Leonardo Ulloa explains how Arsenal helped Leicester City win the title

It’s two years since that famous title-decider between Arsenal and Leicester City at the Emirates Stadium, but the Foxes’ 2-1 defeat still lives on in the memory.

Heading into the game, the Gunners were five points behind Leicester, desperately needing a win to keep their title hopes alive. In an encounter capable of having massive ramifications, Claudio Ranieri’s side started off well, taking the lead through a Jamie Vardy penalty right on the stroke of half-time.

However, Danny Simpson’ sending off just nine minutes into the second-half turned the game around, as Arsenal turned on the style and attacked with full force. Despite Theo Walcott’s equaliser at the 70th minute, Leicester seemed to have weathered the storm, but seconds before the whistle “could have been blown”, a silly foul on Nacho Monreal by Marcin Wasilewski gifted the hosts a free-kick in the territory that Mesut Ozil loves the most: The edge of the box.

As The Emirates Stadium (and England) held its breath, Ozil delivered a peach of a ball into the box, and Danny Welbeck, back after a year’s absence, came up with the most delicate of headers to make it 2-1 at the 96th minute. Arsenal were elated, Leicester City were deflated – and rightly so.

At the time, it felt as if the title race had indeed been turned on its head with Arsene Wenger’s side just two points off the summit and the whole of North London turbocharged, as the post-match celebrations showed. Now, was it too early to celebrate? Leonardo Ulloa (and we all) certainly thinks so.

Speaking exclusively to FourFourTwo, the Argentine revealed how Arsenal’s dressing room photo helped Leicester City remain focused and go all the way. He said:

"“After the match, there was this photograph on Instagram of the Arsenal players celebrating inthe dressing room and holding up two fingers. It made us all laugh.“They were two points below us, and in the end… well, I think they ended up a little further behind than that in the table. We had this picture stuck up in the dressing room as a nice reminder of what they were all thinking about us.“We would also share these pictures through Whatsapp. I can say they helped us keep focused and concentrated."

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Indeed, Leicester City remained focused in their chase, but Arsenal’s campaign derailed soon after, as they failed to win any of their next three Premier League games, effectively ending their title hopes at Old Trafford in a 3-2 defeat to Manchester United before losing to Swansea City, being knocked out by Watford in the FA Cup and bowing down to FC Barcelona in the UEFA Champions League (5-1 on aggregate).