I would say **no**, semicolons are not appropriate here.  [Semicolons are used to separate what would be independent sentences][1], and the reasons here are logically separate, but not grammatically.  For example, it wouldn't make sense to say

> I wanted Leicester to win the league because they were underdogs.  The other teams had spent more money.  I like the city of Leicester.

All of those are grammatically correct sentences on their own, but they don't mean the same thing when separated - that is, they're *syntactically* correct this way, but not *semantically* correct.  It's actually not a comma splice because they function as list elements, not really independent clauses.


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But, you might say, [don't we use semicolons to separate list elements][2]?  Yes, but only when the list elements themselves contain commas.  For example, this is unclear:

> Present were Mr. Jones, the head of the choir, Theodora, and myself.

Are there four people here (Mr. Jones / the head of the choir / Theodora / me) or three?  And if there are three, which one is the head of the choir, Mr. Jones or Theodora?  Using semicolons to separate the list elements would make that clear.

But your list elements don't contain any commas themselves, so it isn't necessary to use a semicolon to disambiguate them.

  [1]: http://www.bristol.ac.uk/arts/exercises/grammar/grammar_tutorial/page_05.htm
  [2]: http://www.grammar-monster.com/lessons/semicolons_in_lists.htm