes, we're the worst team in the league at it.
"We keep speaking about it, but we've started sloppy again and given them a goal. It was a good reaction to get back into the game and we've had spells in the game where we probably should have scored two.
"We know they are a top team, [and we] couldn’t open up as much as we'd like. We had periods where we put them under a lot of pressure, maybe we should have capitalised and gone on to win the game. But it's a tough place to come, [we] would have taken a point before the game."
