Leicester guardian manager Craig Shakespeare says that he feels like a pantomime villain in the wake of assuming control taking after the shock sacking of Claudio Ranieri. Shakespeare is in transitory charge and will pick the group for Monday’s urgent meeting with Liverpool after Ranieri was sacked on Thursday just nine months on from driving the club to the Premier League title.
Ranieri’s previous assistant conceded he felt uncomfortable when he showed up before the media on Friday and handled a question on the planning of the Italian’s dismissal, in the midst of claims of a revolt from senior players and a breakdown in his own particular relationship with his previous boss.
Shakespeare said: “I can do nothing about that. I have to be myself. I have worked with some very good managers but I would say I am determined to stay the same. I want to be myself because I think people read into that and I think you have to do that in football.”
Ranieri returned to Leicester’s training ground on Friday afternoon to collect his belongings while the players accused of turning against him took a day off ahead of Monday’s game. But Shakespeare is open to the idea of Ranieri making another visit to say his goodbyes to former colleagues, with whom he delivered the Premier League’s most unlikely title triumph last season. “Personally I wouldn’t have any problems with it and I am sure the club wouldn’t,” he said.
Regardless of whether Ranieri would select to speak to his previous charges is debatable, in any case, with the 65-year-old thought to feel let around some members of his title-winning side, who are just a point and a place over the assignment zone.
Shakespeare was also left confronting questions about the rewards of last season, including lucrative new contracts and expensive club cars, that were given to many key members of the squad and private alcove staff.
