You can have it all: A whistle-stop tour of Leicester City’s greatest era
In the aftermath of Leicester City’s relegation from the Premier League, I felt regret more than anger. It was a waste of a good opportunity to maintain our long-term progress but I’d accepted our immediate fate long ago.
Then the “smile because it happened” crew appeared and I did begin to feel a tiny bit furious.
Barely had the final ball been kicked before they were out in force and it felt like they were all too ready to accept we were a second tier club who’d had an extended holiday in the top flight and made the most of it. I’ve never bought that and never will.
On reflection though, you can have it all. You can be miserable at what’s happened to us in the past couple of years while still acknowledging you had the great fortune to be born a Leicester City fan at the most perfect time in history.
When you’re smiling because it happened
If you’re reading this, the chances are you’ve either seen the worst of times followed by the best of times, or you’re a little younger and even luckier and purely seen the best of times - albeit following a club that veered wildly between being the best-run in the country and being Banter FC.
Whatever form we took, we went all out. Champions of England. FA Cup winners. European adventurers. We may not have seen it all and won it all as others sing - we didn’t quite conquer Europe - but from where we came from, we certainly had a time of it.
The past year or two has been painful, seeing such progress thrown away. It’s still a story to tell though, isn’t it? Before we’re back to the Plymouths and the Prestons. Let’s indulge ourselves briefly.
Because since the appointment of Brendan Rodgers, his time in charge has been the main scope of our recent attentions.
To start with, to measure the progress from the stale football of Claude Puel to a team that destroyed its opposition and won things.
Then, through a series of injuries, near-misses, a couple of departures and a growing sense of inaction, that team slowly disintegrated and we found ourselves questioning all the things that had gone wrong.
Even in the brief period that followed with the arrival of a new management team, we’ve been stuck at various points in the past, wondering how on earth certain decisions were made. It’s really hard to shake off.
Escape to victory
But then the time comes when you look back on it all, the start being a sunny day in August 2014 when four goals were shared with Everton and it wasn’t a disaster, when Chris Wood was our substitute saviour, when Jeff Schlupp launched a football into orbit.
A month later we were staring up at the sky again, this time pondering whether it was all real. Pinching ourselves, checking we were flesh and bone. Check complete, we celebrated. We had come from two goals down against Manchester United to score five times. It had only been a few weeks since we’d fielded Gary Taylor-Fletcher in central midfield at Stamford Bridge. Now it was Esteban Cambiasso.
This was also the day Jamie Vardy announced himself to the Premier League. Did it seem plausible, in that moment, that he would go on to score 130 goals? That he would become the most legendary player ever to play for the club?
No, but also yes. Because in that moment the possibilities felt infinite. This was something we didn’t think was possible. In that respect, it was merely a dry run.
In the short term though, what followed for both Vardy and Leicester was instead a dry spell. No goals for the GOAT-in-waiting. Few wins for a team that played well for periods but always seemed to find itself just short of what was required.
A few things helped haul us out of the mire, or at least were fittingly fantastical parts of the fairytale. Being able to sign a player of the quality of Robert Huth. The supposed sacking of Nigel Pearson, only for him to turn up for work the next day like nothing had happened. The cardboard clappers that contributed to an atmosphere far too intimidating for a series of teams that were already laying out their beach towels. Sixty seconds in Burnley that went our way.
And before you knew it, we’d escaped.
There’s an argument that the greatest escape with its unstoppable momentum was as enjoyable as what followed, despite what followed being the greatest sporting story ever told.
The number 2016 will always represent the achievement of the seemingly impossible, not just for Leicester fans but for a lot of football fans in general. There isn’t much new to add, except to say there are still days even now when we look back in wonder that we didn’t throw it all away that season. Those days will probably never disappear. There are barely any fanbases in football that can say they even vaguely know what that season felt like.
Dogs of war
In the summer of 2016, it was clear things could go one of two ways. We had either established ourselves as the new upstart members of the elite with a savvy recruitment policy and a suitably abrasive playing style - or we’d make a complete horlicks of the most important transfer window in the club’s history and start trying to tinker with the on-field approach that had served us so magnificently.
On the opening day of our title defence in Hull, we got the answer to all of the above and we probably knew straight away that a glorious opportunity had been missed. It was also a bitter reminder of how it felt to watch Leicester City lose. It had only happened three times in the previous 12 months, in the Premier League at least. We would certainly become reacquainted with the feeling over the coming months. The fall was sudden and disorientating.
At the weekends anyway. Because in midweek we got our gladrags on and kept up the pretence that we were still brilliant. We cantered through our Champions League group, winning in Bruges and dragon-slaying Porto. We’d had the draw of our dreams - winnable games in astonishing cities. It got even better when the first knockout round paired us with Sevilla.
An epic ensued, beginning with a battering in Andalucia. At two down with more seemingly inevitable, Vardy gave us hope. As we readied ourselves to return home the following evening, we heard the news: Ranieri’s reign was over.
It had to happen. We needed the new boss, two balls bounce. And boy did we get it. We got it in the Premier League, winning five in a row. The bonus is that we also got it in the Champions League, seeing off Sevilla with the help of a few old dogs of war amid arguably the greatest atmosphere our home has ever seen.
Transition time
If anything, we went a bit early and we were already on the downward trajectory of the bounce before the season had even ended. Unlucky in places to lose over two legs against Atletico Madrid, we then shipped six at home to Tottenham in the final week. Maybe the writing was already on the wall for Craig Shakespeare.
When you look at the teams we lost to at the start of the 2017/18 season, you can make a strong case Shakespeare was unfortunate: Arsenal, Manchester United, Chelsea, Liverpool. But this is why people still view Khun Vichai as ruthless, in a good way. Draws with Bournemouth and West Bromwich Albion sealed Shakespeare’s fate.
It’s hard to sum up what followed. We didn’t really know what we should be as a club. To use that old get out of jail free card, it was a period of transition. While it was hard to feel enthused about the football under Claude Puel, he did oversee the perfect transition.
We bought well, we sold well, we slowly and painfully but necessarily changed the style of play, we kept things ticking over and we waited for someone who could put the pieces together.
Someone who could help us win something else we’d never won before, but we’ve talked ourselves to distraction about him for the past year.
And now we are back where we came from, but that isn’t to say we belong there or that the greatest days of your Leicester City-supporting life are over for good.
We had it all and we can have some of it again soon. For now, we sit and wait for our next batch of heroes.
