Jim's column 23.4.22

Coventry City had a mixed Easter weekend with another impressive comeback at St Andrew's on Good Friday followed by an unlucky defeat at home to high-flying, star-studded Bournemouth on Monday afternoon. Expectations were high at Birmingham but poor defending gave the Blues a two-goal lead before the outstanding Ben Sheaf scored his first goals for the club to pull the Sky Blues level by half-time. With confidence high and the home side struggling to cope with City's attacking prowess, one felt there was only one team going to win and Rose and O'Hare put Blues out of their misery.

City's away form since Christmas has been very impressive with five wins and a draw from ten games and it is interesting that in the same period the team's home form, which was so impressive in the autumn, has gone the other way with only three wins and three draws from 11 games.

It was the first time City had come from two goals down to win since August 2019 when, during their stay at St Andrew's they trailed Blackpool 2-0 but came back to win 3-2 with goals from Matty Godden, Wes Jobello and a 91st minute winner from Callum O'Hare. City have now gained 27 points from losing positions this season, the best in the Championship and a club record.

I had a log trawl through the records to find the last time City reversed a two-goal deficit and won by two clear goals. There was an FLT victory at Wycombe in 2016 where they were losing 2-0 at half-time before goals from Ryan Haynes (2) George Thomas and Gail Bigirimana saw City win 4-2. For the last occasion in a league game you have to go back to 1946 when City visited Millwall in a Division 2 game. George Ashall put City ahead after half an hour but the Lions roared back and led 3-1 two minutes into the second half. Then a Coventry blitz saw them score four goals in 15 minutes to win the game 5-3 with Ashall completing a hat-trick and Harry Barratt and Ted Roberts netting the other goals. In the match report in the Pink, Nemo wasn't complimentary, saying : 'Play was wild and almost completely lacking in constructive football'.

The game on Monday attracted the biggest crowd of the season to the CBS Arena, 24,492. That is the largest crowd at the stadium since a Family Day game with Gillingham in 2019 when the 'official' attendance was 26,741. However that included 12,500 free tickets, many of which were not used and the likely attendance was more like 18,000. Similarly the 'official' attendance for a Family Day game v Accrington in 2018 was given as 28,343 but there were probably only 21,000 in attendance. The last time there were as many people at a City home game was the Gillingham homecoming game in September 2014 when 27,306 were in the ground (many on cheap tickets). The Bournemouth attendance means that the club's average attendance is now 19,346 and will almost certainly be the highest average since 2006-07 (20,342) and the third highest since the club were relegated from the Premier League in 2001.

I also looked at the home element of the club's attendances and on Monday there were 22,150 City fans in the ground. By my reckoning this is the fourth highest for a Sky Blues home league game since the move to the Arena in 2005. There were bigger home contingents for the Middlesbrough, West Brom and Chelsea FA Cup ties and the Crewe EFL Trophy game in 2013 but the three higher league games were:

2014-15 Gillingham attendance 27,306. away fans: 495. Home fans: 26,811

2007-08 Wolves attendance 27,992. away fans: 5,400. Home fans: 22,542

2005-06 Leeds attendance: 26,643. away fans: 4,255. Home fans: 22,388

With the good news about season ticket sales for next season we could soon be looking at record home contingents but also average home attendances of over 22,000, something we haven't seen at Coventry since the 1970s!

Jim's column 16.4.22

Well the impossible happened and the Sky Blues won 3-1 at Craven Cottage on Sunday with an exhilarating performance that thrilled the travelling Sky Blue Army and left the West London club's fans, expecting to see an easy home victory, in total shock. In what was surely one of the club's best results since Mark Robins returned to the club in 2017, the team were on the front foot from the start and fully deserved the win.

As a wrote last week it was City's first league game at Craven Cottage since 1968 and in the intervening years Fulham have not only built a stand on the river side of the ground but also demolished it. A new replacement stand on that side of the ground is just about ready and will surely be full next season in the Premier League. I hope Fulham buy some new defenders before then or they will be in for some embarrassing thumpings in the top league.

It was only City's fourth league win in 17 visits to the Cottage with the last win coming in a meaningless midweek game in April 1948 thanks to goals from Plum Warner and Alex McIntosh. Sunday's win also ensured that City completed the double over Fulham – the first club to achieve that this season – and only the second time Fulham have conceded more than two goals in a game, the other being in the earlier fixture at the CBS Arena. Yet again City scored an added-time goal – their 11th of the season. I understand this is one short of the divisional record but have no other details.

Sunday's game was admirably refereed by Keith Stroud, an impressive official in this league where so many refs are inconsistent and give talented players little protection. Stroud has refereed four City away games and was the man in black in the wins at Blackpool, Peterborough and Fulham with a draw at Millwall. He also officiated in the home defeat to West Brom (he missed the handled second Baggies goal) and the home draw with Preston (rightly adding time on for time-wasting tactics by the visitors).

Keith Ballantyne enjoyed the trip down the 1968 memory lane last week and reminded me that Ernie Hunt played in that game at Fulham in April 1968 – his third appearance at the ground that season having appeared for Wolves on the opening day before an early season move to Everton took him back to the Cottage in September. He joined City in March just in time to play there for a third time in the 1-1 draw.

Jacqui Crump asked me for information about a relative of her husband, John Wassall, who played for Coventry City in the 1950s. John Charles Wassall was born in Erdington, Birmingham on 9 June 1933. He was on Coventry's books as an apprentice from around 1949 playing in their Modern Machine Tools team in local Coventry leagues alongside many other talented youngsters on the club's books at that time.

                         John Wassall

He became a regular in the reserve team in the Football Combination in 1953 and over the next four seasons he made 126 appearances for the reserves, the majority at centre half. He got his first team chance in September 1955 at Reading in a Division Three South game (1-0 defeat) as a full back. He made 11 appearances in the first team that season at full-back and a further six the following season. He was released in the summer of 1957 and signed for Southport, then a Division Four team. His stay in Lancashire was brief - he played four games before joining non-league Bromsgrove Rovers in late 1957. I don't have any details of his career after that but believe he died at Rowington near Warwick in 1987, aged 54.

Jim's column 9.4.22

Tomorrow the Sky Blues travel to West London to play Championship leaders Fulham at Craven Cottage. It's City's first league visit to the ground since this week in 1968 when the clubs fought out a tense Division One relegation battle that ended 1-1.

Bottom club Fulham, who were First Division escape artists in the 1960s, often coming from seemingly hopeless positions to achieve safety, were six points adrift of 21st place, although they did have games in hand with some of the clubs immediately above them. No team from Arsenal in 11th place downward were safe with three points covering seven clubs from Leicester in 15th to Wolves in 21st position. City, bottom at the end of January, had picked up eleven points from eight games (there were two points for a win in those days) and were 19th and breathing slightly easier than two months earlier.

As a schoolboy I travelled to Fulham on the Priory coach from Leamington and stood on the covered Hammersmith End with maybe a thousand other City fans. That day there was a crowd of 20,869 and I witnessed some of my first football hooliganism. The wind spoiled the game and although former England captain Johnny Haynes was outstanding for the home side they couldn't break down City's defence superbly marshalled by Maurice Setters. With four minutes remaining City substitute Brian Hill hit a superb shot into the Fulham goal at the Putney End. The goal sparked a charge from Fulham's hooligan element and with barely a policeman or steward in sight, a battering looked on the cards. As the fists started flying Steve Earle scored an equaliser at our end and the thugs gave up their attack and instead celebrated the goal.

        Fulham's Haynes and City's Ernie Machin tussle for the ball

The point was far more valuable for City than Fulham and three weeks later their demotion was confirmed. The battle for the other relegation place went to the final day with City and Sheffield United level on points but with the Sky Blues having a better goal average. The Blades possibly had the advantage however as they were at home, to Chelsea, whilst City were away, at Southampton. At half-time, with the Blades leading 1-0, City had slipped into the bottom two for the first time since mid-February. The Sky Blues defence managed to hold out against a strong Saints' attack and thankfully Chelsea scored twice in the second half to send Sheffield down.

Fulham and Coventry have managed to avoid each other in league meetings in the last 54 years. Fulham were relegated again the following season and didn't reach the top flight again until 2001 – the season that City were relegated from the Premier League, so the missed each other again. Fulham then had 13 seasons in EPL but after relegation to the Championship they missed the Sky Blues who were in League One by then.

The clubs were drawn together in the second round of the League Cup in 1982-83 when ties were played over two legs. City drew 2-2 at Craven Cottage in front of 6,237 thanks to two goals from new signing Jim Melrose and went through to the next round on away goals after a 0-0 draw at Highfield Road.

Craven Cottage has changed a bit since 1968 but the old Main Stand is still in use and the Cottage still sits in the corner. In 1968 the Riverside terracing was open to the elements and had the flags of all 22 First Division clubs fluttering in the breeze. A stand was built on that terracing many years ago, blocking the view to the river Thames. I've been back to Craven Cottage on numerous occasions since 1968 – I lived 100 yards from the ground in the 1970s and even saw Pele play there in a friendly for Santos – but am looking forward to seeing my team lock horns with the Cottagers.

This season Fulham are the strongest team in the Championship, helped enormously by obscene amounts of parachute money, and need very few points to confirm their promotion back to the Premier League for the third time in five seasons. They also have the best player and top scorer (and probably the highest paid player) in the Championship in Aleksander Mitrovic who currently has 38 league goals to his name. However City inflicted Fulham's heaviest defeat of the season in October winning 4-1 at the CBS Arena. Nevertheless a tough afternoon beckons for the Sky Blues.

Jim's Column 2.4.22

Once in a while a player comes along, who, with just a few appearances to his name, unexpectedly becomes something of a legend of the club. Roy Barry's early appearances after his transfer from Dunfermline in 1969 comes to mind as does Stuart Pearce's arrival in 1983. More recently Liam Walsh's midfield prowess had a major effect on City's League One title tilt in 2019-20. In the 1920s the emergence of a speedy right winger from non-league football had that same effect.

Ed Blackaby recently asked me for more information on Ernie Toseland, a Coventry City player of the 1920s who went on to have a dazzling career in the top flight with Manchester City winning a First Division championship medal and FA Cup winners and runners up medals. Despite making only 23 appearances for the club many contemporary reports describe him as Coventry City's most gifted player of the decade.

Born in Northampton in 1905, Toseland was playing for non-league Higham Ferrers Town when he came to City's attention in April 1928 playing against City's reserve team at Highfield Road. Higham lost 6-2 to City but Toseland, a right-winger, created a good impression with his speed and crossing and with a well taken penalty in the defeat. Two days later the Midland Daily Telegraph reported that City had signed the 22-year-old for £50 but he couldn't play for the first team that season because City were still under threat of re-election. He had been an amateur on the books of QPR as a teenager but released and played four seasons for Higham before his move – the archetypal late developer.

                     Ernie Toseland

He made his reserve team debut at Southampton the day after he had signed and it ended after thirty minutes when a collision resulted in a broken collar bone. He was fully recovered for the start of the 1928-29 season and after impressing in trial games he made a goalscoring debut in the first team at Watford early in the season standing in for Bill Henderson, a summer signing from Southampton. He kept his place for the following two games against Exeter ('a much improved display') and Southend ('Toseland was City's most prominent attacker') but was back in the reserves the following week when Henderson was fit. Several impressive reserve performances earned him a first team recall at home to Newport at the end of October when Henderson had the flu and Ernie responded with a stunning display of wing play. City were trailing 1-0 when Toseland, given the nickname 'Twinkle-feet' by the fans, scored twice in five minutes and set up a third for Jack Starsmore.

Ernie was developing an excellent relationship with ex-Villa and England inside forward Billy Kirton and a week later Toseland scored one and made another two goals in a 3-0 win at Crystal Palace. A third successive win was recorded over Swindon with Ernie netting in a 4-1 victory before another away win at Torquay lifted the team to fourth place in Division Three South – their highest position for several years. City's form dipped after the four wins, probably due to Kirton getting injured and missing most of the rest of the season, but Toseland continued to star with his wing play . More importantly he netted six goals in eleven games and after only 13 games was the club's leading scorer. Every week the match reports made him City's best forward and his performances soon had scouts from First Division clubs eyeing him up.

               From the  Midland Daily  Telegraph 22 December 1928

On 1st March 1929 it was reported that City had accepted a substantial fee (believed to be £3,000, a club record) from Manchester City for the exciting winger who had netted 11 goals in 23 games for the club. The fee would be the equivalent of several million pounds today and City's financial position at the time would have made it virtually impossible for them to hold on to him.

He made his debut for the Maine Road club at Bury at the end of April and a week later scored his first goal in a 3-0 win over Aston Villa. By the start of the next season he was the first choice outside right and went on to make 411 appearances scoring 75 goals before joining Sheffield Wednesday in March 1939. Manchester City had a great FA Cup reputation in that era, reaching the semi final in 1931, beaten finalists to Everton in 1933 and lifting the trophy in 1934 by beating Portsmouth with Ernie netting four goals on the way to Wembley. In 1936-37 City won the First Division title, scoring 107 goals. One newspaper columnist of the era described Toseland thus: “As quick and dainty a footballer as there is in all of Britain. He can beat a man on a handkerchief and can slip by on either side.”

The war effectively ended Toseland's playing career although he did make the occasional appearance for Manchester City in unofficial war-time games and at the age of 40 he was playing for Mossley in Cheshire League football after the war.

He played alongside some giants of the game whilst at the club including Matt Busby, England left winger Eric Brook and England goalkeeper Frank Swift. Sadly he was never picked for England but a certain Stanley Matthews dominated the England number 7 shirt in the pre-war era.

Ernie died in Stockport in 1987.