Chairman negates Holloway story

There seems little or no chance that Ian Holloway will be appointed Leicester City manager this week, if at any time, despite today's News of the World prediction to that effect.

The NoW suggestion that QPR boss Holloway has told Leicester he would accept the job and that the club's have agreed compensation might just be true. But Holloway has not been offered the job.

Leicester City chairman Jim McCahill confirmed as much when he told BBC Sports that the club was 'still some way off making a decision', that consideration of the main candidates would continue through next week and that 'Rob Kelly is still under consideration'.

He wouldn't have said that if the post had been offered to anyone and Mike Newell offered support to the chairman's comments by saying that although he had spoken with Leicester, no job offer had been made and therefore he didn't have to think about any decision.

All that suggests Leicester are properly interviewing main candidates, finding out what the compensatory damage might be if any candidate were invited to do the job and getting indications of who might be prepared to accept if an offer were made.

Logically, judging by the generally positive reaction of fans, Mike Newell would be ahead of Ian Holloway in the Board's list of preferences but all the time interviews are being conducted, Rob Kelly and Mike Stowell are winning matches and saving Leicester's season.

Indeed McCahill mentions that thought was being given to Kelly continuing his work 'perhaps with the help of an experienced coach or manager'

My current assessment therefore is that Newell remains the main man and would be a fairly popular choice among many fans but that many fans are so pleased with Kelly's performance that they would like him to be part of the new set up whatever it is.

With that in mind, were Newell to reject any offer, it could well be that the Board go with Kelly until the end of the season considering that Steve Cotterill (Burnley) has ruled himself out and Ian Holloway would not seem to be particularly popular with City supporters as a potential manager, especially if he were to displace the caretakers.

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