Leicester win Premier League title: Claudio Ranieri calls Guus Hiddink to thank Chelsea after helping Foxes win
Ranieri touched down in London after his flight back from Italy to discover Leicester were Premier League champions
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Guus Hiddink has lavished praise on Leicester City after Chelsea’s 2-2 draw with Tottenham clinched the Premier League title for the Foxes, with their manager Claudio Ranieri phoning Hiddink after the match to thank him and his team.
Former Chelsea manager Ranieri was forced to miss the match as he was flying back from Italy, having returned to his homeland on Sunday to enjoy lunch with his 96-year-old mother before returning to London in Monday night.
Despite the connotations that the game held – if Spurs failed to win then Leicester would be crowned champions – Ranieri appeared as relaxed as he has been all season in revealing that he would not be watching the affair at Stamford Bridge, but upon his arrival back in Britain, he immediately called Hiddink to thank him for helpied his side cross the line.
“I got a call off Ranieri at the end and he thanked us,” Hiddink said in his post-match press conference after the match. “His voice was trembling a bit, but I don’t know if he was crying because it wasn’t a FaceTime call!
“But they deserve it. They didn’t implode and got no tension when they started smelling the title, so that’s why they deserve it.”
Ranieri was infamously sacked as Chelsea manager in 2004 by club owner Rman Abramovich, who claimed that the Italian would “never win the title”. 12 years later, Ranieri and his side will be given a guard of honour by his former club when they walk out at Stamford Bridge on the final day of the season.
"I'm so proud. I'm happy for my players, for the chairman, for the staff at Leicester City, all our fans and the Leicester community. It's an amazing feeling and I'm so happy for everyone," Ranieri said in a statement released on Leicester’s official website.
"I never expected this when I arrived. I'm a pragmatic man, I just wanted to win match after match and help my players to improve week after week. Never did I think too much about where it would take us.
"The players have been fantastic. Their focus, their determination, their spirit has made this possible. Every game they fight for each other and I love to see this in my players. They deserve to be champions."
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