There simply isn’t a suitable word to describe the season that Premier League champions Leicester City are having. Their fairytale began last season when they spectacularly against all the odds won the Premier League despite being one of the favorites for relegation and then manager Claudio Ranieri to be one of the first managers to be sacked. Following their league triumph, everyone realized that this season simply wouldn’t be the same as last season due to the loss of N’Golo Kante and the fact that last season all too often luck was on their side with the lack of injuries and consistent form of the entire starting 11. But regardless of what was to happen in the league this year the side always had Champions League soccer to look forward it.
Fast forward a year from their title winning season and Leicester now find themselves in 15 positions in the league, a mere 3 points away from the relegation zone. A position that saw club hero Claudio Ranieri lose his position as manager. But since caretaker manager, Craig Shakespeare has taken over for whatever reason Leicester seem to have found their form from last season giving them hope for Premier League survival and potentially Champions League success? To suggest that Leicester City can go on to win the Champions League would be brave, to say the least, but you’d also have been called mental if you’d have said that they would make the quarter final.
On Tuesday night Leicester had the second leg of their Champions League tie with Spanish side Sevilla. Unlike Leicester Sevilla certainly aren’t struggling in their domestic competition as they sit in the 3rd position in La Liga, above Atletico Madrid and a mere 3 points behind Barcelona. Therefore on paper at least Leicester had no right to be winning this tie. But remember, this is soccer and as proven by Leicester themselves last season and Barcelona last week the phrase ‘anything can happen’ has never been truer recently.
The first game which took place in Spain saw Sevilla come out on top 2-1 meaning that the tie was still wide open thanks to the away goal rule. This meant that Leicester needed to win Tuesday night’s fixture without conceding which they did in style.
From the moment the game kicked off, you could tell that the fans were optimistic and very excited for the game given the outstanding atmosphere they created. The players clearly thrived off this atmosphere as it only took them 27 minutes to get the breakthrough as a center back and captain Wes Morgan bundled the ball over the line with his knee following a Riyad Mahrez cross. This goal appeared to then set the tempo of the game as Sevilla now needed to attack Leicester if they were to get anything out of the tie. Leicester also couldn’t afford to sit back and defend as an additional goal would settle nerves.
In the second half, Leicester grabbed the second goal as Marc Albrighton scored a well-placed goal from the edge of the box. All appeared to be going to well and smoothly for Leicester but without Kasper Schmeichel, it could have been a very different story. The Danish keeper was unfortunate to give away a penalty but as in the first leg, he was able to save yet another penalty to get his side out of danger as they cruised into the quarter-finals.
Although their achievements up to this stage have been incredible, Leicester is yet to come up against a true Champions League giant but in the quarter-final, it’s unavoidable that they’ll face a star-studded team. We’ll just have to wait until Friday’s draw to find out their fate.
