If you are a Leicester City fan, life was pretty good in October 2000. Despite legendary manager Martin O’Neill having left to take up the reigns at Celtic, Leicester were topping the Premiership table for a couple of weeks, and who better to take over from O’Neill than the former England Under 21 Manager Peter Taylor.

Taylor was then regarded as an up-and-coming coach who had enjoyed success with the England junior team and was tipped by some to be in the running to take over the senior side from Sven-Goran Eriksson.

As for Leicester, they had enjoyed a period of sustained success under O’Neill; having achieved promotion to the top flight, they had four successive top ten finishes and won the League Cup twice.

Taylor was given the brief to continue this success and build up the club. To achieve this, he was given loadsa money to spend, and spend it he did. He is reported to have shelled out £23m on players during his short reign, most of it on distinctly average players.

Striker Ade Akinbiyi became the symbol of Taylor’s misguided spending, and it was on this day in 2000 that Wolves accepted a £5m bid from Leicester for the player.



Akinbiyi had started his career at Norwich and when he arrived at Leicester, he had already notched up six clubs, despite only being 25.

He was quickly dubbed Ade Abadbiyi by Foxes fans as he struggled in the Premiership, mirroring the form of the Leicester team as a whole.

Despite being top in October 2000, the Foxes went on a horrible run later on in the season and plummeted down the table to eventually finish 13th.

Akinbiyi himself only ever managed 11 goals in 58 appearances for the team, and was eventually sold to Crystal Palace once Leicester had been relegated, and Taylor sacked.

Akinbiyi continued his poor form at his next few clubs, before landing at Burnley, where his scoring exploits earned him a move to Sheffield United and back to the Premiership. He only made five top-flight appearances for the Blades however, before being sold back to Burnley.

Check out some of his worst misses for the Foxes below.

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