Sideways Sammy

Coventry City came out of a trip to Ashton Gate thankful for the point in a showing against Bristol City where they were second-best for the most part.

The home side were well on top in the first-half, with Sinclair Armstrong up front getting on the end of a couple of decent chances to put his team ahead. Just when the Sky Blues looked to have held out until half-time with a clean sheet, Bristol City’s right-back, George Tanner, caught a volley perfectly after a corner was clear to put his team ahead.

The second-half wasn’t much better from a Coventry City perspective, albeit with the Bristol City threat diminished. Kasey Palmer was on hand to finish from the second-phase of a corner-kick with aplomb, with Joe Williams lucky for the home side not to be sent off immediately afterwards after appearing to swing a punch at Haji Wright right in front of the referee.

Oliver Dovin was the busier of the two goalkeepers from then on, but Brandon Thomas-Asante nearly stole the win late on when clean through on goal but was too wide to get a shot on target.

Tailoring For The Road

In both away league games this season, Coventry City have been unable to impose themselves on the game from early on and allowed their opponents to build early momentum. Off the back of a dominant performance against Oxford United, this felt like a step back and it already looks the case that the Sky Blues will have to tailor their approach to become more effective on their travels.

Coventry City are looking to be a controlled possession team this season but this game showed there’s work to do to produce that on the road. Without a particularly aggressive press, the Sky Blues didn’t have enough of the ball to play in areas that threatened Bristol City all that much. They were only tending to win the ball after Bristol City’s attacks had fizzled out, leading to short passing sequences in their own half that were not executed accurately enough to get the ball up the pitch.

If Coventry City aren’t going to press teams with any kind of aggression away from home, they need to be more direct when they get the ball. It isn’t about hoofing it forward but utilising the pace and skill of the likes of Haji Wright, Tatsuhiro Sakamoto and Milan van Ewijk to quickly turn defence into attack. The slow possession only stymies that threat the Sky Blues have in wide areas.

Furthermore, Jack Rudoni doesn’t really seem suited to playing the role of number ten/most advanced midfielder in a counter-attacking shape. The midfielder struggled to get involved here due to the team’s lack of possession and his inability to receive the ball with his back to goal on the turn. It left Josh Eccles and Victor Torp with extra work to do in midfield to get the team up the pitch and they were overwhelmed for large portions of the game as a result. Rudoni is far more effective when possession is to his feet in the opposing half but he didn’t have the opportunity to do so due to the lack of ball the team had.

It is still very early in the season, thus it’s understandable why Mark Robins would want to focus on how he wants his team to play and less on how to stop the opposition. Based on the evidence of the two away league games so far, this team doesn’t have quite the assertiveness off the ball or quality on it to impose a possession heavy style on the road. Perhaps these early showings can help point towards what needs to be done to reach that level, if this trend continues it may be time sim to consider trying a different approach on the road.

Defence Deserves Credit

It may be another league game without a clean sheet but it took an absolute screamer to prevent Coventry City ending that run here. In a game where they were under the cosh for long spells, that they restricted Bristol City to little of genuine quality suggests that maybe this current configuration in defence can be one that can gel into an effective unit over time.

The recent move has been to deploy Joel Latibeaudiere at centre-back ahead of Bobby Thomas. The defender stuck to his job well in this game of providing extra pace at the back and adding greater assurance in possession after a streak of sloppy displays on the ball from Thomas. While he provides less of a physical presence, he generally made up for it with an aggressiveness in the challenge.

However, it was Latibeaudiere that was responsible for Bristol City’s best chance of the game, getting far too tight to the powerful Sinclair Armstrong and getting outmuscled to allow a one-on-one that a more composed finisher would have scored from. It was a battle Joel Latibeaudiere was only ever going to come out second-best in, he has to learn to pick his battles better in future.

As for the rest of the defence, this was undoubtedly Oliver Dovin’s best display for the club out of the three games he’s had. After two matches in which he’s had little to do other than pick the ball out of his net, the Swede made a handful of good saves along with some important interventions in punching crosses away and coming off his line. There is still a concern as to whether he can be bullied at set-pieces, but Dovin did his part in ensuring the team won the point.

The overall defensive shape here was pretty good, with the midfield doing a better job intercepting balls than they had done in previous games. The temptation to start Jay Dasilva at left-back had to have grown stronger with another solid display from the bench that added some more quality on the ball to boot too.

There was little that could have been done about Bristol City’s goal, starting off from a very soft free-kick that the referee didn’t need to give, a good save from Oliver Dovin and then a corner that was well defended initially. The temptation is to question whether George Tanner could have been closed down quicker but if there was one player Coventry City could have been forgiven for allowing to take on a volley form outside the box, it was a right-back who hadn’t scored in nearly 80 Championship games prior to that effort.

Substitutions Need To Make More Sense

Mark Robins made changes in this game and the team went on to score afterwards, but there changes did little to change the lack of control that the Sky Blues had. Once again, it felt like Robins made changes because he could rather than with a reason behind them.

The key change was to introduce Kasey Palmer for Victor Torp, pushing Jack Rudoni to a deeper position. While Palmer grabbed the equaliser, it came from the second phase of a set-piece. Coventry City continued to lack structure in open play for much of the rest of the game, with the only other key chance coming from a long punt in the direction of Brandon Thomas-Asante, who had too much work to do to trouble the keeper with his eventual effort.

There has been an air of throwing changes at the wall thus far this season to see what works. The continued rotation between Ellis Simms and Brandon Thomas-Asante around the hour mark in particular feels a change for the sake of making the change. While Thomas-Asante adds energy up top, his struggles to challenge defenders physically or hold the ball up makes him an odd choice when the team is chasing the game and needs a presence up top. Ellis Simms is exactly the kind of striker a team would want in the penalty area when the team is looking for a goal and for all three league games, he’s been put on the bench in that exact situation.

The only time Mark Robins has genuinely changed things up with his substitutions was in the League Cup tie against the same opponents ten days ago. There, he went briefly for a 4-2-4 shape to overload the opposing defence, which freed Simms up in the box to score. While it may not always be the best choice, it is strange that he hasn’t tried anything similar yet in the league, especially now that there’s another centre-forward to pick from, in Norman Bassette.

The quality that Coventry City now have on the bench means that they will be able to bring on players who can snatch points if games are left tight like this game was. To take the team to the next level, it’s not just about having players who can make something happen out of nothing but being able to genuinely change the flow of the game and ask different questions of the opposition.