Premier League champions Leicester City have sacked Italian manager Claudio Ranieri. The Italian’s dismissal comes only nine months after he guided the Club to the greatest title win in English football history.
The dismissal also comes barely two weeks after Leicester offered him their “unwavering support” in a statement insisting there was no way his job could be in danger.
It is only six weeks since Ranieri was named as Fifa’s coach of the year but his team’s decline this season has left them in danger of being the first English side since Manchester City in 1938 to be relegated the year after winning the league, as The Guardian reports.
Leicester City are currently a point and a place above the relegation zone in the English Premier League standings.
Leicester’s assistant manager, Craig Shakespeare, and the first-team coach, Mike Stowell, will take charge of the squad while the search for a new manager goes on, with two of Ranieri’s other coaches, Paolo Benetti and Andrea Azzalin, also being moved out on a day when one of the more popular managers of the modern era found out the hard way how brutal the business can be.
Roberto Mancini, who had a brief spell on loan at Leicester in 2001, is the early favourite to replace him.
