Coventry City's 1-0
victory over Crewe Alexandra last weekend was the club's fourth
consecutive league game without conceding a goal at the Ricoh,
following clean sheets against Port Vale, Carlisle and Exeter. It
ended an outstanding September for Mark Robins which may well see the
City boss pick up the dreaded 'Manager of the Month' award. For the
record the team won five, drew one and lost one in league games
during the month, equalling the best September ever, set in 1929 and
equalled in 1958 (the Division Four promotion season). As far as
successive clean sheets at home, it is the best run since four in
2002 under Gary McAllister and two short of the club record set in
that Fourth Division promotion season in 1958-59.
Attendances are picking
up slowly as the Sky Blues' home form improves but the Port Vale home
gate of 6,951 was the lowest home league crowd on a Saturday since
April 1958 when 6,939 watched the Bantams play Gillingham. Midweek
attendances are traditionally lower and three days later there were
only 6,151 paying customers for the visit of Carlisle – the
smallest home league crowd since April 1962 when there were only
5,965 to see Bristol City.
It was good to see the
team notch a win at Swindon's County Ground at last. In recent
seasons they have taken the lead on several occasions there but
failed to come away with the points. This time they fell behind only
to come back strongly and goals from Doyle and Nazon sealed the first
league victory there since December 1960. That was a 2-1 win also
with Ray Straw and Billy Myerscough on target.
I was contacted by
Dutch journalist Joris Kaper last month. He is writing the biography
of former City player Nii Lamptey who briefly played for the Sky
Blues under Ron Atkinson in 1995-96. Joris wanted the details of
Lamptey's appearances for City and I was able to furnish him with the
following facts:
In addition he played 2
friendlies: 11/9/95 St Albans (a) 7-1 (he scored one) and 8/10/95
Hearts (a) 5-1 (he scored one).
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Ghanaian Lamptey was
something of teenage superstar helping his country to win the World
under-17 championships in 1991 and being touted as the 'new Pele'.
Atkinson signed him for Villa and then brought him to Coventry soon
after he arrived at Highfield Road. It's fair to say he never looked
like a world-class performer for City and his subsequent career,
which has taken him to Italy, Argentina, Portugal, Germany, Dubai,
China and finally back to Ghana, was an anti-climax after his
exploits as a teenager.
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