Leicester City swerve bottle jobs tag but shortlived Norwich reprieve will precede £40m transfer blow
A 3-1 win over Norwich City offers a reprieve for Leicester City, but this could well be shortlived as financial issues and summer sales dampen their promotion vibes.
The four-team automatic Championship promotion fight has heated up in recent weeks as early-season pace-setters Leicester City have dramatically fallen apart.
During the first few months of this campaign, the Foxes could do very little wrong as Pep Guardiola disciple Enzo Maresca began to build a record-breaking season in which they would earn promotion back to the Premier League at a canter by earning well over 100 points.
Much like Pep’s City, Enzo’s City have been a robotic winning machine for much of this season, but recent results have proven that their system is somewhat faulty.
As of February 16, Leicester had only lost four of their 32 Championship games and were 11 points clear of second-placed Southampton.
With the Championship renowned for being one of the most demanding leagues in the world, a minor hiccup was inevitable at some stage. This hiccup came in the form of three straight defeats to Middlesbrough, Leeds United and QPR. Given Leicester’s superior position in the table, this dip in form would not have been the end of the world had been able to swiftly bounce back, but things just got worse.
After returning to winning ways against Sunderland, Leicester were held by Hull City, knocked out of the FA Cup by Chelsea and lost 1-0 to Bristol City on Good Friday.
Suddenly, Maresca’s crumbling side was in bottle job territory as they found themselves third in the Championship with Ipswich Town and Leeds United ahead of them, while Southampton could soon be breathing down their necks with two games in hand up their sleeve.
There is no rest for the wicked in the Championship and Leicester City had no time to be down in the dumps as they hosted play-off hopefuls Norwich City in the early kick-off on Easter Monday.
With David Wagner’s team one of the in-form sides in the Championship, Maresca may have been hoping for an easier match to ease the pressure on himself and his players. A game against Rotherham United, perhaps?
A well-worked corner allowed Gabriel Sara to fire Norwich into the lead against the run of play, but Leicester had started well and they came on strong after falling behind.
Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall has often been Leicester’s star man this season and his close-range header brought the game level. The talented midfielder was in the thick of the action for the hosts’ second goal as he played in winger Stephy Mavididi, who converted to turn the game around.
Leicester saw out the game without too much stress and Jamie Vardy did Jamie Vardy things to put the result beyond doubt with his 14th Championship goal of the season to earn a much-needed victory, which may be enough to stabilise them ahead of a breathless run-in.
While Leicester’s season had been under serious threat of falling apart, the performance and result against Norwich was much more like their usual selves. This bodes well for their promotion hopes, but the positivity around The King Power Stadium may erode shortly after their end-of-season trophy parade.
This is because Leicester’s slump had been ongoing amid the backdrop of breaking financial regulations, which has seen them butt heads with the Football League and be charged by the Premier League for breaching Profit and Sustainability rules.
The Foxes used a loophole to avoid submitting a business plan to the Football League for the remainder of this season, but cashing in on sellable assets and a points deduction is still likely next season in the Premier League.
The Leicester player perhaps most likely to move on in the summer is Dewsbury-Hall, who produced another heroic contribution in the win against Norwich City.
His goal contributions against the Canaries mean Dewsbury-Hall has 11 goals and 14 assists this season across all competitions and with Manchester United mooted as a possible destination via a tempting £40m fee, an exit is inevitable in the summer either to join Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s Old Trafford revolution or to another Premier League club.
So while the Norwich victory may help Leicester City past the worst of this season’s troubles, more dark days lie ahead following their potential Premier League return and the inexperienced Maresca – like ex-Man City affiliate Vincent Kompany – will face an uphill task next term.
