For even older time sake - Coventry match report part two

My player ratings:

Davies 6: did what he had to do well enough. Quick off his line a couple of times and brave at forwards’ feet a couple of times. Not much to complain about with the goal, really. Maybe he had chances to come off his line, but the defenders in front of him should have dealt with it.

Cavare 8: impressed me all game. Hugely muscular and strong and yet with a great first touch on the ball. Laughable shot into row Z in the first half, but, hey-ho, he’ll do at least one more Scunthorpe this season no doubt. Love the way he just muscles opposition players out of the way.

Pinnock 7: another who looked very comfortable on the ball and won a lot in the air, although Jonsson Clarke-Harris won his share as well, it should be said. Definitely a quality player already and one who will continue to develop. Has a lot of the John Stones traits. Long may it continue. Maybe at fault over the goal, but Daniel will sort that out.

Lindsay 5: just looked a bit off the pace and occasionally a bit sloppy this time. I am impressed with him in general, though and am sure he will have better days and find more dominant form.

Pinillos 6: looked comfortable on the ball, but Luke Thomas was having a good game and was always a threat, so Danel did not manage to get forwards a great deal, which also helped explain why we were not getting in so many quality crosses for Kieffer up front. Thiam is a good wide striker, but not as good at crossing well.

Brown 5: a pity about the misses, but he needs encouragement and there was a lot to praise in the fact that he sniffed out the chances, was in the right position and was quick enough to latch on to them. His day will come on this showing and he has the speed down the flank which we need.

Dougall 5: maybe a bit generous with the 5, because he seemed half asleep today. How long does it take anyone to get over jet-lag after a flight from Australia? I don’t know when he travelled back, but it could explain why he wasn’t quite with it. In fact, the weakness in our central midfield was one of the factors in Coventry getting a grip on the games at times. I like what I have seen of him so far and am sure that he will be raring to put in a quality performance against Burton.

Mowatt 6: battled hard as usual, but our midfield was often under pressure from the pressing game in which Coventry at least matched us and sometime out-matched us. It put Alex under more pressure. He wasn’t totally over-awed, but he had to battle to make much headway and that was down to some high-energy play in midfield by Coventry at times we had the ball.

Thiam 6: great shot which deserved a goal. He is a very powerful wide forward – I can’t describe him as a winger in the mould of, say, Adam Hammill. He was unlucky with the shot and his power and strength are threats to any defence, but his crossing was not good, not generally his final ball and that was a factor which let us down and prevented our scoring today.

Bahre 6: nice touches and showed considerable ball-skills, which we need in this powerful side. I think that he will come good, but he needs to find the slot in the team in which he is going to work best. It looked as though he started as a second striker alongside Kieffer, but seemed to get vertigo through being farther up the pitch than usual and he gradually melted back into the midfield role in which he probably feels more comfortable. I would think that he would be better deployed in a wide position until Potts is fit and maybe after that as well. Good skills. Some lovely touches, passes and movement, but not always on the same wavelength as the others players. It will come. Keep encouraging the lad.

Moore 5: was generally well held by a combination of Hyam and Willis, both of whom had very solid games. With this system of 4-2-3-1 (I think – it was pretty fluid), we were too often looking for the route one ball to Kieffer and because he was being fairly well held, it wasn’t happening for us. It seemed a bit odd that we were trying to play it calmly on the deck at the back for several seconds, but then, rather than continuing that style through the midfield, we humped it in the air for Kieffer. The delivery to him was generally, including from Davies in goal, but Hyam and Willis did pretty well on him. We could do with two up top, so let’s hope Woodrow gets fit soon.

Overall thoughts:

On the day, the weaknesses were in midfield, where we did not hold a strong enough grip of the game. When Coventry had their good spells, we were rather too easily passed through. The defence looks solid enough, but they fluffed their lines two, or three times, including with the goal and the disallowed goal. Needs looking at to see where the errors were made. The final ball was our biggest let-down. Had it been better, including (and in particular) at set pieces, we would at least have drawn and could have won. Mowatt and Thiam seemed to take most corners and free-kicks, but they were an area in need of development on the training pitch today. Coventry’s biggest weakness was down their flanks at full back, but we did not really exploit this route enough. Thiam is a strong, pacy wide front-man who will score us a reasonable number of goals this season, but crossing the ball accurately is something he needs to work on. Brown looks as though he will come good and will still have a part to play, but I could see Bahre fitting in down the right in the coming games, with Jacob being used as an impact sub, at which he has had some success already this season. Playing Moore alone up front didn’t work today and we did not seem to have a plan B when this was misfiring. No great criticism of Moore. He had two very good defenders against, but then two on to one is never an easy match for him, which is why we need two up top.

I think that says enough. We will bulldoze a good number of teams this season and will never be a push-over for sure. Will we get automatic promotion? It all depends how the other teams in the current top six perform once injuries and suspensions start to bite. I would back us for a play-off place, certainly, and a good bet for automatic, but that’s presuming that we stay free of injuries to key players.

You Redzzzz. Nice to be well enough to watch them again.

 

A 5 for Brown seems harsh given the positions he managed to get himself into. Although to be fair I didn't go to the game.

The Ozzies did their training camp in Europe (Turkey maybe?) as most of their players play in Europe nowadays. So there shouldn't have been a discernible jet lag to speak of.

 

Thanks for that. It was hard to rate Jacob's performance more than that, but I could see the potential and we need to encourage the lad, for sure.

 

I thought the training camp was in Italy so maybe Kenny overloaded on pasta which slowed him down

 

It was in Turkey

So probably a few too many kebabs. Not that I could blame him!

 

I stand corrected, although I think I'll just sit down