Coventry City, which has six points after five Championship games, will now be obliged to stop playing because of the international break.
With 11 new summer acquisitions getting to know one another off the field as well as on it, the 2023–24 season has gotten off to an eventful start for the redesigned Sky Blues. There have been many encouraging developments as well as a few growing pains that Mark Robins and his coaching staff are eager to address in the days, weeks, and months ahead.
Despite a poor start in which they gained distance from the bottom of the league in mid-October, City is currently in 14th place, four points behind the top six where they concluded the previous campaign. Following the first round of games, Sky Blues reporter Andy Turner responds to some of your initial queries.
AT: Well, panic stations have not yet been established. To be honest, I don’t believe they’re that far off at the moment. You may go through each game so far, beginning with the away game against Leicester, which they really should have won if not at the very least earned a point from.
It would have been close to game over had Haji Wright’s incredible try succeeded. However, the performance against Leicester, who are predicted to immediately return to the top flight, was very encouraging. City fought valiantly throughout and, in reality, deserved at least a draw from the match, which is their sole loss.
They defeated Middlesbrough 3-0 before drawing at Swansea away from home in a game when they scored the game’s first goal and had other chances to win easily afterward.
They will be upset, or already are, that they only managed to earn a point from that, a close game against Sunderland, and an intense match against Watford. Consequently, you could sort of say after every game that they could have performed better, but they are still very much a work in progress. I’m sure Mark Robins has appreciated the opportunity the international break has provided to reinforce some points on the practice field.
Not to be overlooked is the fact that several of the new players arrived after the transfer window closed. In an ideal world, Mark Robins would have completed his business at the beginning of the transfer window and been able to give each player a full preseason together, allowing them to get to know one another and work as a team. However, that hasn’t been the case. Therefore, it will take time.
How much, in your opinion, did the club increase the sales of Gyokeres and Hamer? Did it perform as well as it possibly might have?
AT: Well, they didn’t really replace Hamer, so I guess that’s where they kind of fell short. And I suppose that’s the only complaint from the fans about the trade.
They received £35 million for the two of them, and Coventry has spent a significant portion of that amount. And come January, I have no doubt that they’ll spend once more. But because Hamer was such a significant participant, there is one vacancy that has been left, and it will be challenging to fill.
The only spot where the team truly fell short was in the midfield, where Mark Robins was eager to sign another player. He wanted a dynamic box-to-box player who could essentially fill many of the roles that Hamer could. Other than that, the squad’s depth doesn’t appear to be too awful, and it won’t until O’Hare and Allen return from injury.
Will City look to the free agent pool to replace the vacuum left by Hamer, or will they hold off until January?
AT: It’s ironic because I recently published a report about the 68 Premier League and Championship free agents, among whom was Eden Hazard.
However, not many managers tend to sign free agents, mostly because there is probably a reason why they are unsigned. The other issue is that they lack fitness since they haven’t had a preseason because they haven’t been to a club all summer. A player will still need to put in a decent effort regardless of how fit he maintained himself throughout the summer by doing his own thing.
And it’s just one of those things where many managers don’t do it until they’re absolutely desperate; otherwise, they don’t prefer to take that road. As a result, I’d be shocked if Mark Robins accepted anyone. Interestingly, when the identical issue was posed to the Watford manager following the match on Saturday, he essentially responded, “I wouldn’t be doing that for the reasons I’ve just stated.”
Of the 14 players who left Coventry in the summer, Todd Kane is surprisingly the only one without a club.
What are the names of the two players from the 11 new acquisitions who have so far made an impression?
I think the defenders have done well; centre-backs Bobby Thomas and Joel Latibeaudiere were fairly steady and steady until the weekend when Bobby had a bit of a nightmare with a softly hit pass back to the keeper that resulted in a goal. But Milan van Ewijk is just one of those players who is already a fan favorite. He just catches the eye, goes past players, and is really exciting going forward.
And finally, he scored over the weekend with a magnificent 30-yard free kick. It’s encouraging for the future since Mark Robins later disclosed that some players remain behind after practice to practice the art and are extremely excellent at it.
Wright is the other player that has performed well. He’s just so thrilling and quick that a defender has no chance of catching him if he allows him even half a yard. He is skilled with it and only needs to start finishing. However, he appears to be a tremendously entertaining player that keeps spectators on the edge of their seats.
