The world was watching: How Leo Ulloa coped with the pressure after Jamie Vardy's red card

Now the former Albion favourite has told The Argus how he coped with being the main man in attack as Leicester City looked to steady their title nerves.

The Argentinean, who failed with both the penalties he took for the Seagulls, has also revealed how the spot-kick he buried in the last minute of a key 2-2 draw with West Ham was possibly the easiest of his career.

Ulloa is relaxing back in Patagonia after helping the Foxes to their incredible 5,000-1 title success two years after leaving the Amex. He accepts he had to learn to live with a back-up role under Claudio Ranieri as Vardy’s goals led the way to the crown.

But, on a tense afternoon in April, Ulloa was suddenly centre stage when Vardy was red-carded against the Hammers.

The heat was on Ulloa after Jamie Vardy was sent-off for this alleged dive 

It was the first sign of the serious wobble many had been expecting from Leicester all season, especially when West Ham went 2-1 up late on at a stunned King Power Stadium.

Then Ulloa guided home a penalty, deep in added time, which was worth a point to the tally but much more than that in reassuring the Foxes faithful that it wasn’t all going horribly wrong.

He told The Argus: “It was a big moment for Leicester and for me but I didn’t feel pressure in that moment. Normally when I take a penalty I have a little nervous feeling before shooting. That penalty was completely different to normal.

“I don’t know why but my mind shut it out. I felt nothing at all. When I took the penalty, I wasn’t even thinking how important the goal was. But then, afterwards, when I’d scored, I really started to think. When I heard the whole stadium and my team-mates came to me, I just thought ‘Wow!’.

Ulloa converts his late penalty against West Ham

“It was a really important goal – but before that I wasn’t at all nervous. I just didn’t think too much about it.”

Still Vardy was in hot water, ultimately being handed a two-game ban, and second-placed Spurs were flying with a 4-0 win at Stoke. By this time there was no hiding place. The massive turnouts at press conferences, the gatherings of TV cameras from around the globe and the requests for interviews hammered home to Ulloa that the Leicester story had, as they say, gone viral.

All those millions would be watching him next time out at home to Swansea, knowing Tottenham were suddenly developing a real head of steam.

Ulloa has always maintained he might never have come to Europe, signing for Castellon in Spain as a youngster, were it not for the support of his wife Maria Sol. So he knew exactly who he needed to talks things over with.

Ulloa has not always been deadly from the spot, as Albion fans know

They went home and discussed the days of high scrutiny which they knew were to come.

“Everyone – and I mean everyone – said ‘Now we need to see Leo’,” he recalled. “I went home that night and we talked about it and my wife asked me what I thought because everyone was depending on me.

“Yes, I knew that in the newspapers, TV, social media, everyone spoke about the Vardy red card and about me.

“I said to my wife ‘I’ve played football for 24 or 25 years. I’ve enjoyed every single day when I’ve been on the pitch with the ball. It’s one game more and I need to do the same as I have for 24 years’. I didn’t feel that pressure.

“I thought ‘It’s my opportunity, I need to play well, I need to score if I can but I need to enjoy this game’.”

The result was a two-goal performance which helped brush aside Swansea 4-0 and apply scoreboard pressure on their rivals.

When Tottenham then dropped points to West Brom, it became a matter of when, not if, Leicester would be champions.

Ulloa celebrates his first goal against Swansea in Vardy's absence

But when did the team think they could do it? For Ulloa, the moment of realisation actually came after a defeat – the last-gasp 2-1 reverse with ten men at Arsenal.

He reckoned he saw a performance of would-be champions that Sunday afternoon at the Emirates and in three previous matches.

“When we took nine points from 12 against Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City and Arsenal, I thought we would win the title,” he said.

“After these four consecutive games, I thought ‘This team is tough’. “I started to think ‘We want to win and the big teams need to win’.

“I think that was the big difference between them and us.

“We really fought hard in the last of those four games, at Arsenal. I didn’t play but it was an unbelievable effort. I saw my team-mates fight for every ball, every tackle.

“We had one player less and, if it was 11 against 11, we win that game. After that, I thought ‘This team is so, so strong’.”

The big doubt over Ulloa in terms of Premier League football was always his pace but he has been quick enough to get out on counter raids as he learns a new way of playing under Ranieri.

He said: “The intensity here is different (to Championship football with Albion), the team-mates are different, the league is different. I like to learn every day. This year I’ve had another role.

"I’ve had to learn to defend more than before. This season I’ve spent the year on counter-attacks. I’ve been running diagonals, more than ever.

“But, when I came to Brighton from Almeria, I learned a lot there too because it was a different intensity to Almeria.”

The party was pretty intense too – for a while.

Ulloa was one of the Leicester players pictured celebrating at Vardy’s house after watching Chelsea draw 2-2 with Spurs to end the London rivals’ title hopes.

“Jamie was a good host,” Ulloa said. “When the game finished we had 15 or 20 minutes of incredible euphoria. Then it subsided. I saw my team-mates going quiet, relaxing, like they were trying to assimilate what we had just done.

“We must have been there a long time because there were so many people at the gates when we came to leave.”

So what now – for Ulloa, Leicester and, indeed Vardy, the man wanted by Arsenal?

Foxes midfielder Andy King admitted this week it would be a long transfer window as members of the title-winning team are targeted.

Ulloa, clearly, wants them all to stay. He is relishing the chance to play in the Champions League.

But he will insist his team stay grounded when it comes to setting pre-season goals. And he knows his inspirational manager will do the same.

He said: “I have two more years here and I’ve never played in the Champions League. I think it is the most beautiful competition and Esteban Cambiasso and other players spoke to me about the Champions League.

“We need to keep the team, all the players. This is the group. If we sell some players now, it is difficult for the future. But for us it starts with the Premier League.

“Everyone is thinking about the Champions League but maybe we forget about the Premier League, which is the most important thing.

“We need to keep our place in the Premier League and, after that, fight in the Champions League and enjoy that.

“It sounds so strange because the fans and players might think it is difficult now for Leicester to go down – but it is never difficult. If you save all the attention for the Champions League, you forget the Premier League.

“For that, our objective this year has to be to keep Premier League status. Don’t go down. That probably sounds like what Claudio Ranieri would say – but he knows that even better than me!”