Leicester City fans search in vain for change with more money trouble reported ahead of PSR D-Day

Of course the idea of strengthening in several key positions was pie in the sky. Of course it was.

Reports this week suggesting that Leicester City are choosing to do very little business in a January transfer window were met with a groan and a sense of déjà vu.

Life at the bottom

Prior to this week’s reports about PSR concerns, all we had on which to based our expectations for January was Ruud van Nistelrooy’s recent talk of improving the squad.

After five defeats in a row, even that thin veneer of ambition has been reduced to a line in a John Percy report about “cheap full-backs”. Happy New Year!

Meanwhile, our direct rivals towards the bottom of the league are strengthening.

Ipswich Town have agreed a fee to sign long-term target Jaden Philogene from Aston Villa. Although Philogene seems expensive at £21million, the absolute worst-case scenario for Ipswich is that they have an entire set of proven Championship-quality attackers ready for next season – most of whom are young with resale value. Ipswich have already signed Ben Godfrey on loan from Atalanta.

Wolves have signed Reims centre-back Emmanuel Agbadou for £16.5million. Wolves sporting director Matt Hobbs said of Agbadou’s arrival:

“When Vitor [Pereira, new Wolves manager] came in it’s the first conversation we had, to add one quick. There are so many games in January, so you can’t afford to waste a month. We have to use this month to be as efficient as possible, and we’re really excited about this signing.”

As we know all too painfully, signing centre-backs from Reims doesn’t automatically guarantee Premier League survival. Nonetheless, another struggling club’s director of football speaking publicly about the need for quick action in the January transfer window strikes such a contrast with Leicester’s approach that it’s hard to ignore.

The timing of the reports about a possible PSR breach and points deduction means that many Leicester fans are already starting to worry about what next season might look like, at a time when every other club will be focusing on this season’s run-in.

The pressure is building ahead of a huge week for our football club.

The tipping point

On social media and messageboards, goodwill towards the club’s leadership largely ran out a long time ago. This hasn’t translated to any large-scale demonstrations at games though.

Even those getting truly furious online haven’t found it in themselves to organise any sort of mass protest. That’s probably because deep down they recognise the difficulty of mobilising against a family who have brought unimaginable success to the club and suffered tragedy along the way.

Whether a tipping point will ever be reached is hard to know, given that the current regime have already presided over one of the most catastrophic relegations in Premier League history.

During that relegation season, the club followed up a cautious end to the transfer window due to financial restrictions with around £30million of spending in January. That could have been partly just spending the money received for the sale of Wesley Fofana late in the previous window, but the financial considerations were still there. They chose to roll the dice.

So it seems hard to believe the club don’t feel the need to strengthen significantly this time around, given that the playing squad is significantly worse than it was two years ago. The perceived wisdom is that they don’t want to aggravate the Premier League further by spending big while sailing close to – or over – the dreaded PSR line. We should find out on Monday whether that assumption is correct.

You might reasonably believe PSR was concocted to put an end to clubs like Leicester City winning trophies and qualifying for Europe. You might also think the Premier League and EFL are acting outside of their jurisdiction by reportedly pursuing our club more forcefully because of the embarrassment caused by the Nick De Marco case.

Whatever your thoughts, it’s clear that Leicester’s problems are still of their own making. They were entirely avoidable with better decision-making.