The Impossible Dream: Leicester City’s Premier League Win
It Was What It Was : The Football History Podcast
The Overlap
4.9 • 667 Ratings
🗓️ 28 April 2026
⏱️ 66 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Welcome back to It Was What It Was, the football history podcast. In this week’s episode, co-hosts Jonthan Wilson and Rob Draper are joined by Sports Journalist and author Jonathan Northcroft to take a look 10 years on from that extraordinary and famous Premier League win! They frame the story around key pivot points, including the Valentine’s Day defeat at Arsenal and the self-belief it sparked, plus Ranieri’s unexpected decision to still grant the squad a holiday. Northcroft traces the longer build-up through the 2013 Watford play-off heartbreak, Nigel Pearson’s cross-department reset, the 2014 Championship-winning platform (and the later FFP breach), and the club’s smart recruitment and early data use that delivered players like Kanté, Mahrez and Okazaki. They cover Pearson’s departure after off-field incidents, the scepticism around Ranieri’s appointment, his “dilly ding” media touch, rivals’ crises, standout wins over Liverpool and Manchester City, Spurs’ chase, and the city’s all-in celebrations as the miracle became real.
06:35 Origins of the Build
10:39 FFP and the Promotion Debate
11:35 Recruitment and Data Edge
17:36 Kante and Mahrez Backstories
22:22 Pearson Great Escape and Exit
26:10 Ranieri Arrives Against the Odds
27:46 Dilly Ding and Pizza Psychology
35:24 Chelsea Chaos Unravels
41:42 Big Clubs in Crisis
45:02 Vardy Volley and City Statement
47:37 Leicester Media Frenzy
53:30 Spurs Pressure and Title Night
59:19 Leicester Celebrates as One
01:04:30 Bonkers Finale
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Well, welcome to It Was What It Was with me, Rob Draper. I'm here with Jonathan Wilson and we are celebrating a very, very special day today. |
| 0:16.0 | Ten years on from, I don't know, maybe the greatest ever story in Premier League history, maybe English |
| 0:21.8 | history. It is, of course, the story of Leicester City and the extraordinary Premier League title |
| 0:28.4 | win from 2016. It's a belter of a story. We're really enjoying researching it and going back |
| 0:35.5 | over a year that really made mugs out of all of us football |
| 0:38.9 | pundits. And we couldn't really have anyone better, I don't think, on the show to discuss |
| 0:45.0 | this epic tale than the great Jonathan Northcroft, who is a football correspondent of Sunday Times, |
| 0:51.7 | but he's also the author of Fearless, the amazing underdog story |
| 0:56.2 | in Leicester City. He lives in Leicester, so he's very well qualified to talk about this. |
| 1:00.6 | Welcome to the show, Jonathan. |
| 1:02.0 | Hi, guys. Lovely to be here. And thanks for calling me the great Jonathan Northcroft. |
| 1:06.2 | That's not what you usually call me, Rob. |
| 1:09.8 | So, Johnny, the book subtitle calls this the greatest miracle in |
| 1:13.6 | sports history. I think we can forgive you a slight hyperbole, but it actually is up there, |
| 1:19.4 | isn't it? I mean, how does it rank for you? I think it really is. I mean, look, I think it was |
| 1:24.3 | the American publisher actually came up with that subheading. |
| 1:29.0 | This is something I tried to quantify in the book, and we'll go on to talk about some of the reasons it was so miraculous. |
| 1:34.1 | But all I can say is that at a distance, it feels even more unimaginable than it was to watch at the time. |
| 1:44.5 | 5,000 to 1 was the famous bookmaker's odds. |
| 1:48.9 | You know, the chances of Elvis being found alive, I think you can get 2,000 to 1 still. |
| 1:53.6 | So it's half as likely or twice as likely. |
| 1:57.2 | I don't think there's been anything like it in football. |
... |
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