Jim's column 12.11.2016

There was nothing to play for on Wednesday night at Wycombe other than home advantage in the first of the knockout stages of the Football League Trophy, a somewhat devalued competition since the inclusion of several club's Under 23 teams. The game did however qualify as a competitive first team game and has to be included in the club's historical records. The 250-odd City fans who made the trip to Adams Park saw three interesting records set.

Firstly, the Sky Blues came from 0-2 behind to win a competitive game for only the fourth time in the last thirty years and the first time in an away game since 1970. After failing to come back from a two-goal deficit in almost twenty years, City have now done it three times in three seasons with Peterborough on the receiving end in the last two seasons.

2016-17 Wycombe Wanderers (FL Trophy) 4-2

2015-16 Peterborough (h) 3-2

2014-15 Peterborough (h) 3-2

1995-96 Tottenham (League Cup) (h) 3-2

1985-86 Southampton (h) 3-2

1980-81 West Ham (League Cup) (h) 3-2

1970-71 Derby (a) 4-3

1963-64 Peterborough (h) 3-2

You have to go back to that famous win at Derby's Baseball Ground in 1970 for the last such away result. City were not only 0-2 down but had seen their new £100,000 record signing Wilf Smith stretchered off in the first few minutes. Kevin Hector and Alan Hinton put the Rams 2-0 ahead in the first thirteen minutes but goals from Neil Martin & Dave Clements pulled City level by half-time. Martin put City ahead early in the second half before John McGovern made it 3-3. Bill Glazier saved a Hinton penalty before Willie Carr popped up with the winner two minutes from time.

Secondly, Ryan Haynes became only the fifth City substitute to score two goals coming off the bench. Some people have called the second goal as an own goal but I am crediting to Ryan in the absence of any official decision. The other four two-goal subs were:

Bobby Gould v Nottingham Forest (a) 1967-68

Jay Bothroyd v Rushden & Diamonds LC (h) 2002-03

Patrick Suffo v Torquay LC (h) 2004-05

Chris Maguire v MK Dons (a) 2013-14

Thirdly, the crowd of 912 at Adams Park for this dead rubber was the lowest crowd to watch a City first-team competitive game since 1930 when 683 watched a 2-2 draw between Merthyr Town and Coventry in the old Division Three South. The game, played at Merthyr's Penydarren Park took place on a Monday afternoon in April and the home side were bottom of the league having lost their previous two games 0-10 and 1-5. At the end of the season despite winning three of their last five games, they finished bottom and were voted out of the league. That crowd is the lowest to watch a Coventry City league game.

Last weekend the crowd at Morecambe (1,732) was the lowest to watch a Coventry City FA Cup tie since 1914 when the Bantams, a Southern League side at the time, travelled to Glossop, then a Second Division side, for a 6^th round Qualifying tie. Only 539 paying customers watched the tie which Glossop won 3-1. Glossop, who had one season in the First Division, finished bottom of Division Two that season and after the war were not re-elected to the League. They have been a non-league side ever since.

If the Sky Blues manage to win the replay they will face the winners of the Dover v Cambridge United replay on the weekend of 5 December. City have never played Dover but were the victims of a Cambridge giant-killing act in 1992 when a Dion Dublin goal earned Cambridge a 1-1 draw at Highfield Road and cost Terry Butcher his job as manager. By the time of the replay, Don Howe was in charge but Dublin scored a late winner in a goalmouth scramble after Oggy had saved Dion's penalty.

Jim's column 10.11.2012

                                       Gerry Baker, spotted at Ricoh this week.

What a treat – two Coventry City wins in a week - could the tide by turning at last. I hope I won’t tempt fate by pointing out that City notched their first trio of successive wins for December 2010 when they defeated Burnley and Middlesbrough at home and Scunthorpe away to reach the heady heights of fifth place in the Championship. They haven’t won four in a row since December 2002!

Sadly the gates at this week’s games were pitifully low. The gate for the Arlesey FA Cup game was 6,594, the lowest for a home FA Cup tie since December 1908 when 6,215 watched City draw 1-1 with Wrexham in a Fifth Qualifying Round tie. Gates were generally poor in the Cup last week and City’s was only bettered by Portsmouth who had 7,560 for the visit of Notts County.

Tuesday night’s gate plumbed new depths for the Sky Blues with only 8,862 present for the visit of Crawley – the lowest home league crowd since March 1992 when 8,454 turned up for the midweek game against Norwich just three days after almost 24,000 had watched the Sky Blues entertain Manchester United. The crowds are drifting down to the lowest in the last 50 years with the smallest since 1962 being the 7,478 who watched the Watford game in January 1986. The Crawley gate means that City’s average this season is just 10,514 and unless it improves it will be the lowest average since 1961-62, the season Jimmy Hill took over as manager.

The FA Cup victory, City’s biggest home win since they moved to the Ricoh in 2005, set up a revenge game for the Sky Blues. The draw paired City with the winners of the Rochdale v Morecambe replay. Both of these clubs have knocked City out of Cup competitions in recent years, Rochdale in the 2003 FA Cup and Morecambe in 2010-11 League Cup, and older fans will remember the even bigger shock in 1971, when City lost at Spotland on a dreary Monday afternoon after the original game had been postponed.

David McGoldrick is the man of the moment and became the first City player to score 10 goals before the end of November since Michael Mifsud in 2007. Mifsud reached double figures on 3 November, beating McGoldrick by three days. Mifsud achieved it in only nine starts, McGoldrick has had 14 starts. McGoldrick is something of an enigma. Forest fans don’t speak highly of him – his nickname at the City Ground was McGoaldrought – and he scored only nine goals in 75 appearances (but only 36 starts) in three seasons. Prior to that he scored only 15 goals in 75 games (55 starts) for Southampton but obviously did enough to persuade Forest’s manager Billy Davies to pay £1m for him. He can’t seem to stop scoring for the Sky Blues and it has to be hoped that he can stay at the club beyond his loan period.

The introduction of Arlesey Town’s substitute, player-manager Zema Abbey, prompted the question from John Woodfield and Dean Nelson: when was the last time a player-manager appeared against the Sky Blues?

The answer is, to my knowledge, Gillingham’s Andy Hessenthaler who played several games for the Gills v the Sky Blues between 2001-2004 during his time as player-manager at the Priestfield Stadium. The last appearance was in City’s 5-2 win there in 2004 when Richard Shaw famously scored his only City goal and Hessenthaler got his marching orders. Another is Paul Simpson who played for and managed Rochdale to the aforementioned Cup win in 2003. My memory of the Premiership years is failing me and I have to thank Paul O’Connor for reminding me of several player-managers who played against us in the Premier League including three Chelsea men (Glen Hoddle, Ruud Gullit & Gianluca Vialli), Liverpool’s Kenny Dalglish and Trevor Francis. Francis, I believe, is unique in that he did it twice (for QPR and Sheffield Wednesday) and scored against the Sky Blues in a 2-1 QPR victory in 1988-89.  I do have good memories of the 1960s and remember Bill McGarry (PM of Bournemouth) and Jimmy Scoular (PM of Bradford PA) in the 1962-63 season. There may be more but it’s not as strange as it sounds.

I bumped into former Coventry City player Gerry Baker after Tuesday night’s game. It is always nice to chat to Gerry – a true gentleman – but it was sad to hear that his wife Anne passed away recently after a long illness. Gerry was down from his Motherwell home visiting his family in Coventry and took the opportunity to make a rare visit to the Ricoh. He was full of stories of the Sky Blues early seasons in Division One and reminisced about the late Ernie Machin.

JIM'S COLUMN 16.1.10

This year’s FA Cup run came to a shuddering halt at a freezing Ricoh Arena on Tuesday night with Portsmouth gaining revenge for the defeats of 1910 and 1963 with their late goals. With City’s excellent record in league games this season (they are the only Championship side who haven’t conceded a goal in the last five minutes) I was contemplating a fourth round tie with Sunderland when Stephen Wright headed into his own net, then Pompey did it again in added time at the end of extra-time with Mokoena heading home unmarked.

The gate was a pitifully low 7,097 – the lowest home FA Cup crowd since 1909. Apart from visits from Middlesbrough and Chelsea, City’s crowds in the competition have slumped in the last few years and the last FA Cup game at Highfield Road in 2005 attracted only 7,628 was the lowest for almost a century. On Tuesday the cold weather and the fact that the game was televised had a big impact and the other games on the night also had low crowds with under 10,000 at St.Andrews and barely more than 7,000 at Derby and Bristol City, and under 6,000 at QPR. The last time a crowd as small watched City at home in the competition was for a Qualifying round tie against Wrexham in October 1909.

My comments about the Portsmouth games in 1963 prompted some correspondence including a long email from Dave Walker of Allesley Park. He was at the first replay at Highfield Road but didn’t expect to see the second replay. He takes up the story:

At the time, I was an apprentice at Coventry Gauge and Tool Co., (£3 7s 6d a week), and out of the blue, one of my mates, John Taylor, came round to my machine and said, ‘If we can swing it with the management, would you be interested in us getting a coach party to go to Tottenham for the replay’, which was on a Tuesday night. What a question?

In double quick time, we got permission from the company, to knock off early, to travel to London, with the proviso that we put in unpaid overtime to make up the lost time, for which we had no objection at all, booked the coach, which I seem to remember cost about ten bob a head and we set out, full of hope for Tottenham.
The game was a cracker and as you can imagine the Sky Blue song was belted out by all concerned on the way back.

Next came the Sunderland match, which was something of a problem for me, in that I had been born in Sunderland (my mother’s home town) but lived in Coventry since 1952 which was my dad’s birthplace, but was, by now a confirmed City fan. I have heard some cheers in my time, in big stadiums, but when the ball went through Jim Montgomery’s hands into the net it was a wonder the Kop and old stand at Highfield Road didn’t collapse.

The next problem was getting tickets for the Manchester United tie, which I did, but only at the last minute. That game was a bit sad, in that there will, for all time, I suppose, be a debate as to whether Willie Humphries’ shot crossed the line of not, plus City being undone by an incredible goal from Bobby Charlton. A ‘nothing’ situation, with John Sillett marking him and a thunderbolt shot, totally out of the blue that nearly broke the net. Genius in action.

As I write this Gary Madine’s move to Coventry City from Carlisle is in doubt. Nevertheless he is approaching a Coventry City record as a substitute. The tall striker has now appeared on nine occasions as a substitute without ever starting a game. The club record of sub appearances before a full league debut is held by Gary McSheffrey who made 11 sub appearances before his first league start in April 2002, although he did start a couple of League Cup games before then. In second place is Wayne Andrews who made 10 sub appearances for the Sky Blues without ever starting a game.