The Rise and Fall of Leicester City – Part 2

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1:41You're listening to the Football Daily Podcast with Kelly Cates. Welcome to part two of our look into the rise and fall of Leicester City. If you missed part one, you can find that on the last episode of the Football Daily. In today's episode, we're going to look at what happened after Leicester won the title. We've talked about that huge title winning season, but then moving on into Champions League football, losing N 'Golo Kante, Claudia Ranieri sacked in the February the following season and Craig Shakespeare took over. Shakespeare, who'd been such a huge part of the club and was such an instrumental part of the title winning season, who died in 2024, was an unsung hero at times for everything that Leicester achieved.

2:25But the most significant event that happened to Leicester in the time after the 2015-16 season was in October 2018. Nick? Yeah, obviously, I think everybody in the room recognizes the significance of it with the helicopter crash, which claimed the lives of four people, including the owner Kun Vishay. And it was a surreal one for everybody there because it was apparent how serious it was very, very quickly. The stadium was essentially locked down. From a media perspective, everybody was kept inside into the media room, obviously still trying to ascertain what was going on, what was happened, what had happened.

3:17and obviously slowly the facts start to come to life and everybody who has been to a Leicester game has most likely seen the helicopter flying to and from the ground. For instance, it was actually used to bring Nathan Dyer to the football club to beat the deadline earlier in the title-winning season. So it's not something you ever, ever expect to happen, to underline just how devastating it was. I don't think we can because Kunva-Shaw was sort of the beating heart of the club, but also the city and the community. He did it so much, so much for the area, not just for the football club. He put the football club on the map, of course, but then his commitment to the area was also second to none.

4:07And as Nick says, Wes, it's difficult to put into words the size of the loss that was felt, not just by the club, but by Leicester itself. But what is maybe easier to talk about is the impact that Vishay had when he was alive and when he was involved in the club and why the supporters loved him so much. It's rare for a football club owner to have that relationship with the supporters. Yeah, he was an incredible man, incredible individual. He was a person that you can tell he really cared. he invested a lot of time not just into the players but the staff the fans the community the city and I think that's why the feeling the response from everyone has been the same you know which is hurt and loss and that's because he had such a profound impact on everybody but we you know we had the we had the the benefit of being close to him, having him around us a lot and when you get to know him he's even better.

5:20Just his smile, just the way he liked to work. I know he definitely cared a lot about his team, the people, the players and we all felt that. So that's why it really hit us hard especially under the circumstances and the way it happened. It really hit us hard and it was difficult for us to accept and deal with. But we had to remember, you know, what would he want? And he would want us to continue to perform and do well and win games, you know. So we had to somehow park it as much as we can and go out there and try and play and do him proud. And football requires that people continue even under the most difficult of circumstances.

6:04And as you said, that's what the players had to do. And then as the club started to recover and started to get back on his feet, it was May 2021, Wes, when you lifted your second major trophy as Leicester captain. Uri Tielemann got the winner this time around to win the FA Cup for Leicester against Chelsea at Wembley. How was that experience for you? Incredible. You know, I've gone into that season knowing it's probably my final season. I was suffering with a lot of injuries and I wasn't featuring as much. You could see it coming in terms of you're not starting as much games, you're on the bench a lot more and then all of a sudden you're not in the squad.

6:48To be fair, I've had a long career. My body was falling to pieces, to be fair, at that point. But at the same time, you're still in and around, you're still enjoying it. The club was on a fantastic FA Cup run. and I remember that season, I think it was around December, January, I had a bad injury. I was out for a long, long time with my back and I'm thinking, right, I just need to try and get fit and try and make one more appearance just to say bye to the fans and just to have that last taste of football. I did not know that last game would be in the FA Cup final, which is fantastic. I remember training hard, trying to get fit, and was fit enough to make the squad for the FA Cup.

7:36I think it was a bit of a flip of a coin between me and Christian Fuchs, who was going to be on the bench. Credit to Mike Stowell. I think he said, you know what, Wes, you need to put him on the bench because if you do go up and you need to kind of shore up the defence, you'd be the perfect person to come on and shore up the defence. So I got my final appearance in Wembley in the FA Cup final. Uri Tilleman scores an absolute screamer. Fantastic goal. We'll see out the game. And yeah, another major trophy in my locker. And final game ever for Leicester City. And I can't think of a better way to kind of finish your football career.

8:15What a way to bring the curtain down on it. Wes, thank you so much for joining us this evening. Been a pleasure talking to you as always. Thank you, Wes. Thanks. With me for the next 20 minutes or so, Mark Albright and Robert Huth and Nick Mascheter. So, Nick, let's just set the scene. We have left Leicester City having won the FA Cup in 2021. In the meantime, they get to the Conference League semifinal, finish eighth in the league. And it starts to go wrong for Leicester City. Just run us through a kind of whistle-stop tour. Yeah, quick potted history. It was interesting. Brendan Rodgers started making noises and saying he needed to start changing the squad around early 2022.

9:02And the start of the next season, 22-23, he caught us all a little bit by surprise by saying we need to get 40 points. He started talking about survival because it's really difficult. It's hard because COVID hit King Power with their duty free business so hard. The money wasn't there. They had to kind of try to stand still. But by standing still, you go backwards quite quickly in the Premier League. So they struggle. Brendan Rodgers goes in April 2023. Fast forward to now, once Gary Rowett, as we expect to him to leave the club come the end of the season, they're going to be looking for their eighth manager in three years.

9:42And to be able to get through that, they've obviously gone through Enzo Mareska, Steve Cooper Ruud van Nistrooy Dean Smith came in to replace Brendan Rodgers to try to keep them up jumping from style to style the identity has been missing from Leicester and I was at the game last week against Hull when relegation was confirmed the place was half empty we spoke about the unity just how close this club was to the fans how close the relationship was between the fans and the players and the staff, that's not there anymore. The club has, along the way, become broken. And it's very, very difficult to see how they're able to restart this and to be able to recover quickly because it's not going to be easy in League One.

10:34The finances are completely different. You're not getting the money in that they did. Of course, there's parachute payments, but they've already borrowed against them. There's a lot of problems. They brought in James McCarron as a new sporting director. He's come in from the Citigroup, having been at Lommel previously as sporting director. But the fans still want some more change. John Rudkin has been at the club for 30 years. He was director of football, I think, when they won the Premier League and has been there when they've had some great success. But he is now the target of the fans and the fans still want to see more change.

11:09Well, let's talk now to Jordan Holford from the Big Strong Leicester Boys podcast. Jordan, it's a difficult one to narrow down to one underlying cause. Where would you start in terms of trying to work out where it's gone wrong? Yeah, I mean, it's been a catalogue of errors over the last few years. I think the problem started after the FA Cup win, where we had previously bought players quite low and sold them quite high and decided to sell one asset per year. Then after that, there seemed to be a change of strategy where obviously Uri Thielemann scored in that final. That's when his value probably would have been at the highest, but we decided actually not to sell anyone and then brought in the likes of Daka, Sumare.

11:55I think we signed Westergaard that summer. And Nick's absolutely right. Brendan Rodgers also came in and started making noises around. I think we lost to Nottingham Forest in the FA Cup and he was saying that we need to refresh the squad. We then lost Kasper Schmeichel, who was obviously a huge part of the success that we'd had. and for me that's when it started deteriorating that we'd moved away from this model that had been so successful for us that you see the likes now of Brentford, Bournemouth and Brighton sort of replicating and we moved away from that and the squad that was so successful I mean I heard you talking before obviously about the title win and the success of the FA Cup but that was a squad of hungry players that all had a point to prove and it felt like we veered away from that and started signing players still on really high wages on long-term contracts.

12:43And it almost feels like their attitude is that they're doing us a favour by playing for us. And it's poles apart from the success we had. So I'd point it back to that sort of change of strategy after the FA Cup win. Jordan, would you take any of the points that Nick sort of alluded to there in his answer where there are factors that were beyond Leicester's control, the death of Vishay and Kuntop coming in. And he had it as his son and then succeeding him and having been involved in a lot of the club's decisions before, but it was a decision that they didn't want to have to make. Things like the impact of COVID on their duty-free business, which impacted the ability to invest in the club in the same way.

13:31Would you say that they were mitigating factors? Yeah, absolutely. I think Nick's right. there are a lot of mitigating factors and sort of sliding doors moments. Obviously the death of Vichai was extremely tragic, unforeseen. And obviously we weren't to know at the time, but would change and alter the path of the football club forever, really. But since then, you know, his sort of fingerprints, I guess, were on that FA Cup success. There has been COVID and then the sort of PSR rules, rules but we we still had the seventh highest wage bill to get relegated from the premier league in 2027 so despite those covid issues leicester was still spending you know hand over fist on on wages and then had that huge relegation um and i'm pretty sure that they the owner and the director of football they really weren't kind of sure what psr was i mean we our business like i say was buy low and sell high which in this in this climate would be great you know great business a great strategy, but we've not really managed to do that since.

14:37So there are a lot of mitigating circumstances, absolutely. And I do think two things can be true. You can be extremely grateful for what Vichai gave us, but then on the other hand, extremely concerned about the direction that his son and King Power have taken us since then. Nick, just outline the six-point deduction this year, because it feels that this decision on on what was PSR has been hanging over Leicester City for a few years now. Yeah, obviously it's made more complicated because they were relegated and then part of the EFL. So they initially last year, they managed to exploit the loophole to be able to avoid a points deduction at the time.

15:20But coming back into the EFL, that then allows the EFL to step up the punishments. And I mean, ultimately, it's one that sends them down. It left them just outside the bottom three on goal difference, I think it was at the time. And as we've said, it's poor recruitment, over expenditure on wages, players needing to be moved on. But because they are on very, very good wages, they don't, they can't. Some of the markets aren't there for them because some of the rivals aren't going to pay the wages that Leicester are paying at the minute. And it's just trickled down. It's just ultimately seen them become a League One side.

16:10And it's going to be incredibly difficult because we see the TV revenue in the Premier League. The TV revenue in League One, I think, is around two to three million. and you're not going to be able to function with what you're paying the players right now on League One finances.

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17:405 Live Sport

17:47This is the Football Daily Podcast with Kelly Keats. Nick, tell me a little bit more about the training ground, Seagrave, and where that fits into the picture. It's a fantastic facility, as Rob will attest to. It's probably one of the best in the country, if not the best. It's got a huge fountain in the middle of it, hasn't it? It has, with foxes dancing out of it. It is fantastic. I think that's part of what the problem, only very, very small part of the problem with Leicester is that Beaver Drive, the former training ground, that you were on top of each other. You were all together. But the way it's kind of Seagrave is shaped as an arc a little bit.

18:26And it's very difficult for the players to be together a little bit more, so much so than at Beaver Drive. And I think I'm right in saying that in the rec room, in the players' room, the door was changed to a glass door to show that the players who was in there, they didn't have to open the door and check who was there to try to encourage them to stay. It's a fantastic facility. It's one that is a fantastic asset for the club as well. and we have to see what they're going to be able to do with it because in League One, it dwarfs stadiums, let alone training grounds. So let's start to look at what they might be able to do to try and get themselves out of this situation.

19:14The wage bill, I think, Nick, what, about£150 million last season in the Premier League. They've now got Pats and Daka and Ricardo Pereira out of contract. The League One average total salary is around£9.5 million. This doesn't work out very easily at all, does it? No, no. And the difficulty for them is now that if they wanted to sell players in January and there were offers on the table for some players in January, they're not going to get those offers now. There was a good offer for one of them for around£10 million. That's not happening now. You know, the players form for a start hasn't been good enough to warrant bids like that.

19:59And now you're essentially a League One player. Clubs aren't going to bid that. The vultures will be circling. So if there were opportunities to move players on and generate some money previously, Leicester were going to struggle to get that cash again because they just simply won't be able to demand for the players. and to be able to function on League One finances with the wage bill they have. And of course, there is wage drops. There are wage drops for the players in the contracts. But even still, they're going to dwarf what other clubs and other budgets have in League One. So it's a huge, huge undertaking for the club now.

20:42And we look at Kuntop and John Rudkin and what they're going to do and the direction, as we've said, the direction of travel that they've overseen and how much influence is the new sporting director going to have, James McCarron. He's come in. If John Rudkin's still there, and this is a contentious thing for fans, I know, and speaking to people who were interested in that role and indeed interviewed for that role, the common theme was what control do I have? What autonomy will I have? What responsibility will I have? if I'm underneath people who are still looking to have control. Jordan, what would you like to see happen?

21:24I think the first thing, certainly from a fan's perspective, is the removal of John Rudkin, who's now actually been promoted to Chief Football Officer. So he's responsible for what was called the strategic squad development of the first team and the women's team, both of which are going to get relegated. What I don't see is why Top won't remove him from the position. He's been there, as you've mentioned, he's been there probably 20, 30 years. That seems to me like an easy win to get the fans back on side. And as Nick mentioned earlier, you know, the whole game, there's barely 15 ,000 people there.

22:00Half of that attendance would have wanted the ownership to be removed. So that seems to me like the most obvious starting place. and as again Nick said James McCarron's come in there looks to be sort of seeds of progress there with the managers that we've been linked with and I'd like to see him give him more autonomy and a fresh start but that seems to me like I say to be the first starting point after what has been a catastrophic season I'm just listening to the suggestions Rob and I know the connections that you have with the owners and with John Rudkin, who you worked with, I think, when he was loans manager.

22:39And I just wonder if there's a part of you that thinks that it would be a mistake to cut ties completely, that maybe you feel there might be a need for continuity and whether that's manageable at the same time as bringing about the change that's needed to get the club back on track. Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't want King Power to say that the club Purely because of my time there, I think it would be nostalgic if they could stay on and turn the ship around. They've done it before when they initially bought them and had amazing success. But yeah, your spot on mistake has been made. So it's difficult to see how they're going to make or get better with keeping the same people in charge at the moment.

23:27I think that definitely needs looking at. but also the one thing that we haven't mentioned at all is the performance of the players you know we John I know you're keen on getting rid of John but some of the performance of the players they've been getting away with it really when I watched them there's just not a lot about them you know we can argue that Leicester have the best squad in a championship so there is a good squad there but why they're not performing it's difficult to understand So they dug themselves a hole and they need to see how they get out. I'm sure there'll be some changes over the summer.

24:04I don't see a benefit of getting rid of staff now, but over the summer, I think I'm confident something will happen. What that would look like, I don't know. There are people whose job it is to go into this situation and try to fix it. The supporters will have their thoughts. They're there every week. They're paying their money for their tickets. and they are financially and emotionally invested in the club. But for someone like you, who's been such a huge part of the club's fabric, what would you like to see happen? A couple of things. I don't really understand how they get rid of players and sort of get them off the books.

24:46But whoever they are bringing in have to be good people because I look at the time before and what she said about, yeah we had Wes as captain but there was four or five captains in that team I look at the team now and the squad now and I struggle to see one I struggle to see one one player that's trying to trying to get everyone together and going even in the tough moments just getting everyone together and going right just sit in for five ten minutes be resilient be hard to be be hard to play against there doesn't seem anything like that I think the other thing that really strikes me and is really sad to see is the disconnection between everybody at the club the fans and the players there's no connection there the fan base is split some are protesting, some aren't there's obviously protests against the board the ownership and everything just feels so disconnected and whilst it is disconnected there's no way of succeeding there's no way of bouncing straight back you have to have that connection between everybody at the football club everybody has got to be pulling in the same direction and while that isn't the case then the club is not going to get back to anywhere close to where it should be Jordan, how optimistic or otherwise are you feeling about next season?

26:11I'm not optimistic at all I mean we're going to have a huge turnaround round of players as we alluded to the wage bill is astronomical it was the highest in the championship let alone in league one so we're going to need to basically gut the whole squad and hopefully we can bring through some of the academy players and then I assume we'll be looking at free transfers we haven't got a manager in place I mean last year we were chasing our tail for for weeks before we got Cifuentes and the players again when we started the season didn't look fit so I think that could happen again but that said I mean we you know we have been in this division once before in our entire history we bounced back straight away and that was in a large part because of Nigel Pearson and we need a manager of a similar ilk who can can kind of galvanize everyone and like Mark says we need everyone pulling in the same direction because at the minute you know like he says the fan base is split people don't know what the best situation is moving forward.

27:11But yeah, I mean, it wouldn't surprise me if we were to get another points deduction for PSR breaches at some point. You know, you look what's happened to Sheffield Wednesday and I see that we could be on a very similar trajectory, unfortunately. But yeah, there's always a part of you as a fan that obviously hopes that you'll bounce back at the first attempt. But the last sort of, certainly the last two years have really tested everyone's patience And it feels like everyone is so down at the minute that, you know, you struggle to see how the ownership and the people in charge are going to be able to turn this around.

27:47Jordan, appreciate you coming on to talk about it. Thank you so much for your time this evening. No problem. Thank you very much to Jordan Halford there from the Big Strong Leicester Boys podcast. We've been talking about Leicester City and we've focused for the last half an hour or so on what's happened over the last decade since that incredible title win for Leicester City. And there have been high points in there, including winning the FA Cup. We talked to Wes Morgan about that, about lifting his second major trophy as captain. It has been a really difficult period for Leicester City. And yet, Mark and Rob, it's a club that will always have those incredible memories for you and will always have, Mark, that incredible connection.

28:30Yeah, I think I can speak on my time at the football club, 10 of the best years of my life in terms of what I experienced, in terms of the people that I met along the way. and just the environment I was working in. Every day was good to be going into training. The games were fantastic. The supporters were incredible on a match day. There was never a dull moment. I think that highlights it now. I think it's such a unique football club that it's just such a rollercoaster of emotions. but I think like what got mentioned earlier the club did everything right in terms of whether it was when we won the league the event that took place there when we lifted the trophy and then on the flip side of that when we had the tragedies as well everybody was just, everybody come as one and the club did everything to the best of what they could have done and to say I've been a part of that football club for just a short spell of their existence, I'm proud to say that and it's a period of my time that I'll never forget and I'm thankful and grateful for the memories that I've been able to make there.

30:02And Rob, for as much as we've talked towards the end of this programme about how things can gather momentum in the wrong way. When one thing goes wrong, everything seems to fall like dominoes. When Leicester won the title in 2015-16, was that the opposite? Was that just everything hitting a sweet spot at exactly the right time? Yeah, totally agree. I mean, everyone was in the purple patch that season. We all peaked at the same time. We rode the wave of success. But like Mark said, I absolutely loved my time there. I was only there for three and a half years. When I first joined the club was Bob Moda League, so really in a difficult situation as well.