Leicester City players pay respects at owner's Thai funeral

Leicester City players attended the funeral for club chairman Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha, killed in a helicopter crash a week ago, at a Bangkok temple on Sunday on the second day of a ceremony due to last one week.

Players and officials of the English Premier League club Leicester City arrive at a Buddhist temple to participate in the funeral rituals of Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha in Bangkok, Thailand, Sunday, November 4, 2018.
AP

Players and officials of the English Premier League club Leicester City arrive at a Buddhist temple to participate in the funeral rituals of Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha in Bangkok, Thailand, Sunday, November 4, 2018.

Leicester City manager Claude Puel led his football team's players as they arrived on Sunday at a Bangkok temple to pay their respects to the club's late owner.

Thai billionaire Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha was killed when his helicopter crashed October 27 in a parking lot next to the English Premier League club's stadium.

His funeral began on Saturday, with other ceremonies scheduled through November 9.

The Leicester City players arrived on Sunday after travelling to Bangkok following their match with Cardiff City the day before. In its first game since Vichai's death, Leicester won an emotional and highly charged match 1-0.

Vichai oversaw one of the greatest underdog successes in sports when his 5,000-1 outsiders won the English Premier League title in 2016.

The business world remembers Vichai as the retail entrepreneur who grew Thailand's massive King Power duty-free chain. Today the King Power empire is worth $4.88 billion, according to Forbes, with Vichai having been the fifth-richest person in Thailand.

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