Leicester City Football Club: A Complete Guide

Leicester City are a professional soccer club based in the East Midlands, England. Since forming in 1884, the club has largely competed in the top two divisions of English soccer, culminating in their victorious 2015-16 Premier League campaign – the first top tier title in Leicester City’s history.

The East Midlands side play their home matches at the King Power Stadium, and are now one of the most firmly-established sides in the Premier League. With a number of prominent players, and a few long-standing rivalries, Leicester continue to play an important role in English soccer. 

This ultimate guide will take an in-depth look at Leicester City as a club, including its history, records, stadiums, and honors. Moreover, we’ll also provide some information on the club’s owners, their prominent former players, managerial history, and the current playing squad.  

Basic Facts

  • Location: Leicester, East Midlands
  • Founded: 1884
  • Ground: King Power Stadium
  • Nickname: The Foxes 
  • Kit Color: Blue And White 
  • Owner: Aiyawatt Srivaddhanaprabha
  • League: Premier League 
  • Current Manager: Brendan Rodgers
  • Current Captain: Kasper Schmeichel 

Home Grounds

In their formative years, Leicester City played at a number of different grounds. However, since their introduction to the English Football League, they’ve only played at two: Filbert Street and the King Power Stadium

Filbert Street was home to the club from 1891-2002. Improvements were first made during the Edwardian Era, before in 1927, a new two-tier stand named the “Double Decker” was constructed. The ground remained the same, apart from the addition of compulsory seating, until 1993 when work began on an impressive new stand named the “Carling Stand”. 

In 2002, Leicester City moved from Filbert Street after 111 years to a new 32,500 all-seater stadium. The stadium was originally named the Walkers Stadium as part of a deal with food manufacturers Walkers. In addition to hosting Leicester matches, the stadium has also been used for international soccer matches and european rugby games. 

With new owners King Power taking over the club in 2010, the stadium was soon renamed as the King Power Stadium in 2011. 

In 2020, Leicester City left behind their long-standing training ground Belvoir Drive to move into a new state-of-the-art training complex in the village of Seagrave. This new training complex has been described as having some of the best facilities in the world. The club’s former training site Belvoir Drive is now used by Leicester City Women F.C. 

Main Trophies

While Leicester City may not have as colorful a history as some of their Midlands rivals, the club is one of the most consistent sides in English soccer. Since their first league season in 1894-95, Leicester have only spent a single season outside of the top two divisions in England’s domestic league system. 

They currently hold a joint-record of seven second-tier titles and have competed in five FA Cup finals – winning their first in 2021. 

However, the greatest title in Leicester City’s history came in 2016, winning their first Premier League trophy. The title win was described as the biggest sporting shock ever, as Leicester became one of seven sides to win the competition since its inception in 1992. 

Listed below is a full record of the main trophies Leicester City have won throughout their 137-year history. 

First Division / Premier League: 

  • Winners: 2015-16
  • Runners-Up: 1928-29 

Second Division / Championship:

  • Winners: 1924-25, 1936-37, 1953-54, 1956-57, 1970-1971, 1979-80, 2013-14 
  • Runners-Up: 1907-08, 2002-03
  • Play Off Winners: 1993-94, 1995-96

Third Division / League One:

  • Winners: 2008-09 

FA Cup:

  • Winners: 2020-21 
  • Runners-Up: 1948-49, 1960-61, 1962-63, 1668-69 

League Cup / EFL Cup:

  • Winners: 1963-64, 1996-97, 1999-2000
  • Runners-Up: 1964-65, 1998-99

Charity Shield / FA Community Shield:

  • Winners: 1971
  • Runners-Up: 2016 

Club History

Leicester City Football Club was founded in 1884, under the name of “Leicester Fosse”, by pupils of Wyggeston School. Before moving to their first home Filbert Street in 1891, the club switched between five different grounds, including Victoria Park, Belgrave Road, and the County Cricket ground.  

Early Years

Leicester became a member of the Football League in 1894, and recorded their biggest ever win to date with a 13-0 victory over Notts Olympic in an FA Cup qualifying match. In the 1907-08 season, Leicester gained promotion to the First Division; however, this achievement was to be short-lived. 

The club were immediately relegated back to the Second Division after a single season, which also included a record 12-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest. This loss remains the club’s heaviest defeat of all time. 

In 1919, the club was reformed as Leicester City due to a financial scandal. This name change was particularly appropriate considering the borough of Leicester had recently been given city status. 

Over the 1920s, the club enjoyed a fair amount of success led by record goalscorer Arthur Chandler. They won promotion back to the First Division in 1925 and then recorded their second-highest league finish in 1928-29 finishing a single point behind champions Sheffield Wednesday. 

The 1930s saw Leicester move between the First and Second Division, while in 1949, the club reached the FA Cup final for the first time in their history, losing 3-1 to Wolverhampton Wanderers. 

1950s – 2000

Leicester remained largely under the radar until 1958 and the appointment of Matt Gillies as coach. Gillies’ team reached two FA Cup finals in 1961 and 1963, as well as an impressive fourth-place finish in the 1962-63 First Division. 

The wait for an elusive first major trophy was ended a year later as Leicester beat Stoke City to win the 1964 League Cup. Following Gillies’ resignation in 1968, Leicester were immediately relegated to the Second Division again. 

After a few decades of yo-yoing between England’s top two divisions, Martin O’Neill took charge of the club and established them as a solid Premier League side with four successive top ten finishes. Furthermore, O’Neill ended Leicester’s 33-year wait for a major trophy with League Cup successes in both 1997 and 2000. 

Early 21st Century Decline 

Despite a fantastic end to the 20th century, Leicester lost manager O’Neill to Celtic, and were soon relegated to the Championship at the end of the 2001-02 campaign. This meant that Leicester’s first season in their new Walkers Stadium was to be played in the second flight of English soccer.

Financial struggles soon took hold of the club, with debts of around £30 million due to a loss of TV money, a large wage bill, and the £37 million cost of the new stadium. Despite these difficulties, Leicester immediately bounced back to the Premier League; albeit only for one season. 

Four further years in the Championship and a managerial merry-go-round followed, before an all-time low of relegation to League One – the first time the club had found themselves outside the top two levels of English soccer. 

Leicester returned to the Championship at the first attempt in 2008-09 under the stewardship of Nigel Pearson and quickly re-established themselves in the second tier. 

A takeover from King Power and a number of close-calls in terms of promotion followed, before Leicester finally clinched promotion back to the Premier League in the 2013/14 season after a ten-year absence.

Premier League Survival And Success 

Leicester narrowly avoided relegation in their first season back in the Premier League, thanks to seven wins from their final nine league matches. In doing so, they became only the third team in Premier League history to survive after being bottom of the table at Christmas. 

This momentum carried onto the 2015-16 season when Leicester did the unthinkable. Managed by “The Tinkerman” Claudio Ranieri, and inspired by the brilliance of players such as Jamie Vardy and Riyad Mahrez, the club hit the big time and won England’s top division for the first time. 

Since this remarkable success, Leicester have firmly established themselves as a top-half Premier League side. Other notable successes include a run to the quarter-finals of the 2016-17 Champions League, a record 9-0 away win over Southampton in the league, and a first FA Cup success in 2021. 

Club Timeline 

  • 1884: The club is established as Leicester Fosse
  • 1894: The club become a member of the English Football League
  • 1903: The team change to their commonly known blue and white kit
  • 1908: The club gain promotion to the First Division for the first time 
  • 1919: Leicester Fosse are rebranded as Leicester City Football Club
  • 1929: The club achieve their second-highest league finish in the First Division, a point behind champions Sheffield Wednesday
  • 1964: After FA Cup final defeats in 1961 and 1963, Leicester win their first major trophy, the 1964 League Cup 
  • 2002: The club leave behind Filbert Street and move to an all-seater stadium later known as the King Power Stadium 
  • 2008: Leicester suffer relegation to the third tier of English soccer for the first time in their history 
  • 2016: The club win the Premier League, England’s top division, for the first time, and qualify the Champions League 
  • 2021: Leicester win their first FA Cup title 

Club Net Worth 

Currently owned by the Srivaddhanaprabha Family and their company King Power International Group, the estimated combined net worth of Leicester City Football Club is $3.7B. 

Stadium

The club’s current stadium is the King Power Stadium. The ground, located on Filbert Way, became Leicester City’s new home in 2002 after 111 years at their first stadium, Filbert Street. 

Work on the impressive 32,500-seater stadium began in the summer of 2001 and was completed shortly before the 2002-03 season. The stadium is thought to have cost over $50 to build. 

The King Power Stadium (formerly known as the Walkers Stadium) was officially opened by Leicester City legend Gary Lineker on 23rd July 2002. The first competitive match took place a few weeks later on the 10th August in front of a near-capacity crowd of 31,022. 

The record attendance for a soccer match at the stadium is 32,242 for Leicester’s opening home match of the victorious 2015-16 season against Sunderland. 

The King Power was famously where Leicester were crowned Premier League champions in 2016. Before their final league game of the season against Everton, a pre-match performance from Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli and a post-match trophy lift were enjoyed by a sold-out crowd. 

On July 28th 2021, the club confirmed that it would soon reveal plans of increasing the capacity of the King Power to around the 40,000 mark. Furthermore, these plans also included a new sports arena, club shop, hotel, and multi-storey car park in the surrounding areas. 

Owners

Leicester City Football Club is currently owned by the Srivaddhanaprabha family, with Aiyawatt Srivaddhanaprabha the chairman of the club. 

The family owns the King Power International Group, a Thai travel retail group, responsible for the majority of the club’s wealth. 

Aiyawatt Srivaddhanaprabha was the vice-chairman of King Power and Leicester from 2010 to 2018, with his father Vichai the main owner and chairman of both. 

However, after his father died in a tragic helicopter crash outside Leicester’s King Power Stadium, Aiyawatt became the full chairman of the club. 

Prior to the Srivaddhanaprabha family, Leicester City were owned by Serbian-American businessman Milan Mandaric, who also owned a number of other English soccer clubs including Sheffield Wednesday and Portsmouth. 

Best Players

Since their formation 137 years ago, Leicester City have had a number of legendary players on their books. Listed below are 10 of the most prominent. 

Hugh Adock (1923-1935) 

  • Right Midfield
  • 434 Appearances / 51 Goals 

Arthur Chandler (1923-1935) 

  • Striker
  • 419 Appearances / 273 Goals 

Ernie Hine (1926-1932)

  • Forward 
  • 247 Appearances / 148 Goals 

Arthur Rowley (1950-1958)

  • Forward
  • 321 Appearances / 265 Goals

Gordon Banks (1959-1967)

  • Goalkeeper
  • 356 Appearances 

Graham Cross (1960-1976) 

  • Defender
  • 599 Appearances

Peter Shilton (1966-1974) 

  • Goalkeeper 
  • 348 Appearances 

Gary Lineker (1978-1985) 

  • Striker
  • 216 Appearances / 103 Goals

Muzzy Izzet (1996-2004)

  • Midfielder
  • 269 Appearances / 38 Goals

Jamie Vardy (2012-present)

  • Striker
  • 352 Appearances / 147 Goals 

All Time Top Goalscorer

The club’s record goalscorer is Arthur Chandler, who netted a total of 273 goals throughout his 12 years at the club. Furthermore, Chandler found the net in eight successive matches in the 1924-25 season. 

Managers

Up until the appointment of Peter Hodge after World War I, Leicester had no official manager. Instead, a nominal role of secretary/manager was employed, while team affairs were mainly controlled through the board and selection committee. 

Although Hodge was initially hired in a “secretary/manager” role, he is considered the club’s first official manager. Since Hodge, Leicester have had a total of 9 permanent “secretary/managers” and 35 permanent managers. It’s worth noting that this number doesn’t include caretaker managers.  

The only managers to have had two separate spells as manager of the club are Peter Hodge and Nigel Pearson, while Dave Bassett had a second spell as caretaker manager after his initial spell as permanent manager. 

The current manager of Leicester City is Brendan Rodgers. Since taking charge in 2019, the Northern Irish manager has secured back-to-back top-5 finishes and an FA Cup trophy. 

Listed below are the managers who’ve taken charge of 50 or more matches as manager of the club.

  • Peter Hodge (1919-1926 & 1932-1934)
  • Willie Orr (1926-1932)
  • Arthur Lochhead (1934-1936)
  • Frank Womack (1936-1939)
  • Johnny Duncan (1946-1949)
  • Norman Bullock (1949-1955) 
  • Dave Halliday (1955-1958) 
  • Matt Gillies (1958-1968) 
  • Frank O’Farrell (1968-1971)
  • Jimmy Bloomfield (1971-1977)
  • Jock Wallace (1978-1982)
  • Gordon Milne (1982-1986) 
  • David Pleat (1987-1991) 
  • Brian Little (1991-1994) 
  • Mark McGhee (1994-1995) 
  • Martin O’Neill (1995-2000) 
  • Peter Taylor (2000-2001) 
  • Micky Adams (2002-2004) 
  • Craig Levein (2004-2006) 
  • Rob Kelly (2006-2007) 
  • Nigel Pearson (2008-2010 & 2011-2015) 
  • Sven-Goran Eriksson (2010-2011) 
  • Claudio Ranieri (2015-2017) 
  • Claude Puel (2017-2019)
  • Brendan Rodgers (2019-present)

Captains

The current captain of Leicester City is Danish goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel. The Dane inherited the armband from Wes Morgan in the summer of 2021 after Morgan had captained the club for the previous nine years – the longest serving captain in Leicester’s recent history. 

Listed below are Leicester City’s recent club captains since Ally Mauchlen wore the armband in the late 1980s for the East Midlands side. 

  • Steve Walsh (1992-1993 & 1996-1999)
  • Garry Mills (1993-1994) 
  • Garry Parker (1995-1996) 
  • Matt Elliott (1999-2005) 
  • Danny Tiatto (2005-2006) 
  • Paddy McCarthy (2006-2007) 
  • Stephen Clemence (2007-2008) 
  • Matt Oakley (2008-2011) 
  • Matt Mills (2011-2012) 
  • Wes Morgan (2012-2021) 
  • Kasper Schmeichel (2021-present) 

Current Squad And Coaching Team

Goalkeepers: 

  • Kasper Schmeichel 
  • Danny Ward
  • Eldin Jakupovic 

Defenders:

  • James Justin
  • Wesley Fofana
  • Caglar Soyuncu
  • Jonny Evans
  • Filip Benkovic
  • Daniel Amartey
  • Ricardo Perreira
  • Timothy Castagne
  • Luke Thomas
  • Ryan Bertrand 

Midfielders:

  • Youri Tielemans
  • James Maddison
  • Marc Albrighton 
  • Harvey Barnes
  • Hamza Choudhury
  • Nampalys Mendy
  • Wilfred Ndidi 
  • Dennis Praet
  • Rachid Ghezzal
  • Boubakary Soumare

Forwards:

  • Jamie Vardy
  • Kelechi Iheanacho
  • Ayoze Perez
  • Patson Daka 

First Team Manager: Brendan Rodgers

Assistant Manager: Chris Davies

First Team Coaches: Adam Sadler & Kolo Toure

Goalkeeper Coach: Mike Stowell 

First Team Fitness Coach: Glen Driscoll 

Kit Manager: Paul McAndrew

Head Of Fitness And Conditioning: Matt Reeves 

Head Of Medicine: Bryan English 

First Team Physiotherapist: Simon Murphy 

Academy Director: Jon Rudkin 

Home And Away Kits 

Throughout most of the club’s history, the home colors have been royal blue shirts, white shorts, and either royal blue or white socks. 

The most popular nickname for the club is “The Foxes”, and an image of a fox was first incorporated into the club crest in 1948. The nickname derives from Leicestershire’s association with foxes and fox hunting. 

The color and style of the away kit varies from season to season, however, the most popular color choice for the shirt is usually either white, black, gray, navy, or light blue. The club have also experimented with flashy red, pink, and yellow away kits in recent years. 

Rivalries

The majority of Leicester fans consider Nottingham Forest to be their main rivals. Located only 24 miles away from each other, the rivalry between the two clubs is often referred to as the “East Midlands derby”. Leicester’s other regional rivals are Derby County. 

Another rivalry to make note of is the one with Coventry City. Games between the two clubs are known as the “M69 derby”, reference to the M69 motorway which connects the two cities together. 

Fun Facts And Records

  • The fastest goal in Leicester’s history was scored by Matty Fryatt when he struck the back of the net after just nine seconds against Preston North End in 2006 
  • The record transfer fee paid by the club for a player is the $55 million for Youri Tielemans, while the highest transfer fee received for a player is the $111 million from Manchester United for Harry Maguire
  • During the 2015-16 season, Jamie Vardy broke the Premier League record for scoring in 11 consecutive league games
  • The record appearance holder for the club is Graham Cross with 599 games throughout his 16 years at the club (1960-1976)
  • The highest number of goals scored by a Leicester player in a single season is the 44 managed by Arthur Rowley in the 1956-57 season
  • The club’s longest unbeaten run in league soccer was 23 matches between 1st November 2008 and 7th March 2009
  • The club’s longest winning streak in league soccer was nine matches between 21st December 2013 and 1st February 2014
  • Leicester set the record the highest margin of away victory in the English top tier, beating Southampton 9-0 on 25th October 2019 
  • Leicester City and Arsenal recorded the highest scoring draw in the history of the English top tier with a 6-6 draw in 1930