Jim's column 17.10.2015

Another great result at Fleetwood last week cemented City's place in the top six of League One. With Steven Pressley's appointment as Fleetwood's manager ahead of the game I was fearing the 'new manager bounce' but City finished the stronger side and snatched a deserved winner in the final minute courtesy of ex-player Richard Wood. The last former City player to score for us was Jon Stead against Bristol City in 2011-12 in the defeat at Ashton Gate that virtually condemned us to relegation.

City left it late at Fleetwood and it was the second time this season that a goal at the death has won them the points, the other being in the 3-2 home win over Crewe. In contrast City haven't so far gone down to a late defeat this term, something that has been very familiar in the last few years.

Keith Rogers who sits behind me in the East Stand and has been a City fan for around 50 years, has asked me if we have ever scored a winner so late in the game. Wood's goal was timed as the 90^th minute and there are several examples of the team scoring in added time. At Crawley last season, James Maddison scored in the 91^st minute, and in 2011-12 both Leon Clarke and James Bailey netted winners in the 94^th minutes against Preston (JPT) and Oldham respectively.

Keith's question reminded me that it would be worthwhile updating my stats on late goals. The table below shows the number of goals scored and conceded after the 80^th minute in games.

Goals scored after 80 minutes (all games)

	By City	By Opponents
2009-10 (Coleman)	11	7
2010-11 (Bothroyd/Thorn)	6	8
2011-12 (Thorn)	6	17
2012-13 (Thorn/Robins/Pressley)	18	11
2013-14 (Pressley)	21	15
2014-15 (Pressley/Mowbray)	13	9
2015-16 (Mowbray)	3	0

The statistics disprove the theory that City concede more late goals than they score. It was certainly the case in the Championship and those goals hastened relegation, but since 2012 the Sky Blues have the upper hand, including this season where City have yet to concede a late goal. Another interesting fact is that of the 13 late goals scored last season eight of them were winning goals.

On the question of statistics, Craig Evans asked whether 22 points from the first 11 games of a season is a record. Craig, it is the best haul of points from 11 since a win was upgraded from two to three points in 1981. If three points had been awarded prior to 1981 then only two seasons better this term's figure. In 1963-64 the team would have won 23 points from 11 and in 1937-38 Harry Storer's team would also have reached 23 points. It's a good omen; in 1964 City won the Third Division title and in 1938 they finished fourth in the old Second Division. 

Two weeks ago I asked for help recognising former City player Horace Matthews from an old team picture of AWA Baginton taken in 1942-43. Regular reader Ron Dickinson contacted me to say that he was pretty certain that Horace is second from the left in the back row. Ron writes: 'The team captain was Bill Beaufoy, in the centre of the front row, behind the big trophy. Beaufoy was a leading player in junior soccer in the war and possibly played a few games for City's reserves.'

                                              AWA Baginton 1942-43

'Probably the best known member of the team was Bob Ward (front row, second from the right, behind the smaller trophy), who also went on to play for Coventry City and was later trainer at Bedworth Town and Lockheed Leamington. Bob was a jovial person yet regarded as a bit of a 'hardman'. I remember seeing him play at Villa Park in the mid week FA Cup game at Villa Park in 1946. It was an early afternoon kick off (no floodlights in those days) and the coach driver made a detour to pick up three of us from school at lunch time to take us to Villa. The City finished with ten men and the newspaper headline the next day referred to them as the "10 commandos". The player sent off was Bob'.

Ron is correct. The first FA Cup competition after the war was played before the Football League commenced and the FA decided to make all ties up to the semi-final, two legged. City were drawn against Villa and beat them 2-1 at Highfield Road on Saturday 5^th January. The second leg, four days later, is the game that Ron remembers and Villa won 2-0 to make it 3-2 on aggregate.

Still on the subject of Horace Matthews, Bobby Gould kindly sent me a picture of the full Coventry City staff from 1965 with Horace's son John, who later became such a success in Ireland, pictured third from left in the third row.

Jim's column 25.1.14

The perception of many City's fans is that historically City have always conceded more late goals than they have scored so I thought it worthwhile doing some research on the subject. The table below shows that in the last two seasons in the Championship (under Aidy Bothroyd & Andy Thorn) the side conceded far more late goals than they scored.

Goals scored after 80 minutes (all games)

	By City	By Opponents
2009-10 (Coleman)	11	7
2010-11 (Bothroyd/Thorn)	6	8
2011-12 (Thorn)	6	17
2012-13 (Thorn/Robins/Pressley)	18	11
2013-14 (Pressley)	15	13

Some fans will remember conceding late goals in those seasons to lose at Crystal Palace, Blackpool, Ipswich and at home to Norwich & Burnley to name but a few. In League One however City have definitely outdone their opponents. This season those 15 late goals for the Sky Blues have on 11 occasions resulted in wins or draws, and we are only just past the halfway mark of the season. Of course late goals that count for something (a win or draw) send the fans home buzzing - the late equalisers at Wolves, Preston at at home to Preston all seemed like victories at the time not to mention the late winners at Barnsley, Rotherham, MK Dons and at home to Hartlepool, Bristol City & Gillingham. On the other side of the coin it is clear that City are still vulnerable to late goals themselves. Of their four away league defeats, three have been because of goals after the 80 minute mark (Crawley, Port Vale & Swindon) plus the League Cup exit at Orient.

Dean Nelson, an avid City fan who has an amazing collection of videos & clips of City games not to mention hundreds of film clips of old Coventry, has been in touch asking for more information on a little-known City friendly game in 1963.

The winter of 1962-63 was the worst in living memory and City didn't play a game between Boxing Day and the last week in February. Game after game was called off because of snowbound or icy pitches as the country virtually ground to a halt. At the end of January after the coming Saturday’s game at Shrewsbury was postponed manager Jimmy Hill grasped the nettle. A call to Manchester United’s manager Matt Busby resulted in a hastily arranged friendly in Dublin. Hill always seeking publicity for the club, had realised that Ireland was far less badly hit by the weather and using his contacts in the Fair isle organised this tasty friendly. Hill had first tried Joe Mercer at Aston Villa but Joe’s players were worried about getting injured. Busby however was more adventurous and, like Hill, was desperate for his team to get some competitive play, and duly put out his strongest team including his expensive forward line of : Johnny Giles, Albert Quixall, David Herd, Denis Law and Bobby Charlton. On a day when only four games were played on the English mainland City and United met at Shamrock Rovers’ Glenmalure Park in a game that belied the two division’s difference in the club’s status. With United’s stars rattled by City’s enthusiasm City recovered from an early Quixall goal to lead 2-1 at half-time thanks to goals from Ronnie Farmer and Jimmy Whitehouse. With Willie Humphries and Ronnie Rees giving Shay Brennan and Noel Cantwell an uncomfortable afternoon and Brian Hill marking Law like a limpit City had chances to increase their lead. Bobby Charlton finally saved United’s red faces nine minutes from time with an equaliser but Coventry City had made an impression, and made a few bob from a 15,000 crowd.

The following Saturday, again after another early postponement (a home game with Port Vale) City flew to Cork to play Wolves in a friendly. Whilst not the force they had been in the late 1950s, Wolves were in the top six in Division One (higher than Manchester United) and fielded experienced internationals Ron Flowers and Peter Broadbent. On a miserably wet day, the muddy pitch suited Wolves’ style perfectly and although City had chances in the first half, Wolves’ strength and experience told and they ran out 3-0 winners in front of a drowned crowd of 6,500.

Last week I wrote a tribute to Albert McCann and David Selby, an Essex-based City fan who is also a director of Chelmsford City reminded me that Albert played for Chelmsford. David writes: 'He was released by Portsmouth in 1974 and went to play in South Africa where he no doubt played with Bobby Kellard, who was also in South Africa at the time. He made his debut for Chelmsford City in February 1976 some 6 weeks after Kellard had taken over as City Manager, as City lost 2-0 at Telford United and went on to make 11 appearances before leaving the Club at the end of the 1975-1976 season. He had originally signed a contract for a month but saw the season out. His second appearance saw City win 3-0 at home to Wimbledon to earn Kellard his first league win as Manager, at the eighth time of asking. He scored 1 goal for City, in a 4-0 home win over Wealdstone in April 1976'. Alberts's son Mark tells me that Albert found the travelling to Chelmsford too tiring and so joined Waterlooville (now Havant and Waterlooville) where another ex-Pompey player Jim Storrie was the manager. 

Follow me on Twitter @clarriebourton

Jim's column 3.3.12

Last Saturday against Barnsley the Sky Blues snatched victory in added time at the end of ninety minutes for the second home game running and won another valuable three points. As I wrote a couple of weeks ago, scoring late winners is a very rare occurrence for the Sky Blues but one that lifts the fans so much. Someone mentioned to me that Norwich City made a habit of scoring late goals during their promotion season last year and I thought I would research the detail. City fans will remember that Grant Holt scored a very late winner at the Ricoh Arena in December 2010 and on checking the records I discovered that it was one of 19 goals scored by the Canaries in the last ten minutes plus injury time. When you add up the extra points they won with these goals it comes to a staggering 24 points. In other words without their late goals they would have finished the season on 60 points instead of 84, leaving them in fifteenth place instead of second!

Conversely if you analyse the late goals conceded by the Sky Blues this season it can be seen that City have lost ten points by conceding in the last ten minutes of games. With the late goals against Leeds (home and away) and Barnsley, five points have been saved.

The facts support the view that successful teams score late goals and struggling teams concede late goals. I wondered how many late goals City scored in their last promotion season in 1966-67. I discovered that in the second half of that campaign they netted eight goals in the last ten minutes of games that earned the team seven extra points (two points for a win in those days). Without those seven points Jimmy Hill’s team would have been level on points with third-placed Blackburn and would have had to rely on goal average for promotion.

Many of you know that I was a supporter of Lockheed Leamington as a youngster and still follow the results of Leamington FC. Paul Vanes is a keen fan of the Brakes and is researching the history of football in Leamington including the aforementioned clubs and Leamington Town who played in the town before World War Two and go back to pre-1900. Paul is hoping to publish a book of his findings in 2016 – to coincide with the 125^th anniversary of organised football in the town. Another Lockheed fan Don Chalk and I have lent Paul old Brakes programmes and books to assist his quest.

Paul was in touch this week to tell me the sad news that Sid Ottewell, Lockheed’s legendary manager from the 1960s, had passed away aged 95 in an Eastwood nursing home. Sid had a lengthy playing career making 191 appearances netting 54 goals for Chesterfield, Birmingham City, Luton Town, Nottingham Forest, Mansfield Town and Scunthorpe United. As a manager he was in charge of Spalding United  and Bourne Town before he was invited to join the Brakes in 1960. His arrival sparked a golden period in the Brakes history as they won the last Birmingham League title then the first one under their new name of the West Midlands (Regional) League, the club switched to the Midland Counties League in 1963/64 and the following season Lockheed were champions. Cup success came with the lifting of the Birmingham Senior Cup in 1961 (5-1 over Rugby Town at Highfield Road) and finalists a season later whilst in the FA Cup, the fourth qualifying round was reached twice.

Paul supplied me with Sid’s managerial record which is better than most:-
Played 346 league games, won 203, drawn 62 with just 81 defeats, goals for totalled a magnificent 924 and only 516 against for a haul of 468 points. Brakes fans saw goals galore as one hundred thundered into the opposition net for seven successive seasons with the highest being 126 in 1965/66.