Leicester City Players Gifted a Mercedes and Casino Chips

Leicester City’s football stars are continuing to reap the rewards of their astounding triumph at this year’s Premier League season. Not only will they receive a brand new Mercedes each worth around £32,000, and a share of a £6.5 million prize pool, but the club’s owner, Thai billionaire businessman Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha, has now given them casino chips and cash worth £10,000. That amount is significantly higher than the £1,000 casino chip that they were given after Leicester was promoted to the Premier League in time for the 2014-2015 season, and as a Mirror Sport source explains:
“The chairman was putting £5,000 chips in the top pockets of some of the boys and telling them to enjoy themselves.”
Although the Premier League insists club bonuses be finalised at the beginning of the season, there will be no repercussions for the surprise gift as the team has already won the Premiership title, and the bonus is therefore not intended as an incentive for the players to win any particular match.
In addition to Leicester City players being showered with money and gifts, the club, too, has also received a bundle of rewards amounting to around £130 million. This includes £93 million from the Premier League fund, as well as a further £30 million for qualifying for the Champions League.
In the meantime, the British bookies have been counting their losses after Leicester City’s remarkable 5000-1 long-shot victory, and are believed to have lost £20 to £30 million between them. As well as offering such huge odds at the start of the season, the bookies were still offering odds of 20 to 1 at Christmas time, which encouraged further waves of punters to place more bets on the team. As UK poker pro Neil Channing explains:
“People say whoever is leading the league at Christmas often go on to win the league so to have them at 20-1 is unprecedented. Had it been Chelsea in the same spot they would have been 1-5.”