Who is your most memorable Leicester signing?
While I was pretty excited by Sven’s entire 2010/11 transfer window (only to be wildly underwhelmed) I’d have to go for our magic man, Esteban Cambiasso.
This was a genuine superstar joining Leicester City. A man who felt like he never played without a Champions League logo stitched to his sleeve. A man who won the treble under Mourinho only four years earlier. A man who was schooled in Buenos Aires, polished in Madrid, and then made in Milan.
Fun fact: his family name was actually spelt with one ‘s’, but when his great, great grandfather migrated from Genoa to Milan, there was an error on his registration form, so the name was legally changed. That document was then rediscovered in 2004, and used as proof of Esteban’s Italian heritage, thus allowing him to sign for Inter without taking up a spot on the club’s non-EU quota.
If you can’t already tell, I’m a little bit obsessed. But if you did find that interesting, you can read an old piece of mine on the man himself.
Charlie Carmichael
Two answers spring to mind at opposite ends of the spectrum. Hossein Kaebi turned out to be absolutely ludicrous despite the hype; Esteban Cambiasso absolutely justified it in the end. The fact Nigel Pearson managed to entice a 2010 treble winner to Leicester four years later was pretty remarkable. That he also played major roles in a) one of our most memorable games this century, b) the Great Escape, and c) somehow wasn't around for the title that followed made it all the more daft. What a club.
Joe Brewin
I don’t enjoy the current trend for transfers being talked about for months on end before they do or don’t happen. My favourite kind of signing is one that arrives out of the blue. Hardly any rumours and bang - there they are, holding up the shirt on the club website. The women’s team actually achieves this at the moment, which I’m enjoying.
Riyad Mahrez was a good bolt from the blue, Hossein Kaebi less so. My personal favourite happened almost exactly ten years ago. I had sat down at Old Trafford, about to watch Spain play Morocco in the 2012 Olympics. Sir Bradley Wiggins had just won a gold. The whole country was buzzing.
These were the halcyon days when Leicester actually used the summer to sign the odd player. I saw a tweet saying we’d signed this guy I’d never heard of and it just felt exciting. Somehow I knew he’d be good. Anthony Knockaert his name was, and he turned out to be one of the most likeable and entertaining players I’ve seen in the 30-odd years I’ve supported Leicester.
David Bevan
There’s something to be said for the general Leicester City transfer approach. A lot of the time it’s picking out players the average fan won’t have seen before. If you look at a lot of the most loved Leicester signings, we probably weren’t excited about signing them so much as intrigued and keen to see what they could do.
I was a bit too young when we signed Roberto Mancini to fully appreciate the insanity of the whole thing. So in recent years there are a couple of names that stand out. One left with a lot of love and having played a key part and one…not so much, though I’ll always maintain that he wasn’t treated particularly well.
I was pretty excited to land Islam Slimani; adding another Algerian into the mix with Riyad Mahrez seemed a good idea and he was going to add an aerial presence in the box and aggression that we badly needed. The fee didn’t help expectations and neither did the fact that you can pretty much count the number of times we played him in the right position on one hand. It didn’t work out but I thought it showed us trying to do something a little different.
The one who left to general love and appreciation? Esteban Cambiasso. Hard not to look back on that one and still feel excited now. It might have just been one season but almost every player from that time says they learned from him. I think I learned something in the stands too, the art of the possible. He was possibly one step ahead of the rest of our team half the time, but it worked. The Manchester United game and goal stand out but he lived up to the initial excitement caused by his transfer.
Helen Nutter
Due to my love of Polish football, and a long history of playing as a centre-back myself, there can only be one possible answer.
Even before he signed for City, Marcin Wasilewski was one of, if not my favourite, Polish players. His aggressive and uncompromising style was a joy to watch, while his triumph against adversity, after his horrific broken leg, was even more enjoyable.
I broke the story of his trial with the club back in 2013, and still remember my giddiness whilst writing the article. I could have never have imagined what he would achieve at the club, either.
Ryan Hubbard
Bartosz Kapustka is Kaebi for the millennial generation. He played for Poland at Euro 2016, was man of the match in their first game, we’d just won the title and, frankly, I was completely giddy. There is also special place in my heart for lightweight creative midfielders.
I think the real answer though is Youri Tielemans, when he joined permanently from Monaco. His loan felt a coup in itself, but to actually sign him when everyone had seen he was ready for the Premier League was a huge statement of intent. It’s about the only transfer saga I can remember being deeply invested in. To me, appointing Brendan Rodgers and then signing Tielemans was like watching the club make the leap in real time.
James Knight