Leicester's Ranieri plays down hopes of retaining the title

Optimist or simply realist, Leicester City manager Claudio Ranieri had no illusions about his team winning the Premier League again in the coming campaign. The new season was about to begin, with the Foxes travelling to newly promoted Hull City. Ranieri was very excited about the start of the season, but he knew how difficult it would be for Leicester City to retain the trophy.

In an interview, the manager of Leicester City – Claudio Ranieri said he was very curious to see what would happen during the season. All the great teams were ready to fight for the title, and Leicester, of course, were ready to defend it. A year earlier the club had been total underdogs, with bookmakers offering odds of 5000/1, and he suggested the odds should now be even longer, at 6000/1, joking that aliens landing in Piccadilly Circus in London seemed more likely. He also felt the pressure on his team was lower, because everything was now different.

Just as 12 months before, the Italian’s first thought was avoiding relegation, and that would be Leicester City’s main objective in the next campaign. Ranieri added that the target was to reach 40 points first and then see what would happen, and that the team also wanted to gain experience in the Champions League.

No aliens had landed in London, but Leicester City had already won the Premier League title, which proved that anything is possible in football. The Foxes kept almost all of their key players, with the exception of N’Golo Kanté, who joined Chelsea. The champions also signed several very talented players, including Ahmed Musa and the Polish prospect Kapustka. The coming campaign promised to be one of the most competitive and interesting in Premier League history.

The summer of the champions

Ranieri had been appointed on 13 July 2015 on a three-year contract, and his first season ended with the title being clinched on 2 May 2016, when Tottenham drew 2-2 with Chelsea. It was the first league championship in Leicester City’s 132-year history, won by a club that had started the campaign as 5,000-1 outsiders. The manager was named LMA Manager of the Year and Premier League Manager of the Season for 2016.

The squad changed more than the departure of one player might suggest. Kanté joined Chelsea on 16 July 2016 for a reported £32 million. Leicester spent heavily in return: Nampalys Mendy arrived from Nice for £13 million, Ahmed Musa from CSKA Moscow for £16 million, Bartosz Kapustka from Cracovia for £2.5 million and, on 31 August 2016, Islam Slimani from Sporting for £28 million. The new campaign began with a 2-1 defeat to Manchester United in the Community Shield at Wembley on 7 August 2016.

How the 2016–17 season unfolded

The prediction of a difficult defence proved accurate. Leicester lost 2-1 at Hull City on the opening day, 13 August 2016, and struggled in the league for most of the campaign. Ranieri received the FIFA award for The Best Men’s Coach in January 2017, but he was dismissed on 23 February 2017, with Leicester one point above the relegation zone and 13 matches left. First-team coach Craig Shakespeare took over, and the club finished the Premier League season in 12th place with 44 points.

The Champions League, which Ranieri had described as a chance to gain experience, became the highlight of the season. In their first appearance in the competition, Leicester won Group G ahead of Porto, Copenhagen and Club Brugge with 13 points. They beat Sevilla 3-2 on aggregate in the round of 16, winning the second leg 2-0 at home on 14 March 2017, and went out in the quarter-finals to Atlético Madrid, who won 2-1 on aggregate after a 1-1 draw in Leicester on 18 April 2017.