Dubai: At 5000-1, Leicester City’s pre-season odds of winning the Premier League are the longest to have come to fruition on any single event, not including an accumulator, in any genre, ever.
To put that in perspective the odds on evidence of alien life being produced by the end of 2017 are 100-1.
Other examples of 5000-1 odds that obviously haven’t come in, yet, are Elvis being found alive, the Loch Ness Monster being proven to exist, Christmas being the warmest day of the year in England, Kim Kardashian becoming president in 2020 and Barack Obama playing cricket for England after he leaves the Oval Office.
The nearest long shots to have actually come true are 2500-1 in the year 2000 when Peter Edwards successfully predicted his 3-year-old grandson Harry Wilson would play for Wales, a feat the Liverpool winger achieved in 2013.
And 1000-1 in 1964 when David Threlfall successfully predicted that a man would walk on the moon by the end of the decade, which of course Neil Armstrong made a reality in 1969.
All this statistically proves that minnows Leicester winning their first league title a year after narrowly avoiding relegation the season before, is unequivocally the greatest sporting achievement of all time, and perhaps, even more mind-blowing, if looking beyond just sport, the unlikeliest event in history.
Other most memorable sporting long shots have been baseball’s St. Louis Cardinals winning the 2011 World Series at 999-1, and the USA beating England in the 1950 Fifa World Cup at 500-1. England winning the 1981 Ashes on the final morning of the third test was also 500-1.
St. Louis Rams winning the 1999 Super Bowl was 300-1, and Equinoctial winning the 2.45pm novice hurdles at Kelso in 1990 was horseracing’s biggest upset at 250-1. Wild Card Goran Ivanisevic winning the Wimbledon in 2001 was 150-1, as was Greece winning the 2004 European Championships. Elsewhere, India winning the 1983 Cricket World Cup was 66-1 and Buster Douglas beating Mike Tyson in 1990 was 42-1.
With this win The Foxes have secured sporting immortality. And a team assembled for less than £30 million (Dh160 million) and ranked fourth from bottom of the league in terms of squad value at the beginning of the season, have proven to all that impossible is nothing.
