Seven years after they conquered English football, achieving the greatest feat in football history and breaking open the doors of the “Big Six”, Leicester’s fairy tale comes to an end. This weekend, Everton’s victory ended the ‘Foxes’ dynasty to the Championship, a death knell that had been announced for weeks.
Gone is the month of May 2016, when Andrea Bocelli sang ‘Nesum Dorma’ in front of the watchful eyes of the King Power Stadium, half Europe recited the starting eleven on a run and Claudio Ranieri cheered as the greatest achievement of his career a coach.
The journey through nine seasons in the premiership began in the 2014/2015 academic year, the year before he became King of England. At Christmas, Leicester were bottom of all pools and favorites for relegation, but four wins in the last five days brought salvation to the Leinsterian team.
While maintaining the core of the squad, the board of directors chose Claudio Ranieri on the bench, setting permanence as the objective. the rest is history. 4-4-2, making Kante the best recoverer in Europe, consolidating Mahrez in the elite class and promoting Vardy as one of the best scorers in the British Isles after playing in the Fifth Division in 2012 Combining this with his job at a prosthesis factory, the Italian coach turned a team of unknowns into a league-winning block.
Since that day, the club has shown itself to be an alternative to Manchester City, Manchester United, Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal or Tottenham. In 2017 they reached the quarter-finals of the Champions League, in 2021 they participated in the Europa League and were FA Cup champions and in 2022 they played in the semi-finals of the Conference League.
However, after the death of the club’s historic Thai owner Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha in a helicopter crash in 2018, the poor financial management of its leaders led the ‘Foxes’ to the championship.
They only signed three players this summer, did not sign a guaranteed goalkeeper to replace Kasper Schmeichel and missed the opportunity to sell Tielemans or Maddison to clean up their €110m loss-making accounts.
Along with Blackburn Rovers, Leicester are the only Premier League champions whose nine-season adventure in the top flight of English football has sadly come to an end this season. However, despite his fall into hell, his legacy in England is already indelible.
