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Leicester City all-time Premier League top scorer Jamie Vardy has said his final match for the club will be “really sad” after announcing he will leave the Foxes at the end of the season.
City captain Vardy, who signed from non-league side Fleetwood Town and was integral to one of the greatest sporting shocks of all time when Leicester won the 2015/16 top-flight title, described himself as “gutted” while announcing his exit in front of the Premier League trophy.
The 38-year-old striker has scored 198 goals in 498 appearances, including 143 in the Premier League, as well as helping Leicester win the 2020/21 FA Cup and the Championship in 2014 and 2024.
Vardy leaving Leicester: When is his last game?
In the message to Leicester fans, Vardy said the club would “always, always have a massive place in my heart” but called the timing “right”.
“I’ve spent 13 unbelievable years at this club, with lots of success and some downs,” he reflected. “The majority have all been highs. It’s finally time to call it a day, which I’m devastated about it.”
Leicester have two home games remaining before Vardy’s departure, facing Southampton on May 3 and Ipswich Town on May 18 (both 15:00 BST).
“[My last game will] be a really sad day,” he told Leicester’s website .“It’s something that I’ve thought about and spoken about with my family. I think it’s time.”
“Good things come to an end. It’s going to be one of those emotional days. Who knows which way that can go? If you ask anyone, I’m not really an emotional guy.
“Nothing like that ever comes across with me but, when you’ve been somewhere for so long and it is time to say goodbye, you just never know what your personal reaction is going to be.”
Jamie Vardy clubs: Leicester ‘family’
Having been released by Sheffield Wednesday as a teenager, Vardy spent time with Stocksbridge Park Steels before making his name at Halifax Town.
After a prolific period at Fleetwood Town – then a non-league side – Vardy joined Leicester for £1 million in May 2012. “Being here so long, the fans took me in like I was one of their own,” he said.
“You always want to repay that… it’s family. The fans have, ever since I’ve been here, stuck with us through thick and thin.
“It comes to game days, and the atmosphere’s great. And then you get the die-hard ones who are travelling to every single away game as well.
“It’s really appreciated, it really is. Nothing in the world these days is cheap, so for them to be spending their money to back the club they love and, fortunately for myself, being involved in that for all of the past 13 seasons, it’s an unbelievable feeling.”
Jamie Vardy stats, goals
By Leicester’s own assessment, Vardy’s arrival was “branded as foolhardy at best, strange at worst” – but his 16 goals helped the club return to the Premier League the following season.
A 24-goal total in that remarkable 2015/16 season, when Leicester had been 5,000/1 to win the Premier League, was the first of seven successive campaigns in which Vardy would hit double figures in the top flight.
On November 28 2015, Jamie Vardy broke current Leicester manager Ruud Van Nistelrooy’s record by scoring in 11 straight Premier League games with one against the team for whom the Dutchman achieved the feat, Manchester United.
Among his litany of other highlights, Vardy helped Leicester reach the 2016/17 Champions League quarter-finals, the 2020/21 Europa League round of 32 and the 2021/22 Conference League semi-finals.
He scored 20 goals last season as Leicester won the Championship and has seven goals and three assists in this season’s Premier League, with only nine English players outscoring him.
More to follow
