Full-time Fletch on Claudio Ranieri’s sacking from Leicester

When you've had a season as successful as Claudio Ranieri, you can't then sack the bloke 25 games into the next season.

I understand that the club is desperate to be in the Premier League because there's so much money in it, but chopping and changing managers very rarely has the desired effect. 

There are so many brilliant and special things about football in the modern era, but the fact that good people can be thrown aside on a whim is one of the aspects of the game that is totally abhorrent.

If there had been a personality clash or Ranieri had been an unlikeable bloke it might have made more sense. But he is a class act who deserves a lot better.

Unrecognisable players

There are a group of players in that side that are unrecognisable from last season. Robert Huth and Wes Morgan suddenly look tired; Jamie Vardy isn’t scoring many goals; and Riyad Mahrez has lost some of his sharpness. Perhaps the success has gone to their heads and that could be why their manager lost his job. 

I think football clubs should end the job title of ‘manager’ because they're not managing - the players only allow them to do what they want to do. The minute the players have had enough of a manager, they just join forces and get rid of him. The manager used to be the authority in the room, but I’d say that role now falls to the players.

Player power has gone too far and I don’t see managers turning back the clock. But that's the way the modern game is, so we have to accept it. It doesn't, however, make it any more palatable, especially when you see a good, honest, hard-working football man lose his job in this manner.

If Leicester's form improves now, it will show that the attitude of the Leicester players was nothing short of a disgrace. If their form doesn't improve then Ranieri will have paid the price for their inabilities. So whichever way you look at it, it's the players – not the manager – who should take the blame.

Follow Burnley's lead

If Ranieri was good enough to win the title last season, he deserves to get relegated with that club and bring them back better. Burnley did it with Sean Dyche and they have grown as a club.

If people went to work and had a couple of bad weeks, and then got fired for it, nobody would have a job.