Gary Neville insisted Kevin De Bruyne should have been booked for diving as the Manchester City star tried to win a penalty against Leicester.

City were trying to turn around their dire run of form at the King Power stadium, which has seen them slip to seventh in the Premier League table in what has turned out to be a disastrous title defence.

They took the lead early through Savinho's first league goal for the champions, after Foxes back-up goalkeeper Jakub Stolarczyk had parried Phil Foden's effort straight to the winger.

And they had a shout for the chance to add another to their tally on the half-hour mark when De Bruyne hit the deck under a challenge from Jannik Vestergaard - though replays showed he went down a little too easily and Michael Oliver waved away appeals.

A VAR check saw the decision agreed with, as replays showed the Belgian fell the the floor with very little - if any - contact.

And Neville, on commentary during Sky Sport's coverage of the game, wasn't pulling any punches with his analysis of the incident. 

'He went down too easily,' Neville began. 'You can tell, it was awkward the way he fell.

'You can see he dived from up here. He probably should be booked really, he has tired to con the referee. But I wasn't fully against one of my team-mates diving though, so I'll just...'

Back in the starting XI, he did, however, have an important role in Savinho's opener, volleying towards Foden to shoot after he was picked out by Rico Lewis.

It was his first start since December 15, with the midfielder, now 33, who has struggled with is fitness for a long period of time. 

He lined up mostly in central midfield, often drifting into the right half-space, or channel, in a bid to create opportunities.

Guardiola said of his man before kick off: 'We want the best of our players to be fit and play good. We are happy to have Kevin. Hopefully he can play like he does.'