Stamford Bridge was bouncing. The atmosphere on the night was a reminder of the Chelsea of yesteryear, one that has been woefully missing throughout the season. But on that fateful night, just as he did last season, Eden Hazard decided the Premier League title. This time though he did it not for the defending champions but for a team that was never supposed to be the champions.
Leicester City wearing the English crown was never in the script but then again football is not decided on statistics or on paper.
For the Chelsea fans that night, it was perhaps a way of thanking their much admired manager who was the first casualty of the Abramovich era.
The former Chelsea manager has been phenomenal this season and deserves all the plaudits coming his way. After all, the Tinkerman took an unfancied side to the title and did so with a smile and a tear on his face.
When the Italian arrived, Leicester had just escaped the drop under Nigel Pearson, an unsung hero in the tale, last season. He inherited a bunch of hardworking players who made a strong backbone, Pearson’s gift to the incoming manager.
But what the former Italian manager brought with him was Italian mentality and the ability to get the best out of the players like Riyad Maharez who, while unorthodox, is as gifted as they come.
Early on in the season, he switched from a back three, the system which ultimately led to their survival last season, to a back four to incorporate Maharez and Marc Albrighton on the wings and formerly unfavoured Danny Drinkwater and new arrival N’Golo Kante in the middle. Add Christian Fuchs and Danny Simpson as wing-backs, and the foundation was set.
Let the other team keep the ball while the Foxes keep their shape and defend better, with players now closer to each other, and hit on the break with the abundance of pace in the side led by Jamie Vardy.
While the tactics in itself is hardly rocket science, what kept Leicester on top was their ability to continue to find a way to be in control. Maharez and Albrighton continued to burst forward, Vardy kept getting behind the defence and Drinkwater found his rampant forwards time and again with the early ball. Ranieri’s ability to keep a good atmosphere and manage the pressure that kept mounting was another major factor. Forever addressing the media with a smile and keeping the dressing room happy with the now famous pizza day all showed the side of the man who enjoyed football and the challenge of being the protagonist in football’s biggest underdog story. He hardly played mind games, except to keep the pressure off his side, and when he did it was in passing mentions which was hardly a sledgehammer attack on the other side’s psyche. It worked though.
When Ranieri arrived at the King Power Stadium, his reputation was in tatters and 10 months later, he is the man who upset the established orders and showed that there is more than one way to win the league, you just have to find your own.
