Pearson targets league title

Leicester City manager Nigel Pearson has targeted the Championship title now that promotion back to the Premier League has been sealed.

Pearson’s charges, who beat Sheffield Wednesday 2-1 on Friday, got the set of results they needed for promotion to be confirmed on Saturday as QPR and Derby County both lost.

That brought to an end the club’s 10-year exile from England’s top flight and Pearson wants his side to enjoy the achievement without taking their eye of the challenge of winning the title.

“I think it’s important to enjoy it of course, but we have six games left,” the City boss said. “To secure promotion with six games left is a very good achievement for us, but if you speak to the players they would say they want to finish the job off now and finish with as many points as possible.

“It would be nice to win the title, that’s what we’ll try and do now. We’re delighted.

“We want to get the preparation as correct as possible. That’s not to say the players won’t enjoy themselves but hopefully there’ll be a freedom in the knowledge that the outcome we were looking for, to gain promotion, we’ve achieved that.

“Of course we want to go that one step further now. It is important to enjoy it, but we have to get our minds back on the job for tomorrow (Saturday’s home match against Brighton and Hove Albion).

“We want to try and win as many games as we can. We’ve put an awful lot of work in, not just over this season but over a long period of time. It’s not as if it’s job done now, it’s about the next chapter.”

Promotion eased the pain of last year’s play-off semi-final failure, when Anthony Knockaert’s missed penalty was followed by Troy Deeney’s late winner that sent Watford to Wembley at Leicester’s expense.