Leicester City: From Premier League glory to relegation to League One -fall from grace of the Foxes examined
Leicester City were relegated from the Sky Bet Championship - a decade after they won the Premier League - on April 21, following a 2-2 draw with Hull City at the King Power Stadium; the Foxes will play in the third tier for just the second season in history in 2026/27
On May 2 2016, Leicester won the Premier League title for the first time, famously beating odds of 5,000/1 to do so.
Results elsewhere confirmed the triumph that day, so it was not until five days later that Claudio Ranieri and his players could celebrate with the fans for the first time, before their final home match against Everton.
Ahead of the 3-1 win, fans inside the King Power Stadium were treated to a memorable serenade by opera singer Andrea Bocelli. It was as surreal as the feat itself, which will be proudly spoken about for generations to come.
On Tuesday night - 3,642 days after their glorious against-the-odds moment - Leicester were relegated from the Sky Bet Championship after a 2-2 draw with Hull.
Only a win would deliver a stay of execution. Oli McBurnie's 63rd-minute equaliser extinguished those hopes.
It was Derby who did it in the shortest window, winning the title in 1975 and dropping to the Third in 1984.
In the modern era, though, nothing compares to this.
Down, up and down again
Leicester finished 12th in their first season after the title win in 2017, with the added rigours of qualifying for the Champions League - and reaching the quarter-finals - taking their toll.
Two ninth-place finishes followed, before two fifth-place finishes and a historic first FA Cup triumph in 2020/21. In 2021/22, they finished eighth and reached the Conference League semi-finals.
The following year, even with a squad that included Harvey Barnes, Youri Tielemans, James Maddison, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall and Jamie Vardy, they were relegated.
Vardy rolled back the years and hit 18 league goals as Enzo Maresca guided them to the Championship title at the first time of asking, with a 97-point haul in 2023/24. But Maresca then left for Chelsea.
Leicester were 16th when Steve Cooper was sacked in November 2024, but when Ruud van Nistelrooy - fresh from a positive spell in caretaker charge of Man Utd - took over, they dropped like a stone. Between December 14 and April 7, they lost 15 of 16 Premier League games.
In 2022/23, relegation was only confirmed on the final day. In 2024/25, they went down with a whimper. There were five games to spare.
The slide continues
It was all change again in the summer.
Van Nistelrooy left, with former QPR boss Marti Cifuentes taking the hot seat.
Leicester were fourth by the start of the September international break, having won three of their first four, and still there by October 18, with just one defeat in the first 10.
But then they started to slide - and it has got worse since the turn of the year.
In 2026 so far, Leicester have won just two of their 20 Sky Bet Championship matches.
Gary Rowett took over on February 18, almost a month after Cifuentes was sacked, but has been unable to arrest the slump.
Meanwhile, earlier this month, the club lost their appeal against a six-point deduction, imposed for breaching Premier League Profit and Sustainability rules (PSR) in the 2023/24 season. It was the first such punishment in their history.
Without that, they would still be in the drop zone, one point from safety. With it, they are seven points adrift of safety with only six points left to play for.
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