Sunday, 27 March 2022

Jim's column 26.3.22

Coventry City threw away a 1-0 lead at Derby last weekend. After Matty Godden and Callum O'Hare combined in scoring a dazzling opening goal the Sky Blues conceded their fifth league penalty of the season and Derby skipper Tom Lawrence duly beat goalkeeper Simon Moore from the spot. This season's other four penalties conceded were:

Luton (a) Elijah Adebayo

Reading (h) John Swift

Bristol City (h) Chris Martin

Preston (h) Damien Johnson

Last season the team conceded 11 league penalties and the subject was one that concerned many Sky Blue fans. This impressive improvement has largely gone unnoticed this season. In 2020-21 those eleven penalties cost City seven points on the basis that without the penalty the result would have been different, so for example, Preston's penalty at St Andrews gave them a 1-0 victory and cost City one point. This season the penalties have cost City four points, two points each at Derby and against Preston with the Reading and Bristol penalties having no effect on the final result.


One common theme about this season and last season is that the opposition haven't missed a penalty. Sixteen penalties conceded, sixteen scored, although Marko Marosi did save one in a League Cup game at MK Dons last season. You have to go back to an away game at Tranmere in January 2020 for the last penalty miss by the opposition when Rovers' Morgan Ferrier blasted his spot kick over the bar in City's 4-1 away win.


It's five years since a City goalkeeper saved a league penalty. That was Lee Burge in April 2017 against Peterborough at the Ricoh Arena. Burge saved Craig Mackail-Smith's penalty before a Ruben Lameiras goal gave City a victory in what was only Mark Robins' seventh game in charge. Six days later the club's relegation to League Two was confirmed. Since then the Sky Blues have conceded 25 penalties and none have been stopped – a pretty miserable record and a long way from 2013-14 when Joe Murphy saved five out of the 11 penalties conceded by the team.


A while ago I had an interesting email from Harry Devey who revealed an interesting fact about former Coventry and England goalkeeper, Reg Matthews:


I played for the Cheylesmore Youth Club Junior side in goal. I had a trial to play for Coventry Boys in 1946 at the Memorial Park on a sloping pitch. The one player who stood out against us on the day was the right winger who was from Foxford School called Tom Cartwright who went on to play cricket for Warwickshire and England.


I got picked to play for Coventry Boys at the Butts Stadium but due to a mix up with the date I didn't turn up. The lad who was picked to play at left back was asked to go in goal and his name was Reg Matthews. As they say the rest is history.



For fans who are interested in the history of the English game there is an excellent new book out telling the history of the FA Cup. The Cup by Richard Whitehead (published by Pitch Publishing) is a pictorial celebration of the competition and coincides with the 150th anniversary of the first final. The large format coffee-table book allows the outstanding photographs, many of which have never been published, to be displayed at their best. All of the glorious photographs have a revealing and sometimes surprising backstory with many featuring fans as well as the heroes of the competition. My favourite is from 1959 of Nottingham Forest's Stewart Imlach smoking a pipe whilst carrying a tea tray down a train corridor. Imlach, who later signed for City, had been the hero of Forest's 1959 2-1 Cup final win over Luton Town.



Coventry City's greatest FA Cup goal sadly doesn't feature – the author explains that he instigated 'the Houchen rule' which involved trying to avoid choosing pictures that were over familiar. The Sky Blues do get several mentions however including a previously unseen picture of Greg Downs holding the Cup aloft.


Sunday, 6 March 2022

Jim's column 5.3.22

Coventry City did it again on Saturday, scoring in added time for the ninth time this season with rookie Fabio Tavares scoring a spectacular equaliser in the 98th minute against Preston North End. This was just one week after the Sky Blues beat Barnsley in added time with Dom Hyam breaking Tykes' hearts with his close range finish in the 93rd minute. The winner against Barnsley was the fourth time this season that the Sky Blues have scored winning goals after the clock has passed ninety minutes, all in home games. Kyle McFadzean started the trend in the opening game against Nottingham Forest in the 96th minute. Matty Godden hit the 98th minute winner against Reading and the 92nd minute decider against Bristol City and Hyam made it four. I was checking my records and discovered that between 2003 and 2012 the team only scored one winning goal in added time! That was at QPR in 2007 when Kevin Kyle netted an injury time winner.

The five other goals the Sky Blues have scored in added time this season are:

Waghorn v Middlesbrough (h) 91st minute

Kane v Bournemouth (a) 94th minute

Godden v Huddersfield (a) 93rd minute

Godden v Peterborough (a) 91st minute

Tavares v Preston (h) 98th minute

Sandwiched between the Hyam and Tavares late goals we saw Viktor Gyokeres score an 89th minute winner at Ashton Gate in midweek. The Swede's winner is the seventh goal to come in the last ten minutes of the 90 minutes, which means 15 of City's 45 goals have been scored after the 80th minute and resulted in an extra points gained. An impressive record which seems to have been ignored by opponents.

City's Fankaty Dabo received his second red card of the season last week for denying Preston a goal-scoring opportunity by giving away a penalty. This follows his first dismissal versus Cardiff in September for dangerous play. He has now received his marching orders three times in City colours – the first being in his fourth league game for the club in 2019 at Portsmouth. The last City player to receive two red cards in a season was Kyle McFadzean last season. Dabo is now just one red card behind the club's record holder Paul Williams.

                                  Paul Williams

It's Legends Day next Saturday at the CBS Arena – the first since 2019 – and a big turnout of former players is expected with lots of ex-Sky Blues expected to attend. Two former managers, Gordon Milne and Bobby Gould, will be attending, Gordon for the first time. A good number of 1970s players will be appearing including Colin Stein, Ian Wallace, Dennis Mortimer and Garry Thompson as well as more recent players such as Dele Adebola, David Bell and Leon McKenzie and a good number of the 1987 team. New member Roland Nilsson is flying in from Sweden and will be making his Legends Day debut. The day is dedicated to George Curtis and John Sillett and their respective families will be special guests for the event. Make sure you're in the bowl during half-time when the legends will be making their customary entry to the pitch.