“Unfortunately, the following season didn’t go nearly as well,” Ranieri recalls to FourFourTwo. “I had warned everyone that we couldn’t repeat what we’d done. It was impossible. Playing both league and Champions League football is extremely demanding if you aren’t used to it. The physical and mental energy required is enormous."

“In the league, especially against the bigger sides, the performances were still there. Whether we won or lost, the boys played well. But European football takes a toll and we paid the price in the league, usually against less prestigious teams.”

“Still, our Champions League adventure was wonderful,” the Italian continues. “We won our group with a game to spare and without conceding a goal in the first four matches. We lost 2-1 at Sevilla in the first leg of the last 16. It was a difficult period in the league – we’d taken just a single point from the previous six matches. That evening, on the plane home, I was told that I would no longer be the manager."

“I didn’t say a word, but honestly, it hurt. Nine months earlier, we had won the Premier League together, but now I was being dismissed? Why? Later, the chairman’s son told me the problem was I didn’t get on with some English members of the staff. Unbelievable."

“Already the season before, when we were top of the league, one of the staff members had been speaking badly about me to the players. I called him into my office and asked why – he couldn’t even give me an answer.

“At that point I was too focused on the title race, so I simply told the general manager that at the end of the season, we’d let him go."

“In the end we won the title – there was such joy, such celebration, that I decided to do nothing. That was a mistake. The following year, he continued speaking negatively about me to the players."

“Being sacked is part of a manager’s career and I accepted it,” he continues. “I took it badly, but not really much worse than other dismissals I’d experienced, because the satisfaction of what we’d achieved went far beyond any disappointment. Football is like that.”

Ranieri on Leicester’s miracle triumph

“I went there with real determination,” the Italian tells FourFourTwo. “From the very beginning, the chairman asked me to reach 40 points, and I kept hammering that message home all the way through the season."

“That was the target. Well, at least until a certain stage, then I had to adjust my aim slightly!”

“At the start there was scepticism about me,” he continues. “Apparently the bookmakers were offering 5,000-1 on us winning the title and considered it more likely that aliens would land, the Loch Ness Monster would appear, that Elvis Presley was still alive, or that Bono would be elected as Pope. I know this because somebody told me – I don’t read newspapers, so I didn’t even realise."

“I was welcomed in a truly wonderful way. The scepticism of a few people didn’t bother me – I didn’t even know about it. All I know is that when I saw the boys in training, I was astonished. I could see incredible determination in the way they worked.”

“The miraculous relegation survival at the end of the previous season gave them confidence, and the work done by my predecessor Nigel Pearson had been excellent,” Ranieri adds.

“The lads were in great physical shape. I was very impressed and understood that, by changing only a few things, we could do well. Of course, never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that we could win the league."

“I watched several matches and led the first training sessions. I immediately realised that Riyad Mahrez starting from the right and cutting inside on to his left foot could be extremely dangerous. On the opposite flank I put Marc Albrighton, who usually played on the right and delivered plenty of crosses, but from the left he too could cut inside and shoot."

“Danny Drinkwater and Andy King were the two players who provided solidity in midfield. I gradually placed Danny Simpson at right-back, and Christian Fuchs at left-back – he was truly ready only after our first defeat, at home to Arsenal in September."

“Yes, I made some adjustments, but the decisive move was placing N’Golo Kante in midfield alongside Drinkwater. That boy was extraordinary. With him, it felt as though we were playing with 12 men. Once, I said I wouldn’t have been surprised to see him cross the ball, then head it in himself. He was incredible.”