Sideways Sammy

Coventry City’s three-game unbeaten run came to a halt at Portman Road as they slunk to a 2-1 defeat to an Ipswich Town side that barely had to get out of second gear.

As soon as George Hirst was played clean through to finish in the seventh minute, it looked a tall order for a disjointed Coventry City side to get anything out of the game. The Sky Blues toiled throughout much of the first-half and threatened to find a rhythm, with Haji Wright even managing to find the net from an offside position, but an excellent Wes Burns strike killed the game off as a contest.

Matt Godden should have made things interesting in the second-half when he was handed the chance to half the deficit from the spot in the 73rd minute, however, his effort struck the crossbar to effectively put the final nail in the coffin for Coventry City on the day. They were able to muster a consolation goal, with Ellis Simms forcing Brandon Williams to head into his own net from a Ben Sheaf cross, but it had come as effectively the final touch of the game.

A Muddled Start

It took Coventry City roughly thirty minutes to get going in this game, by which time they were 1-0 down and fortunate for it not to be more. The Sky Blues had looked laboured in possession, with players often getting in each other’s way when in promising areas, causing Ipswich Town few problems and allowing the opposition to launch quick counter-attacks when play broke down.

The opening goal came from Ben Sheaf and Josh Eccles getting into a tangle around the centre circle, providing Nathan Broadhead the opportunity to play George Hirst in behind Coventry City’s offside trap to finish. It should have been two not long afterwards when the Sky Blues again conceded possession softly up the pitch and Broadhead was played clean through on goal but pulled his effort wide.

It was a far cry from last week’s win away at Millwall, where Coventry City were fast and purposeful on the break and looked dangerous whenever they got the ball. What was different about this performance compared to that one was that instead of having the directness of Haji Wright and Tatsuhiro Sakamoto in wide areas, it was Jamie Allen and Yasin Ayari in those roles, who posed little threat when carrying the ball directly and tended to make runs towards the ball rather than into space. It meant that the Sky Blues had to play additional passes to advance up the pitch and only really had Haji Wright as a target in the penalty area, which made Ipswich Town’s job of defending all the easier.

Coventry City’s best spell of the game came in the ten minutes leading up to Ipswich Town’s crucial second goal. The team started playing the ball faster and into more purposeful areas, with Haji Wright able to get on the end of a couple of chances and finally test Vaclav Hladky in the opposing goal. However, they were once again caught on the counter, with Ipswich switching the play to a completely unmarked Leif Davis, who carried the ball up the pitch and then found Wes Burns, evading the attention of Jake Bidwell and Jamie Allen, before producing a superb outside-of-the-boot finish which killed off any meaningful jeopardy as to the final result.

Key Moments Pass City By

The frustration from this game from a Coventry City perspective is that they had the ability to take a result from this game, despite what was largely a flat performance. The combination of Wes Burns’ absurdly well-taken goal for Ipswich Town that made it 2-0 to Matt Godden’s 73rd-minute penalty miss were the key moments upon which this game swung against the Sky Blues.

There is encouragement to take from going to one of the division’s best teams and being only a couple of key moments away from a positive result. However, there is a difference between coming close and actually claiming results. Defeat here wasn’t so much down to bad luck for Coventry City but from not being switched on enough to force those moments into their favour.

The key goal in this game was the second one, which highlighted the difference between the two teams on the day. The move begins with another Coventry City attack breaking down and then Jamie Allen getting beaten a bit too easily to allow Wes Burns to get a shot off. The finish itself is as brilliant as it is sheer ruthlessness, the result of a player having the clarity of purpose to take advantage of a momentary opening. It was in stark contrast to the Sky Blues’ attacking approach play.

There can be little issue had with Matt Godden’s process or technique when it came to taking the penalty; he looked to take the goalkeeper out of the equation and would have scored with slightly better execution. It was the period of play that led up to the penalty that highlighted Coventry City’s lack of a killer touch on the day. Godden had been in a good position to slide Haji Wright through on goal, only to under-hit the pass. Callum O’Hare then seized on the loose ball but sent in a shot more in hope than expectation, which went out for the corner from which Tatushiro Sakamoto was eventually fouled.

There were plenty of similar moments in attack from Coventry City throughout the game, but they weren’t as ruthless in their execution as Ipswich Town were. The two teams took almost exactly the same number of shots, but it was Ipswich who tested the opposing goalkeeper more often. The Sky Blues were by no means outplayed away at one of the best teams in the division, but they never looked likely to put the final result in jeopardy.

Square Pegs In Round Holes

Mark Robins’ team selection heading into this game raised some question marks among Coventry City fans, with Ta Tsuhiro Sakamoto and Matt Godden taken out of the side in favour of Yasin Ayari and Callum O’Hare. However, the manager had a good rationale for the decision, given the need to keep the team fresh at the end of a three-game week. What it highlighted was that this squad has not been built for its current 4-3-3/4-2-3-1 set-up and any changes to the first-choice team are going to lead to square pegs in round holes.

The issues caused by playing Yasin Ayari and Jamie Allen as the wide-men in a 4-2-3-1 shape were outlined earlier in this article. While Ayari and Allen didn’t necessarily play that poorly, they didn’t provide the team with the directness and penetration that orthodox wide men would provide. The reason why they were used there was because Ta Tsuhiro Sakamoto wasn’t deemed fit enough to start this game and there simply isn’t a direct replacement for the Japanese winger in the squad.

From starting the game with effectively five central midfielders on the pitch – counting Callum O’Hare as a central midfielder purely for rhetorical reasons – Coventry City ended it with just one, Ben Sheaf, with Joel Latibeaudiere, a central defender, and Jay Dasilva, a left-back, alongside him. As much as it is to the credit of Latibeaudiere and Dasilva that they showed a couple of decent moments in unfamiliar roles, that lack of familiarity limited the Sky Blues’ ability to build pressure as the game reached its closing stages.

It highlights where the team is right now after a big summer rebuild and a recent tactical shift. The three positive results that preceded this one showed that this team could well be better off in this new system, but it is clearly going to take both time and a transfer window or two to make this look fluent. Until then, if Mark Robins can’t name his strongest team, performances are likely to be similarly disjointed to this one.