Steve Walsh is responsible for a number of Leicester City’s most successful signings in recent times.
Walsh, who was Leicester’s chief scout and assistant manager to Nigel Pearson and Claudio Ranieri, unearthed the likes of Jamie Vardy and Riyad Mahrez.
Vardy was brought in from then non-league side Fleetwood Town whilst Mahrez joined from French second-division outfit Le Harve.
Walsh also led the drive to sign N’Golo Kante from Caen in 2015 and that became another terrific signing to add to his ever-growing list of successful recruits.
That said, here is the remarkable story of how the Leicester chief signed Kante.
Steve Walsh wouldn’t let N’Golo Kante leave the training ground until he signed for Leicester City
Steve Walsh revealed he almost had to force N’Golo Kante to sign a deal and effectively locked him at Leicester’s training ground to push through the deal.
“When I first saw him [for Caen] I thought ‘Is there two of him?’ He was everywhere,” the former Leicester chief said.
“He wanted to go to Marseilles. Leicester? He didn’t know where Leicester was. We had to almost kidnap him.
“I had friends in France bring him over. His primary agent didn’t even know he was there.” Walsh instructed Kante to switch off his mobile phone and didn’t allow him to leave until he’d penned a contract.
Claudio Ranieri was sceptical about signing Kante
Walsh also added that Ranieiri wasn’t really convinced about Kante due to his size.
“Claudio kept saying, ‘He’s not big enough. Why do I want Kante?’ I said, ‘I’m telling you.'”
Walsh was able to ware down Ranieiri, though, for the first few weeks of the season, Kante didn’t play much and when he did, he was shoved out wide on the left.
It didn’t take long for the Italian boss to realise his best position was in the middle of the park and from there on, the little Frenchman became one of the most influential players in the team.
Kante only stayed at Leicester for 12 months before moving to Chelsea in a £32m deal, where he would win the Premier League, Champions League and Europa League.