OPINION: By Sam Coleman
Football is a results business.
It doesn’t matter where you’ve been, who you’ve managed, what you’ve won or who you’ve played for. If you don’t deliver what the bosses ask, you’re gone.
Nine months ago Leicester City achieved the impossible under the guidance of The Tinkerman, Claudio Ranieri.
Yet this year they find themselves one point above the relegation zone after losing five Premier League games in a row.
The footballing world appears to be in uproar after the so called “disgusting treatment” of Ranieri, sacking a manager who did something nobody thought was possible.
But why are people so outraged?
After winning the league the standards you set are different to those scrapping to avoid relegation. It’s harsh, but true. Leicester City have set themselves a high bar.
Because if this was a Chelsea or a Man United, they’d have sacked Ranieri months ago.
But this is Leicester City. This isn’t as black and white as it might be at Stamford Bridge or Old Trafford. Maybe that’s why he has been given until late February, as opposed to being sacked before Christmas.
Do Leicester fans understand they could be facing trips to Preston North End and Rotherham next year if things do not change? It’s hardly the bright lights of Old Trafford.
There’s no room for sentiment in football and I cannot help but feel the people in Ranieri’s corner are only acting outraged to look like the “good guy.”
Where was everybody last week, or the week before that when questions about his job first arose? I didn’t hear many voices then. Yet, suddenly, Ranieri is a gift from God and the greatest thing to ever happen to Leicester, let’s build a statue of him.
To be honest, he might have been.
He gave something to Leicester that, no matter what happens in the future, can never be taken away. He has put Leicester into the bracket of the big boys and that will never change.
But it does not matter, that was last year and this year they’ve played like a team who are happy sitting with their big money deals, where is the pride playing for the badge we saw last year?
Whatever the case, Ranieri leaves with not only the affection of Leicester fans, but the affection of football lovers worldwide and deservedly so.
I feel it almost right that Ranieri be sacked before the inevitable. He does not deserve to have that relegation badge stamped over his winners’ medal.
He lost the dressing room. The results were poor and like any other manager in that situation he didn’t deserve to keep his job.
But that does not taint what he did for a City that most had not heard of before last year.
