Leicester City’s back-to-back relegations confirmed as former champions drop to League One

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Leicester City have been relegated to League One just ten years after their miracle Premier League title success.

The Foxes’ failure to beat Hull City at the King Power Stadium on Tuesday evening officially confirmed their demotion to the third tier of English football for just the second time in their history.

Two goals in as many minutes from Jordan James and Luke Thomas was not enough to give Gary Rowett's men the win they needed to stay alive, with the game ending 2-2.

The result sees Leicester become the latest club to suffer back-to-back relegations, having also slipped out of the Premier League last term. Their return to League One is the culmination of a woeful season that has seen them hit with a points deduction, yet another managerial change, financial concerns, as well as a run of 17 games without a league victory.

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Leicester kicked off the season with former Queens Park Rangers boss Marti Cifuentes at the helm. The Spaniard was appointed in mid-July, three weeks after former boss Ruud van Nistelrooy was dismissed.

Cifuentes actually started positively - the Foxes sitting as high as fourth in the league in mid-October, albeit sub-par performances did not reflect their position at the time. But things took a sharp downturn, with Cifuentes winning just a further six league games after that point. He was eventually sacked after a 2-1 defeat to Oxford United. Leicester once again took their time to find his replacement, with former midfielder Andy King placed in interim charge but he could only lead the side to four successive defeats - a 4-3 reverse against Southampton where Leicester blew a 3-0 lead the most damaging of those.

Current boss Rowett was eventually appointed on a contract until the end of the season but he has secured just one win in 11 games. Leicester’s 1-0 defeat away to Portsmouth at the weekend effectively put the club on the verge of relegation to League One.

Of course, a six-point deduction handed out to them by the EFL has not helped their cause in retaining their place in the Championship. The Foxes were handed the deduction in February after being found guilty of breaching PSR for the 2023/24 season - a later appeal being dismissed.

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But even with those points on their tally, Leicester would still be in the relegation zone and two points adrift of safety. As it is, their fate is sealed.

The Midlands side will round off their campaign with their final home game coming against promotion-chasing Millwall on Friday evening. They then take on Blackburn Rovers on the final day of the season at Ewood Park in a clash of two fallen Premier League champions.

Attention will then turn to their return to League One. Leicester were last in the third tier of English football during the 2008/09 season but bounced back at the first attempt under the stewardship of Nigel Pearson.

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