Conor Coady has offered one of the more candid assessments of Leicester City's struggles so far this season, suggesting that the problems at the King Power Stadium go considerably further than the current manager or the players in his squad.

Speaking on BBC Radio 5 Live's Monday Night Club, the former England international said the club had been "in transition too long" and that something "deep down" was wrong. That is a harder claim to dismiss than most, given Coady was actually there. He joined the Foxes from Wolves in 2023 and spent two seasons at the club before leaving for Wrexham, and he was unsparing in his self-assessment: "I was there, I felt it, I wasn't good enough when I was there. But there's got to be a deeper issue."

The context matters here. Leicester are 18th in League One after five matches, with five points, and were beaten 4-0 at home by Oxford United at the weekend. Three relegations in four seasons have left the club a long way from where it was, and Coady pointed to the loss of an identity that once made the King Power Stadium a formidable place to visit. He recalled squads containing players who made Leicester one of the hardest sides to face in the country. That identity, he argued, has been gradually eroded, and he acknowledged being part of the team during which it slipped further.

It is worth being measured about what five games in the third tier actually tells us. Four games is four games, and five is not much more. Russell Martin has been in charge for less than three months, and his record so far stands at two wins from seven competitive matches. That is not where the club needs to be, but it is a sample size that demands a degree of caution before drawing firm conclusions about the manager's tenure.

Coady himself made that point directly. "They've decided to bring Russell in, so you decide to tie your flag to the mast and go, 'right, we are going to go with this'," he said. "If they're going to make a decision after four or five games, there was no point in bringing Russell in because that's not the sort of manager he is." It is a reasonable argument: Martin's methods, built around a patient, possession-based approach, take time to embed. Southampton's promotion from the Championship under him did not happen overnight.

Observer football journalist Rory Smith, also on the programme, raised a separate but related concern: the lack of a coherent long-term strategy at the club. He pointed to the variety of managers Leicester have appointed in recent years and questioned whether the ownership has a clear idea of what the club should look like. The differing styles of those appointments, he suggested, do not point to any overarching footballing philosophy being driven from above.

That feeds into the wider picture. Leicester's owner has publicly acknowledged his own responsibility for the decline and has put the club on the market, with the asking price reported to be in excess of £200m. That uncertainty at the top of the structure is hardly ideal when a manager is trying to build something from the bottom up on the pitch.

Former Blackburn striker Chris Sutton added that Martin's reputation for possession football could become a burden if results do not improve soon. The perception, fair or otherwise, of his teams keeping the ball without cutting edge has followed him since his time at Southampton ended. At a club with Leicester's resources and ambitions in the third tier, patience from the stands will be limited if the performances do not shift.

What Coady's comments do is widen the frame of the conversation. The scrutiny on Martin is real and understandable, but if a player who was inside the dressing room during the decline is pointing to something structural, it would be naive to treat the current difficulties as purely a coaching problem. Whether the ownership sale changes anything, and how quickly, is another question entirely. For now, Leicester sit in the bottom half of League One and the run of fixtures will not wait for anyone to find answers.

Frequently asked

Why are Leicester City struggling in League One?
Former Leicester defender Conor Coady has suggested the issues go deeper than the current manager or playing squad, pointing to a loss of club identity and what he describes as a structural problem that has built over several seasons of decline.
Is Russell Martin's job safe at Leicester?
Russell Martin remains in charge at Leicester. Coady has argued that sacking Martin after just four or five games would be counterproductive given the time his possession-based style requires to take hold, though pressure is growing for results to improve.
Where are Leicester City in the League One table?
Leicester are 18th in League One after their opening five matches, having collected five points. A 4-0 home defeat to Oxford United at the weekend has deepened concerns about their start to the season.