Rejecting Arsenal for Leicester was easy, says Vardy

Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy has revealed it was easy for him to reject an offer from Arsenal and stay at the reigning English Premier League (EPL) champions as both his "head and heart" wanted him to stay with Leicester.

Vardy played a starring role in Leicester's fairytale run to their maiden EPL title last season. He was offered a lucrative offer by Arsenal during the off-season and had travelled with the England squad to the European Championship in France last June with his future still unresolved.

The 29-year-old revealed that he gave a lot of thought to the matter between training sessions with the England squad at their Euro 2016 base in Chantilly before decing to reject Arsenal's offer.

"I was in a hotel room [in Chantilly] for so many hours of every day with nothing to do. You had a lot of time on your hands. I am not going to beat around the bush -- every time I thought about it, and every aspect of it I thought about, both my head and my heart were saying to stay at Leicester, which is why I made my decision to stay," Vardy was quoted as saying by the Guardian on Saturday.

"There were loads of reasons. You get that much time to think about, every single thing down to the tea lady. You think about what might happen, what might not. Where you could be, where not. Every time I thought about every little thing, though, both head and heart were saying 'you need to stay'. I could see people's point when they assumed I would go, but, deep down, if you don't think it's right for you, you don't do it. It's as simple as that," he added.

"In my professional life, it was the hardest decision I've ever had to make, but I haven't been a professional for that long. It was hard, but it was actually an easy decision to make."

The striker asserted that Leicester's successful run to the EPL title last season was no fluke and is confident that the club will do their best to defend their title.

"Leicester have been on the rise for a while now and will keep doing that. Look at the deals they did in the transfer window: they obviously want to keep it going. And, if it does keep going, I want to be part of that. I've been there from when I was at Fleetwood Town, five years ago, when we were in the Championship and we have gone up and up and up," Vardy said.

"We are a group of brothers and lots of the lads have signed long-term deals now, which the gaffer wanted. To only lose [N'Golo] Kante from a Premier League-winning team is not that bad, so hopefully it will carry on. That is something I want to be part of."

--IANS

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