Pain of relegation is not going away

It´s more than a week since we were relegated and it hasn´t begun to stop hurting yet. And it´s not like you can get away from it either because every time you turn on the TV or look at a paper you are reminded.

It´s not like I´m trying to avoid the responsibility, but it will be nice when I can just switch off and put what has happened behind us.

We really lost it when we were 1-0 up against Sheffield Wednesday the previous week and ended up losing 3-1. That was a terrible result and we should definitely have gone on to win that game. We then threw everything at Stoke in the last game, but just couldn´t score.

To be honest that has been our problem – putting the ball in the back of the net. Against Bristol City we had something like 20 shots, ten on target, and it ended 0-0. That was symptomatic of the season.

As a striker I have to take a lot of that responsibility on my shoulders and I do. But as a team I think we are all aware that things haven´t gone as well as they could given the talent that is here.

When I arrived here I looked around and was convinced that we had more than a decent enough squad to survive. I thought it would be no time before we were pushing on and securing a decent mid-table position. On paper there is no way we should have gone down.

The boss was devastated at the end. He was actually lost for words and if you know Ian Holloway you know how bad he must have been feeling. So far it looks like the chairman is sticking with him and I hope that continues. I´ve spoken to a number of people in and around the club and they are all saying that what we need is a bit of stability.

But now we have to start planning for next year. League One will be very tough and very physical but we have to harden ourselves to the task. We should never have gone down, so now we have to believe we are more than good enough to come straight back up.

I don´t have any worries about the physical side of it and we all know that we´ll have to adapt a bit, while not totally abandoning our style of play. We are going to be one of the sides that everybody will want to beat and so we know that every game will be like a cup final. That´s good because it will keep us on our toes.

We have some quality young players and obviously there will now be a lot of speculation as to whether we can hang on to them. It´s important that we do that and make it clear that our only intention is an immediate return to the Championship.

Right now I´m going to get away to America with my family and just draw a line under last season. But already I´m eager to get back and start putting things right at Leicester. We know there is huge disappointment at what has happened, but all we can do is try to turn that around and everyone is determined to do that. We believe that this time next year we will have totally different feelings to the ones we are suffering now and I just pray the fans stick by us and believe in us as well.