Enzo Maresca’s side kept their heads to secure promotion but financial worries loom large as club prepare for the top flight
A campaign that began with Enzo Maresca insisting his Leicester City players sleep overnight at their sprawling, 185-acre Seagrave training base for the first week of pre-season in the name of team building has ended with their primary mission accomplished, promotion boxed off, the Championship crown likely to follow. Leicester’s most memorable and marvellous moment came when they confounded expectations; this time, it was a case of simply meeting them by getting back to the Premier League at the first attempt.
Perhaps it should come as no surprise that surely the most expensively assembled squad in the division – their wage bill was the biggest outside the Premier League top six 12 months ago – has sealed that return after Leeds lost at QPR on Friday night but it turned into a slog after they ceded a 17-point lead. In the last couple of months, their 51-game season has flitted between a sense of collapse and catharsis. “It has been a very long season,” Maresca said with a wry smile this week.
