City can summon the spirit of 1996

Esteban Cambiasso – pointing the way to Premier League success for the Foxes?

Today sees the start of the 2014-15 Premier League campaign – the first in 11 years to feature Leicester City.

Many media scribes, though, forecast the Foxes to make an instant return to the lower leagues.

Superficially, they may have some justification for this. Two of City’s previous three spells in the top flight during the Premier League era have lasted just one year, while five of the last ten Football League Champions have suffered instant demotion.

However the style, flair and resilience so often displayed from Nigel Pearson’s side on the way to collecting last season’s crown with a record total of 102 points are indications of their capability to confound the critics.

There are similarities between the current side and the fabled 1996-97 side built by Martin O’Neill, which was also widely disparaged and condemned as doomed by many pundits before a ball had even been kicked. Yet O’Neill led his squad to a top-half finish (as he would do in each of the following three seasons) as well as guiding them to the League Cup.

His side was full of eager, hungry footballers determined to establish themselves at the top level – a mix of experienced, hardened professionals and fresh, emerging talent. It is a blend that none of O’Neill’s successors at City – until Pearson – have been able to replicate.

Several of the current squad – goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel, central defender and captain Wes Morgan, utility player Jeff Schlupp and winger Riyad Mahrez – have already achieved recognition at international level. Others – most notably, influential midfielder Danny Drinkwater and locally-born defender Liam Moore – look likely to do so in the future.

As at this stage in 1996, though, the squad is still a work in progress. Reinforcements will be needed to add a depth which a crop of pre-season injuries suggests may currently be lacking.

But in the same way as O’Neill distinguished himself with the targets he landed during that season – most notably Ian Marshall, Matt Elliott and Steve Guppy – Pearson can identify and recruit players who will bring more steel to the club.

This process has made a promising start with the signing of striker Leonardo Ulloa from Brighton and ambitious efforts to add his compatriot Esteban Cambiasso from Inter Milan. The arrival of the veteran midfielder, whose collection of winners’ medals is second only to that of Lionel Messi among current Argentine players, would send a clear signal that City look to do more than make up the numbers in the world’s most lucrative league.

Although the club’s Thai owners will not be realistically expecting a top-six finish this season, the stable environment they have helped to create at the club gives City an advantage over many of its rivals.

The board, management, players and fans are all pushing in the same direction and with lavish funds available in the transfer market – which hasn’t always been the case during previous forays at this level – City can once again, as in 1996, become a Premier League force to be reckoned with.