Out of the spotlight: I can’t wait until Leicester City are back in the big time
While some Leicester City fans are relishing a season away from the non-stop media frenzy of the Premier League, Chris Lymn is already counting down the days until we’re back.
Somewhat to my surprise we are doing ever so well.
There isn’t a team at any level who would not take 12 wins out of 13. Experts say we are ‘smashing’ this league. Not a huge level of expertise needed to come to that conclusion. I don’t have a problem with this. Who would?
But it is not the league I want to smash. To me it’s the second division. They can rebrand it all they want but that’s what it is. Is this unfair, a sign of approaching and unwelcome elitism?
Why surprise? Relegation inevitably prompts the departure of a club’s best players. Although arguably those least responsible for the drop, they hold the best value as budgets shrivel. Their replacement must be problematic, the days when recruitment offering the wealth of Premier contracts have gone.
And bettering such as Rotherham and Millwall does not stir any blood.
Many years ago during our yoyo years, I asked a local footie journo who was giving a talk ‘were we a natural second tier club who struggle in the top league or a top league club who should not be lower?’
His reply was unequivocal. ‘The former’…
I thought those years were behind us. If the reality then was that you end up where your financial wherewithal lands you, King Power backing offered us a fighting chance to be established.
So last season was a shock to the system. But money can be misspent. Status can be assumed. Others can also be equally, or more, motivated to compete at the top level.
I never entertained realistic hopes of matching the big six on a sustained level but hoped that they took us seriously. Now every match represents a step towards getting back to that status. And hoping the lessons of last season are well learned.
Reading the comments of fans at other clubs we have just played is instructive - they think we are really a Premier club playing in the wrong division. They envy our perceived riches. I hope so.
A glance at the footie media on a Monday morning leaves us in no doubt that we no longer count.
Luton v Bournemouth has more space now. We are a footnote, a second thought, bit players.
That is not what I want us to be, Ross County to Celtic, Grace Road to Lord’s or the Clock Tower to Marble Arch.
If, reading this, you are bristling with wounded local pride then fine, but we are talking about the fantasy world of football which imposes its own standards and has the capacity to upset norms of recognition.
This season is going well, thankfully, but for me it is just about buying a one way ticket out, to regain a place where we get match reports and analysis and other parts of the world have heard of us.
Putting us back on the map.
Back (cliché alert) where we belong...
