- The manager delivers a fascinating interview
Coventry claimed their first Premier League win under Lampard on Saturday night with a 1-0 win over Nottingham Forest. Good news for Coventry, who have left last place in the Premier League. Bad news for Tottenham, who will land in last place if Fulham beat Manchester United later today.
READ: There came the upturn for David Møller Wolfe!
Frank Lampard used his former England teammate Wayne Rooney as an example of how Coventry have had to adapt to the Premier League in a hurry after the 1-0 win over Nottingham Forest.
The Sky Blues secured their first league win since promotion at the City Ground, where Jay Dasilva scored the only goal of the game after 57 minutes.
Coventry had their backs against the wall towards the end. Centre-back Bobby Thomas cleared acrobatically on the line before Forest striker Igor Jesus had a goal disallowed by VAR for a foul. Lampard was understandably delighted with the result, giving one of the most open interviews you’ll ever see from a Premier League manager after a game.
‘Not everyone is a Wayne Rooney…’ – Lampard opens up about Coventry squad
Speaking to Sky Sports, Lampard gave insight into how many in Coventry’s squad have prepared to play Premier League football for the first time – especially after the 5-0 loss at home to Brighton last Sunday.
“We’re a team with a lot of players who have come in and are playing their first period of Premier League football,” he said. “And I think it’s human nature. You can’t expect them to come in… not everyone is a Wayne Rooney, or these superstars, who just own it. They’ve worked hard in their careers to get here, we’re trying to get that out of them, and when they play like they did today, you can see that. And we’ve got players who have come in and are looking for match fitness, adaptation, all those things.
“So there have been some things we’ve had to deal with that have been there in the first four games. This can now hopefully give us confidence – without getting carried away. There’s so much to do and every win, every point and everything you get in this league is going to be an absolute game. But the boys have shown today that they can do it and there’s a recipe for them to keep doing it.
Lampard gives fascinating analysis after Coventry’s first PL win
“The way the players worked for it. Difficult place to get to, we knew that. After losing the first four games, I think it’s easy to feel negative… where will the next goal come, where will the next win come from. The reality is that in football you have to fight for it, you have to work for it, you have to have organisation. You create your own luck, in terms of VAR. I think it’s an offence, but when you work so hard, you deserve it.
“We know their system, we know they play it very well. So defensively it was easier to explain to the players – it’s not easy in practice.
“We’ve had a couple of games now, we’ve played some good teams, teams that press high. We felt like maybe we had played a little too direct at times, more than we wanted. So we tried to set up the team today to give ourselves a chance to play, to get Matt Grimes to settle down a little bit and get involved in our back line. We didn’t want any players playing up against them – they’ve got some big centre-backs – so Rudy [Jack Rudoni], Brandon [Thomas-Asante] and Ephron [Mason-Clark] tried to go between the lines and create problems for them, which hopefully gave us more opportunities to play.
“In the first half, I felt like we played well. I was just wondering if we had that conviction, that last bit in the final third? Do we think we’re going to score? That’s what I said to them at half-time and they just kept going, and Jay shows up – he’s been outstanding in all of our games so far – and he deserved that goal.
“We had been working on that particular pass and run in practice yesterday. Listen, if you have wingbacks in the team… I mean, it’s harder when you go from wingback to wingback, because it’s going to be a bit of a duel, so Jay has to outrun him. But the timing is perfect to do it. It’s about: can we play, and can we have that threat as well? Because when you play people between the lines, which we did a little bit centrally, you have to have a threat.
“We felt we could have a sustained threat in the game. That’s how we created our success last year – we can play and play our way through, but we can also have runners and be a little more direct in style. You can see the effectiveness of that in the goal.
Good news for Rosenborg, who have started winning football matches again this autumn
