Fox hunt
Adams has brought in the equivalent of a new team for the club's return to the top flight and still spent less than Russian billionaire Roman manages to get through before breakfast. Adams has added his 11 players for less than £6.5million, and that's including fees and wages. Leicester make no bones about being cash-strapped and the manager admitted: "I have been given a budget for the season and that will be it for the whole campaign, so whatever business I do now will have to last the full term."
But just making the Premiership is a major achievement for Adams and the club after a season in Division One that could have been scripted for a soap opera.
Dumped out of the Premiership after a disappointing reign under manager Dave Bassett, Adams stepped up from being his assistant and was given strict orders to take the club straight back up.
Reclaiming their place in the Premiership would have been a difficult assignment for the new boss, but then he was walloped by two major disasters.
The trouble started before the season had even kicked off when Dennis Wise fractured team-mate Callum Davidson's jaw during a game of cards on a pre-season tour of Finland. Wise tried vainly to smooth things over and said the incident had been blown out of proportion, only for the club to terminate his contract after much soul-searching and legal discussion.
In a drawn-out and painful saga that was splashed over the back pages on an almost daily basis, the former Chelsea star took the matter to the Football League's Football Disciplinary Commission, which ruled that Leicester could only fine the player and not fire him.
But City then took the case to the League's Appeals Committee, which ruled in the club's favour after a six-hour hearing.
Wise then tried to sue the club in a £2.3 million wrongful dismissal case in October, but lost and was off-loaded to Millwall. But the end of that sorry story was only a small chink of light in a gloomy month for the club and just four days later, City went into administration owing debts of £30million following their move to their new £35million Walkers Stadium home.
The club was in desperate straits, but the controversial decision to go into administration meant Adams could stick by the squad that was relegated and hang on to crown jewels like Turkey international midfielder Muzzy Izzet, defensive kingpin Matt Elliott and keeper Ian Walker, while other relegated clubs like Ipswich and Derby were forced to sell to survive their drop from the Premiership.
The manager and his stars even agreed to defer some of their wages until the end of the season to keep the club afloat, but on the pitch, things got better and better.
By the end of the year, the club's accountants were left hoping for a miracle even though Micky's magic had lifted Leicester into second place in the Division, eight points clear of Sheffield United.
Despite all the off-the-field troubles, Adams had managed to lead his team to 18 victories with just five defeats and six draws. The traumas seemed to be taking their toll as the team slipped in January, but the Foxes were handed a massive boost in February when Leicester legend Gary Lineker rode to the rescue.
He headed a takeover consortium of businessmen to raise the £4million needed to take the club out of administration. The effect on the club and the city of Leicester couldn't have been bettered if they had won the European Cup.
Long-time league leaders Portsmouth started to wobble and it began to look as though Leicester would go up as champions, though in the end, they were happy enough to settle for the second automatic promotion spot.
Despite all the frantic wheeling and dealing in personnel, arguably the best bit of business undertaken by the club has been the shackling Adams to a new three-year contract. He's one of the rising stars of management and at around £500,000 a year, he's costing the club dearly. But they've also made sure there's a hefty compensation clause written in the new deal in case he is headhunted by the bigger clubs (expect Spurs to make a bid for him if Glenn Hoddle doesn't get off to a flier).
It was always on the cards that Leicester would struggle badly once Martin O'Neill left for Celtic, but Adams is from the same mould and the desperate fans have wasted no time in celebrating a new saviour.
LIKE O'Neill, he expects his players to give 100% to him and to each other and like O'Neill, he has moulded a team of workers, with few stars or egos to worry about. And like the Celtic boss, he is brutally realistic about his squad which is why he's been involved in football's version of Supermarket Sweep.
His recruits include Premiership veterans nearing the end of their careers like Les Ferdinand from West Ham, Steve Howey (Manchester City) and Craig Hignett (just about everybody, but more recently, Blackburn); those who have never quite established themselves at the top like Ben Thatcher, John Curtis and the mercurial Keith Gillespie; and those who you just say 'who?' to such as French duo Lilian Nalis and Nicolas Priet and former Brighton winger Paul Brooker.
Adams has only opened his wallet to pay £250,000 for Howey and almost £500,000 for Thatcher (who cost former Tottenham manager George Graham £5million three years ago). Only time will tell if he has pulled off the coup of all time, but the one thing they all have in common is that they all have a point to prove.
They all want to show that they're Premiership players and that is the ace up Adams' sleeve (actually, it's his only ace).
He said: "I was very aware of the fact that I needed to attract players with Premiership experience. Some managers worry about experience, but you can still get the best out of players who others might say are coming to the end of their playing days and improve them."
Ferdinand, 37 in December, escaped the wreckage of West Ham to join the Foxes for what looks like being his last season as a player and insists he wants to end his career with Leicester still in the Premiership.
He feels rejuvenated by his move up the M1 and wants to repay the favour.
"To be honest, I feel like a kid again. It's a new start for me, even at this late stage of my playing career and I couldn't be more excited."
'Sir' Les is rightly proud of his achievements in a career that has seen him claim 17 England caps and net the 10,000th Premiership goal and claim third place behind Alan Shearer and Andy Cole as the third highest scorer in the top flight with 137 goals. But, like everyone else at the club, he is under no illusions about what they will face over the next 10 months: "We're not saying we will be a top six side straight after coming up.
"But the players here have had a taste of relegation as I had last season and none of us wants to go through that again."
It is telling that four of the new signings are defenders (Howey, Thatcher, Curtis and Priet), while Riccardo Scimeca and Nalis have been brought in to stiffen up midfield.
Adams fears the onslaught from international stars like Thierry Henry, Alan Shearer, Ruud Van Nistelrooy, Michael Owen, Damien Duff and others and admits: "We're facing teams who have spent millions and millions on world-class players and one thing we do not have is a world-class player. We have to cope with that, I hope we can."
Curtis is desperate to kick-start his career back into life after spending the past year and a half on the sidelines at Blackburn, but realises it is going to be a long, tough season.
He said: "I think any of the promoted teams would take 17th place and we're no different."
The bookies and many big-name pundits have already made them favourites to freefall out of the Premiership and already the match at Bolton on December 28 looks like a relegation six-pointer. But then, O'Neill's side were tagged favourites for the drop on more than one occasion and in five seasons from 1996 to 2001, the lowest finish for the Foxes was 13th.
But Adams doesn't care about comparisons and knows exactly what to expect starting on August 16.
"I know we will be underdogs in the Premiership, but I regard that as a challenge and the one thing I'm not afraid of is a challenge.
"We are the bookmaker's favourites to go down, but if we stay up it will be a tremendous achievement."
While Chelsea amass a Roman legion of stars, Adams has collected a rag-tag army given little chance by most people.
But miracles have been worked before at Leicester and if Adams can keep them in the Premiership it would equal anything O'Neill achieved.
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