Leicester City started life without Claudio Ranieri with a 3-1 win against Liverpool and a performance worthy of the Champions of England. In other words they played like they did last year. Jamie Vardy was back to having a party and Danny Drinkwater showed the kind of skill in scoring his goal that earned him an almost call up for England's Euro 2016 team.
And the obvious reaction from the Ranieri sympathisers was that this was proof that the players wanted Ranieri out. All weekend they said, "let's see what happens on Monday. If they play well then we know it was their fault Ranieri was sacked." And, voila, today's events played out just right for them.
My theory? Leicester could have won today, without any manager or anybody coaching them. The stand in guy, at most, might have picked who was playing. Or maybe he didn't even do that. The players have been tweeting and Instagram-ing all weekend about how angry they are at the suggestion that there was a player revolt. They were so worked up about the whole thing that they went today, determined to show the world that they can play, with or without Ranieri. Of course, it was Ranieri who coached them to play the way they played today. And by him leaving their true from came to the fore again. So by getting sacked Ranieri gave them his last bit of inspiration, to punch above their weight. It was down to Ranieri again.
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