5 things you probably didn't know about Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy

Jamie Vardy is currently the Premier League’s top goalscorerHow many people had bet on Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy to be the Premier League top scorer at this stage of the season when the 2015/16 season got underway in early August this year? His name was surely not even considered in a league replete with high-profile forwards such as Sergio Aguero and Diego Costa. Even Harry Kane would have been the first English forward to come up in such discussions.12 games into the season, Vardy is the only player to get into double digits so far with 12 goals. The next best players are five goals behind in the charts. In a bizarre start to the season, Aguero has been injured, Costa has struggled and Kane has only just found his form again. Meanwhile, the 28-year-old striker has even set a record for most consecutive EPL matches scored in by an Englishman, now chasing Ruud van Nistelrooy’s record of 10 games.But who exactly is Vardy and where did he come from to light up the Premier League and even get an England call-up?

#1 Jamie Vardy almost gave up on football at 15

When Vardy was a teenager, he was doing what every talented kid dreaming of playing professional football was doing. Playing at an esteemed academy. Born in Sheffield, England, young Jamie was enrolled in the Sheffield Wednesday academy.

But he was in for a rude shock when he turned 15. The club decided he was just too short to have a successful career in football and they eventually released him from the academy.

Vardy took it hard. It was a huge and disappointing blow to a youngster who chased big dreams. For him, it seemed like the end and he stopped playing football altogether.

“Sheffield Wednesday were the club I’d supported all my life,” Vardy had said, according to The Guardian. “That was the lowest moment for me, real heartache, and what made it even worse was that I had a growth spurt literally a month after I was released. All of a sudden, I shot up a good 20 centimetres out of nowhere.”

It would take another eight months before Vardy decided to give football another go. But it wasn’t at any fancy club or academy – it was, instead, for a local team which took part in Sunday League football (amateur level competitions in the UK) at the park.

He would eventually play for non-league side Stocksbridge Park Steels’ youth team and earn a modest £30 a week. “I’d never earned anything through football before so I was happy to get that,” Vardy said when he was questioned about his past.

#2 Vardy was a factory worker in his younger days

While most of the players his age were trying out for clubs or even being named in England squads for Euros and World Cups, Vardy was playing football more as a hobby than for the money.

Vardy’s family wasn’t exactly wealthy. His father was a crane worker while his mother was employed at a solicitors. Studies could never come to his rescue, and so he worked in a factory that made medical prosthetics where workers lifted carbon fibre pieces which were quite heavy, definitely too heavy for a young adult to lift.

“My job involved making splints for disabled people, but we had to do a lot of lifting into hot ovens and continually lifting things hundreds of times a day was damaging my back.”

That was all Vardy could manage. It wasn’t that he wanted to, but because he had to to make ends meet.

#3 Vardy couldn\'t play away games because of a criminal record

Ankle monitor (Photo for representational purpose only)

There was a time when Vardy got himself into trouble after he got involved in a fight. The result? Vardy had to wear an ankle monitor on him at all times.

“I was out with a friend who wore a hearing aid and two other lads thought it would be funny to start mocking him and attacking him. I’m not proud of what I did but defended him, which I’d always do for a mate, and it ended up getting me in a bit of trouble.”

This meant that he couldn’t leave the town and had to be back by six o’ clock every evening or risk breaking curfew.

“If the away games were too far, I could only play an hour and then there was a rush to get me back. It was a case of hope that we were winning, take me off and straight in the car. That was for six months.”

It wasn’t until he was 23 years old that he finally got his break...

#4 Vardy has won the Player of the Year award several times

Vardy’s first real break was in 2010 when he played for FC Halifax Town – a club that plays in the fifth tier of the English football pyramid. Their manager Neil Aspin had seen Vardy play and decided to sign him up. Vardy never looked back.

Former teammate Gareth Seddon summed it up in The Guardian: “At first some of the lads were like: ‘Why have we signed this lad? From a few leagues below?’ Then, in his first game, he was unbelievable. And we were just: ‘That’s the reason he signed!’ I’ve never played with anyone as quick, I’ve been a professional for 18 years – he kind of glides across the pitch.”

In his first season at the club, he went on to score 27 goals and finish the season as the club’s top goalscorer. That campaign also saw him voted as the Players’ Player of the Season. He was in such red hot form that he almost grabbed a hat-trick of hat-tricks, managing just a brace in the third game.

Vardy fired the club to the Northern Premier League title and soon a move to Fleetwood Town materialised at the start of the 2011/12 season. In that season, Vardy exceeded expectations. The striker grabbed two hat-tricks that saw him finish the season with 34 goals in all competitions (31 in the Conference Premier League).

Fleetwood would win the title and gain their first ever promotion to the English Football League (where the lowest tier is League Two). Again, he was voted the Players’ Player of the Season. Vardy was on the rise.

#5 Vardy was the most expensive non-League transfer

Soon, the big time came calling. Then Blackpool manager Ian Holloway had made a bid to sign Vardy in January 2012 by offering Fleetwood £750,000 for his services. Fleetwood rejected the deal and asked for not only £1 million but a loan back to the club so Vardy could finish the season.

Ultimately, Vardy would join Leicester City before the 2012/13 season for a fee of £1 million – a non-league record. Although he did have an indifferent first season and didn’t react well to criticism from the fans, then-manager Nigel Pearson convinced him to stay with the Foxes.

Vardy turned it around in the 2013/14 season and helped Leicester City gain promotion to the Premier League with 16 goals that season. Again, he was voted the Players’ Player of the Season.

The striker then announced himself to the world at the start of the 2014/15 season in a thrilling Premier League encounter at the King Power Stadium when Manchester United lost 5-3 after initially leading 3-1. Vardy scored once and assisted three goals as Louis van Gaal’s men were put to the sword.

The rest, as they say, is history.