29 Oct 2018
Leicester City chair Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha confirmed dead in helicopter crash
BY Tom Walker
English Premier League club Leicester City has confirmed the death of its owner and chair, Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha.
Srivaddhanaprabha died with four others in a helicopter crash shortly after Leicester City's game against West Ham United on Saturday night.
The Thai billionaire – owner of the King Power duty free business – bought Leicester City in 2010 for around £39m, when it was languishing in the bottom half of the English Championship.
Since then he has invested a considerable chunk of his personal wealth into the club, transforming its fortunes.
In 2016, Srivaddhanaprabha and his ownership team – which also includes his son Aiyawatt Srivaddhanaprabha – pulled off one of the biggest upsets in the history of professional sport when Leicester were crowned Premier League champions against odds of 5,000-1.
Earlier this year, Srivaddhanaprabha announced plans to expand the club's King Power Stadium, committing his future to Leicester.
He had also secured planning permission for a brand new training ground that will cost upwards of £100m.
"It is with the deepest regret and a collective broken heart that we confirm our chair, Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha, was among those to have tragically lost their lives on Saturday evening when a helicopter carrying him and four other people crashed outside King Power Stadium," a statement from the club said.
"The world has lost a great man. A man of kindness, of generosity and a man whose life was defined by the love he devoted to his family and those he so successfully led. Leicester City was a family under his leadership. It is as a family that we will grieve his passing and maintain the pursuit of a vision for the Club that is now his legacy."
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