It has been a total transformation. Leicester City propped up the table after 13 games last season. They top it after 13 now. Indeed, Leicester were at the foot of the division as recently as the start of April. Since then, they have played 22 games and procured 50 points. To put it another way, they have sustained title-winning form for the equivalent of more than half a season.
All of which prompts the question: they can’t, can they? Leicester would be the least likely champions since promoted Ipswich Town in 1962, if not ever. Yet a team widely tipped for relegation have already confounded most expectations. Like Jamie Vardy’s scoring spree, there is something endearingly implausible about Leicester’s season so far. That does not automatically mean they will relapse into normality.
Indeed, Saturday’s improbable top-of-the-table battle, featuring Leicester and Manchester United, highlights football’s capacity for the improbable.
Nigel Pearson’s Leicester won their meeting last autumn 5-3, but then only tasted victory twice in 24 matches. Since then, under the Englishman and Claudio Ranieri, they have triumphed 15 times in 22 attempts.
[Predictions: Spurs inflict more misery on Chelsea, Man United knock Leicester off top spot]
An anomaly, an outlier, has turned into something more. The same is true of Vardy’s prolific return. The 29-year-old Englishman was playing non-league football in 2012. Now he has equalled Ruud van Nistelrooy’s record of scoring in 10 consecutive Premier League games. He is closing in on Jimmy Dunne’s top-flight record of 12, set for Sheffield United in 1931/32.
Vardy is redefining what is possible. A player who only scored five league goals last season is now on course to claim the Golden Boot. Fast, fearless and invariably effective, he personifies Leicester. Like Riyad Mahrez, he is proof that City have unearthed quality players without looking for big names or paying big prices. The Algerian is the division’s top-scoring midfielder and ranks second only to Mesut Ozil for assists. The French ball-winner N’Golo Kante averages most interceptions per game. He is one of Claudio Ranieri’s recruits and the self-proclaimed “Tinkerman” has only changed Pearson’s winning formula to implement specific improvements.
Vardy is the headline act but the excellence of players such as Marc Albrighton and Danny Drinkwater means Leicester are no one-man team. Instead, they have the spirit, fitness levels and collective determination to mean that they have taken 10 points from losing positions already. Such a refusal to accept defeat was a trademark of Alex Ferguson’s title-winning United teams.
[Greg Lea: From factory worker to England striker: Jamie Vardy takes the long route to the top]
And yet there is something illogical about their lofty status. Ranieri has managed clubs of the status of Chelsea, Juventus, Inter Milan, Roma, Valencia and Monaco without winning the league title. It would make it all the odder if he did with Leicester. Vardy is on a scoring run that Thierry Henry, Cristiano Ronaldo and Alan Shearer never managed. Sooner or later, opponents ought to defend deeper to try to negate his pace.
Most successful sides have solid foundations but Leicester have conceded 20 goals, a total topped only by the bottom six, and have kept just two clean sheets, fewer than Newcastle United. They are scarcely suited to grinding out 1-0 wins, a staple diet for challengers.
They play a thrillingly direct brand of football, but they do not exert control. They have had the third lowest share of possession in the division this season, just 45 per cent, and have the poorest passing accuracy, of 71.5 per cent. Misplaced passes could harm them at some stage. When they tire, and their game plan is exhausting, an inability to keep the ball could be costly.
And, brilliantly as they have done, they have lost to the only potential champions they have faced, Arsenal, and in emphatic fashion, in a 5-2 setback. They are yet to beat any of last season’s top nine finishers.
Their next six games, against United, Swansea City, Chelsea, Everton, Liverpool and Manchester City, will provide a truer test of their credentials. But if Leicester are still top at the start of 2016, then it is time to proclaim them contenders for a top-four finish, if not better.
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