Jamie Vardy hit with ‘substantial fine’ by Leicester over racist outburst

Leicester have handed striker Jamie Vardy a “substantial fine” and said he will take diversity awareness training after the England international was filmed using racist language in a casino.

A video emerged yesterday showing Vardy abusing a fellow gambler and calling him ”Jap” on three occasions. The incident is reported to have taken place in the early hours of July 26 and the 28-year-old has since apologised for a ”regrettable error in judgment”.

The Premier League club have been conducting their own investigation into what happened and in a statement last night announced they had dealt with the matter. The fine will be donated to local charities.

Earlier in the day Leicester manager Claudio Ranieri insisted Vardy would not be sacked as he fielded questions on the incident at his pre-match press conference, ahead of the trip to West Ham tomorrow.

Leicester are owned by the Thai Srivaddhanaprabha family and it is only a matter of weeks since they terminated the contracts of Tom Hopper, Adam Smith and James Pearson, son of former manager Nigel, for their conduct on a close-season tour of Thailand.

Ranieri was confident the same fate would not befall Vardy, which the later announcement confirmed.

Italian boss Ranieri said: “No. It is not my matter, but he won’t be (sacked). The situation is everything is okay, Jamie apologised to everyone, it was a mistake. The relationship is okay. We go on and forward. The club has said it is okay. James has apologised and for me it is okay.”