Jim's column 8.3.14

Last Sunday's 0-0 draw at home to Shrewsbury was a very rare occurrence - the first goal-less draw in a Coventry league game since 17 March 2012.  That day Andy Thorn's side grabbed a point at Watford to end a dreadful sequence of 10 away defeats stretching back to October 2011 and kept their first clean sheet on the road of what was a dire season that culminated in relegation from the Championship. Of the side that won a point at Vicarage Road only Joe Murphy & Jordan Clarke are still at the club. The last home game to end  0-0 before Sunday was also against Watford, earlier in the same season.

Sunday's clean sheet was the first that City have kept in 16 league games -since the 3-0 home win over Notts County in early November. When I checked the records I realised that it was the club's worst run without a clean sheet for thirty years. Between Christmas 1983 and August 1984 Bobby Gould's team failed to keep a clean sheet for 22 league games. The worst run in the club's league history is 23 set in the 1956-57 Division Three South season.

On Wednesday evening the Sky Blues got back to winning ways with a 2-1 victory over Walsall. Callum Wilson was back on the score-sheet after his two-month absence and netted his 15^th league goal of the season to draw level with Leon Clarke in the scoring charts. This is the first season for 35 years that two Coventry players have netted 15 league goals (Ian Wallace & Mick Ferguson were the last in 1977-78). Callum is now one goal short of McGoldrick's 16 league goals last season which was the best haul by a City player since Dion Dublin's 18 in the Premiership in 1997-98, and on the evidence of Wednesday night's performance looks well capable of smashing that record.

Following my piece about the origin of the Bantams nickname used by the club from 1908 and 1962 I had several readers give me their view. Graham Smith, author of Sky Blue Heaven, wrote: 'Regarding the Bantams nickname, I can add some detail to how it came about. When I was researching my book "Sky Blue Heaven" at Coventry library in the Evening Telegraph archives, I found the sequence of articles that led to the name.

To summarise, as you said, in 1908, "Nemo" invited ideas for a club nickname. There was a suggestion "that the three geese that promenade themselves about at Highfield Road would make a good mascot."

On November 7, 1908 a reader from Berry Street offered the name "The Bantams" saying "it is a good sporting name and judging by the weight and physique of the Southern League teams...City are surely the lightweights...Perhaps one of our fur and feather supporters will be kind enough to present a bantam to the club as a mascot." Nemo reckoned it to be "Not half a bad idea."

Nevertheless, other ideas kept coming, including ,"The Pedallers," (cycle industry) and "The Watchdogs," (watchmaking), "The Sinners," "The Terriers," "The Chickens" and "The Pip-Pips." But, by the end of the month, Nemo was referring to the teams as the Bantams.

Incidentally, in 1922, City nearly became "The Scrapers." A ballot was held to coincide with the change of colours to green and red halves. The prize of two guineas attracted ideas such as "The Velocipedes" and "The Oojahs," but retaining the Bantams name was the overall winner.

Mike Young also sent me copies of the above fascinating articles from the Midland Daily Telegraph which confirms the above. He had also heard it said that an enthusiastic supporter's donation of a pair of bantams cemented the deal and that the club were named after a make of car constructed in the City at the time. I have heard the 'Singer Bantam' story before and don't buy it as the car was only launched in 1935.

 In last week's tribute to former City player Gordon Nutt there was a picture of the club's youth team from 1949 & several readers have tried to name all the players. Former player Lol Harvey was at the club at the time & could name most of the people in the picture. 

Back row (L to R): Ces Barratt (coach) (father of Harry Barratt), ? Bates, John Quinney, Reg Matthews, Bill Lovett, Albert 'Bulldog' Sneddon, unknown, Harry Moore (trainer).

Front row (L to R): Gordon Nutt, Philip Cresswell, unknown, unknown, Billy Watson.

Can anyone fill in the gaps?