Drama, charmers and the 92 Club - Hazzetta dello Sport: Brentford (H)
The show rolls on. Another loss. Another week of dramatics off the pitch. Another week of concerns growing.
King Power have been unable to service payments to the Thailand Airports Group. It’s hard to say what that means but it doesn’t sound good. Another poor exposure of fan relations as a supporter reports that him receiving cancer treatment is not viewed by the club as reason enough to extend the transfer of his ticket to more than five games.
While we sit in our Leicester City echo chamber, it feels no club is like it. Across the weekend; from The Athletic’s article about Project Reset right through to Sunday afternoon, where the Foxes remain still two points away from safety.
On the pitch, it does not change either. In isolation, a decent effort against Arsenal. That does not acknowledge how it felt - a groundhog day repeat of games against Liverpool and Manchester City. We were afforded more time by a team who are comfortable that we don’t create many chances, and we can’t defend for prolonged spells. Keep us at arm’s length and then wait for the chance.
We have arrived back at Cooperball. Now though, we don’t have the luck of the opposition going down to ten men, or a deflected goal in our favour or a once in a lifetime shot from distance. Mads Hermansen was performing ridiculously well and now he’s reverting to be good rather than statistical model-breaking world class. The early promise of a front three containing Vardy, El Khannouss and Buonanotte against West Ham has evaporated into an age concern triplet of Vardy, Ayew and Reid.
After the 4-0 hammering at Newcastle, we have reined in the attacking side to supposedly improve our defensive capabilities but the personnel aren’t good enough there regardless of how you set up. The concentration levels will always fail and once you’ve blunted the attacking side of this squad, you are left with not a lot.
The visit of Brentford represents one of the few ‘winnable’ games between here and late April. However, they are the team to most comprehensively beat us back in November. Despite an early goal, we were left chasing shadows and, notably, Thomas Frank knew our tactical weaknesses. Rather than the relaxed approach to pressing Arsenal took, Brentford will be more combative, and, in all probability, they will score from a defensive error.
The season now resembles something of a long-distance race or a cycling stage where City need to keep on the shoulder of the race leader until the final few kilometres and then pull through. The fixtures, however, would suggest Wolves have the opposition to really make some distance between themselves and the relegation zone. In comparison, Leicester must run or ride up the Ventoux climb.
Unfortunately, a combination of a cold and work made me struggle to put something together for last Saturday’s game. There was an admission that I remain sceptical of Project Reset, largely because of anonymity yet asking of people willing to be quoted for the media. However, applause must be given to how the coverage cranked up in the days leading up to it. That’s a real effort of action.
While some may argue that the numbers of 500 to 700 were poor and there were issues with organisation, there are two big wins; 500 at least were happy to act and this was a welcome break from the apathy increasingly running through Leicester City fans. The other being that in a post truth world, the headlines are the impact. That coverage was shared on TNT, Match of The Day and most importantly, the world feed for the Premier League, means its impact was large. To turn the narrative around, the seed needs to be sowed that Leicester fans aren’t happy and this isn’t an unjustified show.
The aftermath highlights the bigger challenge which faces any fan action with Leicester City. In the process, it asks uncomfortable questions of the fanbase in terms of how much we have done to salvage active fan groups, or what the solutions are to repair the relationship between club and fanbase.
After all, the club have gone full charm offensive this week with the appointment of Andy King to first team coach and the announcement that four games will be used a showcase for local charities. There is a heavy slice of cynicism but equally they are exactly the sort of actions that the fanbase would want. It remains to be seen if an Everards pump of Tiger has been installed across the ground to make it a triple crown of positive gestures.
Those steps, though, are little in the grand scheme of things. After all, the real challenge of ticket prices is nearly upon us and the discontent shown across the Premier League highlights a real problem. The sport at top level has slipped into an entertainment and tourism first attitude which shows little recognition that a club of Leicester’s ilk is provincial, doesn’t have Americans visiting weekly and that currently our attendances go against the pattern of increasing crowds across the country.
While the appeal of Leicester 1 Brentford 3 with a belly full of curry is huge, the big event for me is on Saturday. In visiting Bromley, I complete the 92 and can proudly say I’ve visited every ground in the top four divisions (until August). Remarkably when doing the stats, you have all the evidence that Leicester City FC are batshit crazy, amazing and frustrating.
In visiting the existing 92, I have seen Leicester City at 64 of those grounds. While across the bid for the 92, I have been to 117 grounds - of which Leicester City were viewed at 75. That extends even further when we include grounds abroad, where City have been watched in 87 grounds and in total 10 countries. From Newcastle to Torquay, Randers to Hereford, what a mad journey this club is.
