Is this Leicester City team better than the 2015/16 champions?

As you may have heard, this year’s Leicester City squad are ahead of the pace set by the 2015/16 team that went on to win the Premier League. This raises the question*: is this team better than the team that won the league? Is it possible that, in just 4 years, the back room staff have assembled an even stronger team than the famous 5000-1 squad?

The short answer is: No.

The longer answer is: Of course not, but they might be by the end of the season.

A team that has performed well over 11 matches is not as good as one that did the job over 38. Even if we were undefeated up until this point, it would be a stretch to say that the team had surpassed the champions.

Most of the memorable matches of 2015/16 occurred in the second half of the season. There’s a good reason for that: that’s when the pressure started to pile on and the team was under a microscope every week. It’s impressive to put 9 past Southampton, but it’s a different thing to go to Manchester City in the mother of all six-pointers.

Photo by Simon Stacpoole/Mark Leech Sports Photography/Getty Images

That isn’t to take anything away from this team. It’s a special group of players and a group who are in many cases much younger than their counterparts from four years ago. The future is incredibly bright for these guys and there is every reason to hope that they will reach the same heights at the 2015/16 season...

...but they aren’t there yet. Let’s take up the question after the festive period and we’ve played everyone else in the league at least once. Let’s see if we’re still breathing this thin air at the top of the table come March. Ask me again when Harry Kane tweets something that looks hilarious in retrospect.

Until then, just enjoy watching these guys play because we haven’t seen a team play football like this in Leicester for a long, long time. Appreciate what they are and we’ll worry about where they rank next spring.

* It’s “raises the question”, not “begs the question”. Begging the question is a logical fallacy where a proposition presupposes its answer. Yes, this is a hill I have chosen to die on. [Editors note: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯]