Burnley
Blackburn Rovers
Coventry City
Derby County
Leeds United
Luton Town
Middlesbrough
Millwall
Norwich City
Portsmouth
Sheffield Wednesday
Sheffield United
QPR
Charlton Athletic and Leicester City face each other for the first time in 11 years this season, and Addicks fans will remember their last game against the Foxes for all the wrong reasons.
A lot has changed for both sides since their last meeting in March 2014. Leicester won the Premier League title in 2016 and have won the FA Cup, as well as the Championship title twice. Now, Leicester are dealing with the threat of a points deduction and have lost a number of their players, including Jamie Vardy.
The south Londoners, meanwhile, were relegated to League One again while Leicester became champions of England, and have only had one campaign back in the second tier between then and now. Now, they have finally made their return after winning promotion via the third tier play-offs.
Charlton have only just pulled themselves out of the many ownership issues that were emerging the last time they played at Leicester, and their most recent trip there marked the final league game in charge for a club legend.
Chris Powell faced Leicester in last league game before sacking
Former Charlton defender and fan favourite – and ex-Leicester star – Chris Powell managed the Addicks from 2011 to 2014.
He led them to win the League One title in his first full season in charge in 2011/12 before guiding the south London club to a ninth place finish in the Championship. It was in January 2014, three years after Powell’s return to The Valley as manager, that Roland Duchatelet bought the club.
The Belgian businessman’s ownership marked a dark time for the Addicks, with the new chief selling star players including ex-Bournemouth striker Yann Kermorgant, marking the first of a long list of terrible decisions. Duchatelet, who also owned Standard Liege, wanted his loaned players to be part of Powell’s match day plans, but the Charlton boss resisted.
The former England international’s final league game in charge came in the form of a 3-0 loss at Leicester, before he stood in the Addicks’ dug out for the final time in a 2-0 defeat to Sheffield United in the FA Cup quarter-final. Duchatelet cited Charlton being bottom of the table when explaining his decision, but there was much more to the story than that.
- READ MORE – Leicester City can take inspiration from 2014 win vs Sheffield Wednesday to realise promotion dream
The King Power will always remind Addicks supporters of that final league game for Powell, both when mourning the proper chance he should have been given at Charlton, but also as the trigger point for many fans who later protested against the owner.
Despite the sad ending, Powell has carried on loving Charlton since his departure, and he was soon snapped up elsewhere.
What happened to Chris Powell after his Charlton sacking?
Powell’s managerial career was far from over after the heartbreaking end to his time at The Valley.
The former West Ham player, who was Leicester caretaker manager before his time with the Addicks, went on to take charge of Huddersfield and Southend.
He was also Derby’s caretaker manager in 2016, going from being assistant coach to Nigel Pearson to taking temporary charge when his boss was suspended. He was assistant again after Steve McClaren took charge, but left when the ex-England boss was sacked.
Powell got a role as a coach in Gareth Southgate’s England set up, serving for four years including during Euro 2020 and the 2022 World Cup.
His most recent job was as assistant coach to Danny Rohl at Sheffield Wednesday, joining the club in October 2023 upon the German’s arrival, and quickly became loved at the club.
Powell left Hillsborough this summer, with the club descending into chaos and fan protest against Dejphon Chansiri.
In a recent interview, Powell described the Yorkshire outfit as the ‘most dysfunctional’ club he’s worked for – which is saying something, given his experience in South East London.