Nigeria national football team players Kelechi Iheanacho and Wilfred Ndidi could be playing in the EFL Championship in the 2023/24 season after Leicester City got relegated from the Premier League on the last day of the 2022/23 season.
The Foxes put up a fight at home to win against UEFA European Conference League finalists West Ham United but Bournemouth did them no favours by losing to Everton, where Nigeria Super Eagles midfielder Alex Iwobi plies his trade.
Leicester City are relegated from the Premier League 😱
They're the second team in the PL era to be relegated after winning the title 😨 pic.twitter.com/d3huiPKUbB
— ESPN FC (@ESPNFC) May 28, 2023
Iheanacho and Ndidi will now be looking forward to a summer where they can seal a move away from the club.
Everton stay up, Foxes go down on tense final day in Premier League
The 2022/23 Premier League season has been nothing short of an amazing anomaly in the order of things.
The top four consists of teams who nobody thought would be in the conversation at this time. The middle of the table has teams who, although are normally mid-table teams, overperformed the expectations fans had for them.
The bottom of the league saw some teams who have struggled in the past seasons but managed to stay up. These teams would end up relegated to the disappointment of their fans and neutrals who had bet on their safety. One of such teams is Leicester City, where Super Eagles players Wilfred Ndidi and Kelechi Iheanacho are employed.
After a terrible season under Brendan Rodgers where Iheanacho was relegated to the bench instead of being counted on and Ndidi suffered a serious injury that kept him out of the team, they brought in Dean Smith to salvage the situation.
The former Aston Villa and Norwich manager would do his best to help the Foxes regain some good form but it would prove too little, too late for them.
Iheanacho got things going by assisting Harvey Barnes for the opener against West Ham and despite the 2 – 1 victory at the end of the night, they would end up relegated thanks to Alex Iwobi and his Everton teammates creating a miracle of their own to see off Bournemouth.
EVERTON AVOID RELEGATION 🔵 pic.twitter.com/YSO8MySvxw
— B/R Football (@brfootball) May 28, 2023
What next for Iheanacho and Ndidi?
Championship football beckons for two of the Super Eagles main men. Their current position as second division players will not stop them from being a part of the AFCON 2023 squad should Nigeria qualify for the tournament, however.
Wilfred Ndidi has suffered another injury setback which means he could miss the upcoming AFCON 2023 qualifiers fixtures. Iheanacho, on the other hand, is back to full fitness and will be expected to make the squads.
After the international break is done, both players will surely be considering transfers away from the King Power. Their contracts both expire in 2024 and they are both players who the Foxes consider valuable.
As has become a custom among relegated teams, both players could be listed on the transfer market as Leicester seeks to build for the EFL Championship next season.
There are no concrete transfer links for Ndidi at the time but it is a long summer and the window will end in September.
Leicester City failed to invest rightly & Rodgers' sentiments came back to "hurt" them.
Ndidi & Iheanacho now has to decide their futures if they want to stay in the Championship & fight back up.
Ndidi could have moved 2 years ago & it's time for critical decision-making.
— POOJA!!! (@PoojaMedia) May 28, 2023
For Iheanacho, he could be replacing Lautaro Martinez at Inter Milan if the Argentine gets a transfer as the Serie A club intends, according to reports.
This article was most recently revised and updated 1 year ago
