It wasn’t just Leicester fans smiling as the team lifted their first ever FA Cup

With fans back at Wembley, victory was even sweeter for the Foxes, writes Ben Burrows, on a day packed with emotion for the club and for English football in general

Match-winner Youri Tielemans, front centre, celebrates with team mates (Getty)

Whether a Leicester fan or not, it was impossible for most not to smile as the Foxes finally lifted the FA Cup for the first time.

The win, at the fifth attempt after four losing finals, was painted by many as one for the “other 14” in the wake of the rise and dramatic fall of the European Super League, the failed venture Saturday's opponents Chelsea were one of the architects of.

Leicester, backed by billionaires like so many at the very top of the modern game, are not a fairy tale in a traditional sense, of course.

This was no Wimbledon’s Crazy Gang or Ronnie Radford against Newcastle; but it was nonetheless refreshing to see the cup lifted by a team who so clearly wanted to win it after so many years of big clubs using the world's oldest cup competition for rest and rotation in favour of bigger prizes.

For Leicester, 5,000-1 winners of the biggest prize in English football back in 2016, it also held greater meaning, too.

The club and their fans have always held Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha close to their hearts – and will do so forever, having lost him so tragically in a helicopter crash back in 2018.

“He is always with us,” captain Kasper Schmeichel said afterwards, before revealing there was a picture of the late owner's face on the inside of all of the players' shirts.

Schmeichel would go on to bring Khun Top on to the pitch to celebrate with the team before he lifted the trophy himself and pointed to a banner of his late father in the stands.

That there were fans in those stands made it all the more special, too.

More than 21,000 were welcomed back for English football's showpiece game; and the wall of noise that greeted Youri Tielemans's stunning winner crashing into the back of the net was long-missed.

Even the howls of anguish at Ben Chilwell's equaliser being denied by VAR at the death was something to be savoured, for those who haven't heard such emotion in so long.

It felt like a special occasion again, a day to remember for Leicester but also for football, too.