Leicester sealed a place in
the lucrative top flight of English football by winning the Championship title
last month, ending a decade-long absence from the Premier League.
Like all promoted clubs, survival is the initial goal for Leicester but billionaire chairman Vichai
Srivaddhanaprabha has grander notions in the years ahead."We want to stay
in the EPL as long as possible," Vichai told reporters in Bangkok on Monday after the team enjoyed a
three-day stay in the Thai holiday destination of Phuket.
"But we won't take the huge leap to challenge the
league's top five clubs immediately. Do we have a chance to beat them? Yes, we
have, but I think we need to establish our foothold in the league first and
then we think about our next step.It will take a huge amount of money, possibly
10 billion Thai Baht ($306.56 million), to get there. But that doesn't put us
off. I am asking for three years, and we'll be there."
Leicester, three-times
League Cup winners, were relegated from the Premier League in 2004 and then
fell to the third tier in 2008. Manager Nigel Pearson took them back to the
Championship at the first attempt before leaving for Hull City, only to return
in 2011 and lead them up to the top flight.
The former Sheffield Wednesday and Middlesbrough defender
shared Vichai's optimism. "We have to be adaptable when we play big teams.
But, the important thing is we're going with a belief that we can
achieve," he said after showing off the Championship trophy to fans in the
Thai capital.
"I want to set high standards for ourselves. The next
challenge for us as a club is to establish ourselves in the EPL. We're not
going to make up the numbers. We want to be competitive. We've tasted success
now. It's important we continue to improve everything about ourselves. So, we
can challenge for the top five. But, of course, one step at the time. The boys
are really looking forward to playing with some of the best teams in the
world."
Vichai, who previously had a VIP box at Chelsea where he
also bought advertising space for his King Power retail group, took over
Leicester with a consortium in 2010. He said he had ignored the opportunity to
invest in a Premier League club in favour of taking on the challenge of leading
one there.
"After spending time studying many clubs, I fell in
love with Leicester. One reason was the team's colours, which were the same as
my company's," he said. "The other was the fact that they were
playing in the second tier at the time. I thought if we bought an EPL club it
wouldn't be challenging enough. If we could lead this team to the EPL, that
would be a real challenge."
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