Time for Euro elite to start taking Foxes seriously
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E-mail Shanghai Daily, March 16, 2017
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The obvious answer was Barcelona or Real Madrid. Bayern Munich would have been understandable, too.
But when Gianluigi Buffon was asked which team he would like to avoid in the draw for the UEFA Champions League quarterfinals, the Juventus goalkeeper went for competition's big outsider.
"Leicester," the Italy great said, "because it is a dangerous team, a team which will have enthusiasm, a team which has the weapons to cause trouble for teams who want to take the initiative."
Against Leicester, Buffon added, "there would also be everything to lose".
Indeed, the previously unheralded club from central England is making a habit of embarrassing Europe's big teams.
Last season, the cream of English soccer couldn't live with Leicester, which romped to the Premier League title by 10 points at odds of 5,000-1. This season, it has moved onto the UCL, topping a group that contained two-time European champion FC Porto before eliminating Sevilla— a club that has won the Europa League the past three years — in the last 16.
"We are in there on merit, make no mistake," Leicester City manager Craig Shakespeare said, looking ahead to tomorrow's quarterfinal draw. "We might be the surprise team."
Except no one should be surprised by Leicester anymore. This is a team playing soccer in a simple but highly effective way and specializing in making possible the impossible.
It's time to take them seriously.
Shakespeare was asked after the 2-0 win over Sevilla on Tuesday, which sealed a 3-2 victory on aggregate, whether playing against Europe's power clubs would actually suit his counter-attacking team. He seemed to agree.
"You have to be concerned about the opposition and know their strengths. But I think as a football club, we have to know our strengths. And you saw that in abundance (against Sevilla), in terms of desire, and we can play a bit as well."
In the final days of Claudio Ranieri's tenure, Leicester's players had lost the values that took them to the top of the English game. Those values are back under Shakespeare and it could yet lead the team to an even greater achievement than last season.
Leicester, after all, is 360 minutes away from a UCL final.
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