Soccer Leicester scandal: One of the three Leicester City players accused of carrying out a serious sex assault yesterday came face-to-face with one of their accusers in a Spanish court room, a member of the defence team said.

The unnamed Leicester City player took part in a careo, or face-to-face meeting, before a judge in order to form an impression of who was telling the truth.

Paul Dickov, Frank Sinclair and Keith Gillespie have been accused of attacking three African women in a room at the five-star Hyatt Regency Hotel in the resort of La Manga. They deny the allegations.

Lawyers for the players have made submissions to the court for them to be released on bail.

Luis Ruiperez, who represents the players, said one of them had appeared before Judge Jacinto Areste to argue for his version of events against one of the women - but refused to say which of the players it was.

He said the careo was an opportunity for each party to confront the other with their testimony and for the judge to reach a decision as to who had presented their argument with the most "clarity, serenity and balance".

The lawyer also said that it was the intention of the judge to reach a resolution last night.

It was the intention of the players and the club to make any decision public when it had been made, he added.

Yesterday morning the players arrived at the courtroom in Cartagena after spending a sixth night in Sangonera prison near Murcia.

The judge spent the day taking statements from a number of witnesses, thought to include hotel staff and guests and taxi drivers.

It was not until after that that proceedings moved on to take evidence from the three accusers and three accused. There was also the careo as well as an identification process in court.

One of the witnesses seen by the judge was Leicester City player Steffen Freund, who was last week one of the nine arrested in Spain but later released free of all charges.

Freund was driven away from the court after giving evidence, and City chief executive Tim Davies announced that the player was heading back to England to prepare for tomorrow's match with Birmingham.

Proceedings were interrupted earlier in the day following news of the bomb attacks in Madrid. Court staff filed out of the building at noon for a five-minute silence out of respect for those who had been killed.

Later the judge, flanked by the lawyers in the case, issued an emotional statement condemning the "barbaric" atrocity.

Meanwhile, Leicester City manager Micky Adams has stressed to his players that the club's troubles in Spain are not a convenient excuse for them to ease up in their fight against relegation.

Adams has admitted that morale in the camp is low.

"I have got to be honest to say that I have seen training better and the mood of the players more bubbly than it has been in the last couple of days," Adams said. "But the players will have to be focused when we play Birmingham on Saturday - there are no excuses. Nobody has got more excuses to lose games of football than we have at the moment and that is no good for the club's supporters. That would be sending out the wrong message to them."

In addition to giving the Leicester players a chance to resume their efforts to retain their Premiership status after a 14-day lay-off - they have not won in 15 games and lie second to bottom - tomorrow's encounter at St Andrews also affords them the opportunity to start repairing the damage done to the club's reputation.

"A lot of harm has been done to this football club's reputation," Adams added. "What we have got to do is to try and get that confidence and trust back from everyone connected with Leicester City.

"I seem to be forever asking the fans of Leicester City to stick with us. It has been a difficult time for the club's supporters, sponsors and shareholders who ploughed an awful lot of money into it last season so that Leicester City did not go out of existence. It's up to the players to start putting that right."

Birmingham are understood to be taking steps to ban their supporters from bringing insulting banners into the ground tomorrow.

Adams has recalled the striker Trevor Benjamin from loan at Brighton.