“I told you it would be frantic!” Dean Smith shouts to his new players during his first training session at Leicester City’s plush 185-acre Seagrave training facility, telling them they have a one-minute break before going again.
Leicester’s owners believe a spark is all that is required to get this squad firing again, to lift them out of the relegation battle, and Smith has ignited training since taking over as manager on Tuesday.
One particularly intense drill involved a small pitch, roughly the size of two penalty boxes, four teams of three and two permanent goalkeepers.
While two teams waited by either goal, one team attacked and another defended. Once the ball was in the goal or out of play, the defending team left the pitch, immediately replaced by the team waiting by the defended goal, who attacked with a new ball. The previous attacking team became defenders.
It was relentless, short bursts of attacking moves lasting no longer than 10 seconds. On it went, again and again. Smith has wanted to see plenty of shots and goals (as well as some decent defending), is trying to get them used to the feel and thrill of scoring again.
Leicester have barely mustered a shot on target in recent matches – one against Brentford, two against Crystal Palace and none in the game against Southampton being the worst examples.
Smith feels they have lost some belief and confidence, has noted a peculiar absence of energy and enthusiasm – a sort of malaise that has infected their performances – and wants to instil some zest and emotion back into the team.
Even captain Jonny Evans has admitted a nervousness has crept into the players’ legs.
So another session last week, led by Smith’s assistant manager Craig Shakespeare, was set up to create “chaos”: another smaller pitch marked out by cones with plenty of bodies inside. Keep the ball, one or two touches allowed.
It kept the players on their toes, forced them to deal with pressure and stress. Demanded they confront that nervousness, to get it out of their system in training, rather than let it afflict their performances in the remaining eight games crucial to Premier League survival.
If their current slump in form – eight defeats and a draw, only five goals scored, in nine games, leaving them second bottom, two points behind Everton and safety – is not arrested soon, they will be experiencing plenty of uncomfortable minutes on the pitch. Games that were previously straightforward and routine will become tetchy, anxious, strained.
A trip to champions Manchester City chasing down Arsenal at the top is a start to a managerial reign you would not wish upon your worst enemy, but beyond that there is hope of plotting a path to safety. Eight games in six weeks in a period Smith is treating as a mini-competition in its own right, where first prize – the only prize – is survival.
Smith, Shakespeare and coach John Terry have been the trio tasked with the job. Perhaps an unlikely choice at first glance, but the idea has sound grounding. Smith steered Aston Villa away from relegation in 2010. Shakespeare was assistant to Nigel Pearson when Leicester beat the drop in 2015.
And Terry is not only a strong defensive coach who is said to drive extraordinarily high standards based on his own playing days in the harsh but successful environment at Chelsea, but he also helps bridge the divide between the two 50-plus blokes in charge and the young men playing, many who grew up watching the indomitable defender win everything at club level and play 78 times for England.
Shakespeare – still known as “Shakey” to many at the club – is a well-known and extremely well-liked figure back for his third spell. On Tuesday morning, there was a touching reunion hug with Jamie Vardy, with whom he won that title in 2016, when they were reunited in a corridor at Seagrave, as well as introductory handshakes for the three new coaches and the playing squad in the canteen.
One of Smith’s priorities this past week has been meeting all the players individually, getting to know them, discovering what makes them tick, assessing their mood, asking each of them why they believe they’re in a relegation fight and if they have any ideas for how to get out of it. Obviously he will make the final decisions, but it’s a different way of empowering the players, making them feel part of the process, another little boost to damaged psyches.
There are also repairs to be made to strained relations with the fans, who turned their ire from dismissed Brendan Rodgers to the players when they lost a tight, nervy relegation encounter with Bournemouth at the King Power Stadium last Saturday. The home fans chanted “You’re not fit to wear the shirt” at the players as they left the field.
But Smith knows those reparations will come with results. He and his small team were brought in on an interim basis but they have every chance of securing the job long-term, depending how the audition goes.
Aiyawatt Srivaddhanaprabha, the Leicester owner, Susan Whelan, the chief executive, and Jon Rudkin, the director of football, are leading recruitment of a new permanent manager and felt that, in the circumstances, Smith was worth a shot in the short-term.
His track record and in particular his motivational qualities impressed Leicester’s hierarchy, although his tactical preparation and insistence on players learning multiple systems to adapt to the circumstances of a game was also noted.
As a boy, Smith learned to play chess against his uncle during school holidays and went on to become West Midlands school chess champion and, still a keen player today, it is thought to have informed his eye for tactics in football.
And, perhaps not to be discounted in the decision, Leicester are getting a fresher Smith than he has been in a long while. The three-and-a-half months he has had off after being sacked by Norwich in December is really the only break he has had in 11 years and some 600-odd games in management since his first job in charge of Walsall in League One.
That season, with four months to play the club were bottom of the table, nine points from safety. What happened? Smith kept them up.
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