Jamie Vardy used to show up to training drunk

LEICESTER, ENGLAND - MAY 02: (MINIMUM FEES APPLY - MINIMUM PRINT/BROADCAST FEE OF 100 GBP, ONLINE FEE OF 50 GBP PER IMAGE, OR LOCAL EQUIVALENT) Leicester City players gather at Jamie Vardy's house to watch title rivals on May 2, 2016 in Leicester, United Kingdom. (Photo by Plumb Images/Leicester City FC via Getty Images)
LEICESTER, ENGLAND - MAY 02: (MINIMUM FEES APPLY - MINIMUM PRINT/BROADCAST FEE OF 100 GBP, ONLINE FEE OF 50 GBP PER IMAGE, OR LOCAL EQUIVALENT) Leicester City players gather at Jamie Vardy's house to watch title rivals on May 2, 2016 in Leicester, United Kingdom. (Photo by Plumb Images/Leicester City FC via Getty Images) /
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Jamie Vardy used to show up to Leicester City training while still drunk from the night before

If you know about Jamie Vardy, I’m sure you’ve heard the jokes about him loving WKD and vodka. Well, it turns out the Leicester City star has that reputation for a reason.

Coming off the back of his Premier League title win, the former Fleetwood Town striker has been exposed by Leicester City’s vice chairman, Aiyawatt Srivaddhanaprabha.

This article for Goal see’s Aniyawatt reveal how Jamie Vardy used to turn up to training still drunk from the night before. Aniyawatt spoke to Thailand’s A day magazine saying;

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“I was against signing Jamie Vardy in the first place. I asked Nigel Pearson and Steve Walsh about him, checked the scout reports, and I started to believe he would be a good signing, but I had to answer the supporters who were asking ‘how is a non-league player worth £1 million?’,”

“It turned out I was the dumbest club owner in the world to them. I asked Pearson and Walsh, if I have only £1m transfer budget for the next season, who would you buy? And they replied ‘Vardy’. Then I said ‘go’. “

“There was outrage from the fans. Some even called me to say ‘are you nuts? Why have you spent this much on a non-league player?’.”Back then, I think he didn’t even have what it took to play in the Premier League.”

“The day we bought him, he came to me and thanked me for changing his life. He had never had this much money so he was over the moon already. He went straight from the bottom to the Championship, which eventually led him to start drinking booze every single day. We had no idea what to do.”

“I didn’t know about this until someone told me that he came to train while he was still drunk. So I went talk to him myself, I asked ‘do you wish to end your career like this? Do you want to stay here like this? We’ll let your contract run out, then release you. Don’t expect a better career path’.”

“He said he didn’t know what to do with his life. He’d never earned such a large amount of money. So I asked him ‘what’s your dream? How do you think your life should be? Just think carefully about what would you do for the club. I invested in you, do you have to do something in return?’”

“After that he simply quit drinking and started working hard in training. His physicality wasn’t as good as it is now. We know he had explosive acceleration, but we simply had no idea he could be this good.”

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From training drunk to being one of the Premier Leagues better performing strikers, going on to create one of the greatest footballing miracles to date, Jamie Vardy really did turn his life around.

Hopefully, Jamie Vardy clears this issue up himself in his new autobiography, set to release soon.