Jim Brown's Journal

Jim's column 14.1.12

2012-01-15T16:49:00.003Z

Jim McInally on the day he signed for the Sky Blues

The honour of playing in the 1987 replica shirts did littleto inspire the current Coventry City team to great heights and the club’s FACup run ended with a wimper almost before it had started. Since the club movedto the Ricoh Arena in 2005 City have won only four of the ten home FA cup ties,losing five of them, a pitiful record and a far cry from the excellent FA Cuprecord at Highfield Road. Between 1972 and 2005 the Sky Blues lost only four of41 home ties in the competition. It is a similar story in the League Cup withtwo wins and three defeats since the move to Longford seven years ago. Yearsago Birmingham City fans used to say St Andrews was cursed by a gypsy – I ambeginning to wonder if the Ricoh is cursed because City seem incapable ofbeating all but the poorest sides there.

The Cup defeat at the hands of the Saints, the second of theseason against a well-marshalled but hardly outstanding Championship side,means the Sky Blues have only reached the fifth round of the trophy twice ineleven seasons – a dreadful record when the club’s overall FA Cup history isconsidered. Over a hundred years ago the club carved out a giant-killingreputation by reaching the quarter-finals as a non-league side, beating twoFirst Division clubs on the way, which was talked about in the city for years.Then in 1963 Jimmy Hill’s team sparked the Sky Blue Revolution by reaching thelast eight as a Third Division club. Even under Iain Dowie and Chris Colemanthe club pulled off shocks in the Cup competitions – frankly, it is hard to seethe current side pulling off any shocks anywhere, whether in league or cup. Oneconsequence of relegation this season would be City having to start their FACup campaign at the First Round stage for the first time since 1963-64. Morepotential banana skins for our beloved team!

Dean Nelson alerted me to two former City players plyingtheir trade as managers in Scotland. Dean spotted former City defender JimMcInally as manager of Third Division Peterhead who faced Celtic in theScottish Cup last week. City bought Jim from Nottingham Forest in 1986. He wasone of three signings manager Don Mackay was allowed to make after the sale ofTerry Gibson to Manchester United. The blond full-back played only five gamesin a City shirt and was never on the winning side. He is best remembered forscoring the best headed own goal I've ever seen in a 0-3 defeat at Arsenal.When John Sillett & George Curtis took over they managed to sell him andfellow Scot Dave Bowman to Dundee United, where they both had successfulcareers. Within a year Jim won the first of 10 Scottish caps and between 1986and 1995 went on to play almost 300 games for Dundee United. Since retiring in1999 Jim has been a coach at Celtic and manager at Irish club Sligo Rovers,Greenock Morton, East Stirling and since October Peterhead. Sadly his teamfailed to make an impression on the mighty Celtic and lost 0-3.

The other ex-City man managing north of the border is ColinCameron. Former Scottish international Colin spent the 2006-07 season at theRicoh after joining on a free transfer from Wolves but was released in 2007whereupon he joined MK Dons. He returned to Scotland in 2008 and appeared forDundee and Arbroath before joining Cowdenbeath as player/assistant manager in2010. Last summer he was promoted to player-manager after Jimmy Nicholl left tojoin Kilmarnock and is doing a great job as Cowdenbeath are top of Division Twoand have lost only twice all season. Despite being 39 years old, Colin has beena regular in the team and on 2 January scored his first goal of the season inthe 4-0 thumping of East Fife. Last weekend his team gave Premier League Hibs afright in the Cup before going down 2-3.

Jim's column 7.1.12

2012-01-08T20:01:00.000Z

Lee Hurst, debutant at The Dell in 1991

It’s FA Cup Third Round day but sadly what was once one ofthe most exciting days in the domestic football calendar is now a mere shadowof its former self with so many clubs putting out weakened sides. The fans havegot wise to it of course and gates at FA Cup ties this weekend will continuethe downward trend see for the last 10-15 years. The decline in attendances islargely to do with the fact that clubs have such a large number of seasonticket holders these days. Most clubs charge their season ticket holders extrafor cup games and many supporters cannot afford £20 plus in the week afterChristmas. City’s home gates in the competition in recent years bear this out.The big clubs may show little respect for the famous old competition but fansof lower division clubs will turn out in force when they get a smell of a Cupupset. Just last season only 8,000 turned out at the Ricoh for the CrystalPalace third round tie, less than half the crowd a week earlier when QPR werein town. But three weeks later over 5,000 City fans travelled to St Andrews forthe fourth round tie. I read that Andy Morrell’s Wrexham are taking over 2,000fans to Brighton for their big day out. Similarly I would expect SalisburyCity, Tamworth and Stevenage to have the biggest away followings in theirhistory for plum ties at Sheffield United, Everton and Reading respectively.The romance of the FA Cup lives on!

Today’s gate against Southampton will be affected by theSave Our City-organised protest but unless there is a sizeable following fromthe South Coast I wouldn’t expect the crowd to be much higher than lastseason’s Palace gate.

City and the Saints have been drawn against each other threetimes previously in the competition and Saints have the edge having progressedtwice to City’s once. It is exactly 100 years ago that City won the first FACup encounter, 2-0 at the Dell. ‘Boxer’ Turnbull and Harry Parkes scored thegoals in front of a 12,500 crowd. City, who had a reputation as giantkilling inthose days, by virtue of their famous 1910 Cup run, were rewarded with a plumhome tie with First Division Manchester United but in front of a 17,000Highfield Road crowd were thumped 5-1.

The second encounter with the Saints came in the first roundin 1959 when the clubs were vying with each other for promotion from DivisionThree. City failed to capitalise on home advantage and were held 1-1 and got a5-1 hammering in the replay at the Dell. It was a similar story on the lastoccasion the clubs were drawn against each other, in the fourth round in 1991.An Alan Shearer penalty cancelled out a Brian Kilcline goal in a 1-1 draw atHighfield Road and an injury-hit Sky Blues travelled to the Dell more in hopethan conviction. Missing key players Trevor Peake, Paul Edwards, David Speedieand Kevin Gallacher, they were further hampered by an early injury to SteveOgrizovic. Goals from Jimmy Case and Rod Wallace sent Saints through to roundfive but City were lucky to get away with only a two-goal defeat. One Cityyoungster, midfielder Lee Hurst, made his debut as a substitute that night,coming on to play out of position at left back.

The defeat at West Ham made it 14 away league games withouta victory for the Sky Blues and some readers wondered if a record was gettingclose. The club record is 28 away games without a win set over two seasonsbetween January 1924 and April 1925. The latter season, 1924-25, saw Cityrelegated from Division Two – hope that’s not an omen. The post-war record is25 set between November 1954 and December 1955, whilst the worst run sincerelegation from the Premiership was 16 between March and December 2005 whenMicky Adams was in charge.

Jim's column 31.12.11

2012-01-02T12:52:00.000Z

The donkey-kick outlawed in 1971.

Andy Thorn’s Sky Blues finally came good on Monday with aheart-warming Christmas victory over Bristol City thanks to Gary Deegan’ssecond half goal. Today sees the final game in what has been the most miserableyear in the club’s Football League history. Monday’s victory was only theseventh League victory of the year and another win is required over Brightontoday if we are to avoid the club record low for a year. A win would take thepoints total for the year to 40. In 2003 Gary McAllister’s team managed eightwins from 46 games and accumulated 42 points.

Before City were relegated from the Premier League in 2001they had an outstanding Christmas home record. In the 48 years between 1953 and2001 only five sides lowered City’s colours at Highfield Road in games playedbetween Christmas Eve and New Years Day. In that time City played almost fortygames. The victors were:

1979-80 NottmForest 0-3

1981-82 WestBrom 0-2

1984-85 WestHam 1-2

1985-86 Ipswich 0-1

1994-95 Tottenham 0-4

No visiting side won at the famous old ground between 1953and 1979 and there were some memorable Christmas games including the 5-4 overNorwich in 1977, the 3-2 wins over Manchester United (1997) and Arsenal (1999)and the famous 3-0 battering of Aston Villa in 1992.

Since 2001 however City’s excellent Christmas form hasdeserted them and of twelve home games in eleven seasons the Bristol win wasonly the fifth victory with five defeats and two draws.

The victory ended a terrible run of results, eleven gameswithout a win. That run equalled the poor run at the end of the 2009-10 seasonwhich cost Chris Coleman his job but is not the worst in recent memory. In 2003City went 16 games without a win straddling the 2002-03 season and the start ofthe following season.

Bemoaning City’s dreadful position George Ling emailedasking what the record lowest points total is in the Championship. I haven’tgot all my record books to hand but can confirm that the lowest total since thedivision was increased to 24 clubs (and therefore 46 games) in the late 1980s,was 26 by Stockport County in 2001-02. By coincidence that season Stockportwere the first club City met after being relegated from the Premiership – Citywon 2-0 at Edgeley Park. In 1983-84 Cambridge United finished bottom of the oldDivision Two with 24 points from 42 games.

Welsh club Bangor City’s historian Huw Pritchard was intouch with me recently after discovering a programme of a game between Bangorand the Sky Blues from 1971. He wanted information about the friendly gameplayed on 17 May and I was able to furnish him with some details.

City lined up as follows: Eric McManus: Jimmy Holmes, ChrisCattlin, Ernie Machin, Bill Asprey, Brian Alderson, Ernie Hunt, Billy Rafferty,John O'Rourke, Willie Carr, Dennis Mortimer. Asprey, a former Stoke Citydefender, was City’s first team coach at the time.

Bangor, then a top non-league side playing in the NorthernPremier league, strengthened their side by including several guests from theFirst Division. Manchester United’s Shay Brennan, Manchester City’s Tony Book,Liverpool’s Ron Yeats and former England captain Jimmy Armfield (Blackpool)evened up the teams and helped Bangor to a 4-2 victory. Their goals were scoredby McGowan, Conde and Fleming (2) while Rafferty and O’Rourke replied in frontof an estimated 5,000 crowd. According to match reports Willie Carr and ErnieHunt attempted the donkey-kick, possibly for the last time in a public matchbefore it was outlawed that summer.

Christmas Quiz answers

2011-12-26T10:38:00.002Z

Quiz 2011

Answers

Sect 1

Brighton’s American Express Community Stadium
Lukas Jutkiewicz
Roy O’Donovan
Carl Baker
Matt Mills
Josh Ruffels
Leicester City 21,102
Andy Gray (Barnsley)
Northampton Town
Blackpool

Sect 2

Ronnie Farmer
Scott Dann
Michael O’Neill
Patrick Suffo (Cameroon)
Colin Cameron
Robbie Keane
Andrew Whing
Darren Huckerby
Dion Dublin
Adam Virgo

Sect 3

Billy Frith
Brentford and Fulham
Roy Dwight (Gravesend)
Peterborough
He got married
Alan Dicks
Millwall
George Hudson
8-1
The game was televised on CCTV at Highfield Road and the shirts were chosen to distinguish the teams in the black and white transmission

Sect 4

1883
1919
1910
1981
2005
1983
1997
1995
1983
2006

Sect 5

Micky Adams
Martin O’Neill
Frankie Bunn
Bobby Gould
John Sillett
Micky Adams
Steve Kean (unless he is sacked this week!)
Terry Butcher
Aidy Boothroyd
Roland Nilsson

Christmas Quiz 2011

2011-12-26T10:34:00.002Z

Merry Christmas to all my readers. Hope you enjoy the annual quiz

CHRISTMAS QUIZ 2011

1. THE SEASON SO FAR

1. Which stadium did the Sky Blues visit for the first timeearlier this season?

2. Richard Keogh has played every minute of every league game forthe Sky Blues this season, but which other player has also done so?

3. Who scored City’s goal in the League Cup defeat at Bury?

4. Two City players have received red cards this season. GaelBigirimana is one, who is the other?

5. Which former City loanee appeared for Reading at the RicohArena?

6. Which City player made his club debut as a sub at SelhurstPark this season?

7. Which club has attracted the biggest crowd to the Ricoh Arenathis season?

8. Two opposing players have scored twice in the same gameagainst the Sky Blues. Darius Henderson (Millwall) is one, who is the other?

9. From which club did Chris Dunn join Coventry in the summer?

10. Which club failed to win at City again this season and haven’tdone so since 1937?

2. WHICH FORMER COVENTRY CITY PLAYER…..

…coached City’s Youth team to the FA Youth Cup final in 1970?
…was laid low with a ruptured testicle last week?
…managed Shamrock Rovers to the Europa Cup group stages this season?
…won a gold medal for Football at the 2000 Olympic Games?
… is the manager of Scottish club Cowdenbeath?
…helped LA Galaxy win the MLS Cup recently?
…is currently playing at full-back for Oxford United?
…had his biography ‘Through Adversity to Great Heights’ published this year?
…is a musician who accompanied Ocean Colour Scene at a concert at the University of East Anglia earlier this year?
…spent last season at Yeovil and is now vice-captain at Bristol Rovers?

3. THE JIMMY HILL ERA

Who did JH succeed as manager of Coventry City?
Which two London clubs did JH play for?
Who, in January 1962, was JH’s first signing for the club?
From which club did JH sign Terry Bly in the summer of 1962?
What personal event in JH’s life occurred in January 1962?
Who was JH’s assistant manager for most of his time at City?
Which club did City beat on the final day of the 1966-67 season to clinch the Second Division championship?
In 1963 which City player scored a hat-trick on his debut against Halifax Town?
In 1964-65 City were beaten in the quarter finals of the League Cup by First Division Leicester City. What was the score?
Why did City wear red striped shirts in their away game at Cardiff in 1965?

4. INWHICH YEAR?

..were Singers FC formed?
..did City join the Football League?
..did City have a record crowd of 19,000 for an FA Cup quarter final against Everton?
..did Highfield Road become an all-seater stadium?
..did Highfield Road close and the club moved to the Ricoh?
..did Jimmy Hill leave as chairman?
..did Dion Dublin score a hat-trick against Chelsea?
..did Ron Atkinson take over from Phil Neal as manager?
..did Danny Thomas become City’s second England international?
..did Dennis Wise sign for the Sky Blues?

5. MANAGERS & Coaches

1. Which former Coventry City manager is currently managing PortVale?

2. Which current Premiership manager almost joined City as aplayer in a part exchange with Mick Ferguson in 1979?

3. Which former Coventry City coach was recently sacked asassistant manager at Rochdale?

4. Which City manager allegedly resigned in the toilets at LoftusRoad?

5. Which former Coventry City manager had a brother Peter whoplayed for England?

6. Which Coventry City boss manager as a player, was thefirst ever Premiership player sent off in 1992?

7. Who is the former City coach currently a first-team manager inthe Premiership?

8. Which former Coventry City manager was recently inducted intothe Scottish Football Museum’s Hall of Fame?

9. Whichformer Coventry City manager was recently appointed manager of NorthamptonTown?

10. Which former Coventry City manager is currently manager of FCCopenhagen?

Jim's Column 17.12.11

2011-12-18T23:09:00.000Z

Billy McDonald pictured (far right) in 1937

Last week’s column with my observations about relegation andthe small number of points acquired to date by the Sky Blues depressed a numberof readers. So this week I will try and be a bit more up beat and frivolous.

In my absence from Saturday lunchtime sessions in theWhitefriars Inn my friends are getting very frivolous. Last week they got todiscussing the number of City’s great players’ names started with HU. There’sWillie Humphries, Ernie Hunt, Darren Huckerby, not to mention arguably the twogreatest ever, George Hudson and Tommy Hutch. My chums set about coming up witha team of HU’s and asked for my assistance.

The conclusion was that we could put out a great forwardline but defence would be tricky. Then Dave Long pointed out that StephenHughes had once played most of a game in goal after Ian Bennett got a red cardand therefore in the absence of a ‘real’ goalie starting HU, Hughesy got thevote! The casual midfielder wouldn’t have got into the side in his normalposition anyway.

No true full backs’ names started HU but back in 1991 LeeHurst made his debut as a full back in an FA Cup debacle at Southampton’s Dell(Not an omen, I hope), so he could play at number 3. Ernie Hunt played a numberof times in midfield so could get the number 4 shirt and 'Sailor' Hunter was acentre-half from the 1920s and gets the 5 shirt. Jailbird Lee Hughes wouldn’tget a game up front so he could play at right back and the left-footed MichaelHughes (one of Dowie’s useless Palace refugees) could play at 6. The teamtherefore lines up in an old 2-3-5 formation, as follows:-

Goal
Stephen Hughes

Right Back LeftBack
Lee Hughes Lee Hurst

Right Half CentreHalf Left Half
Ernie Hunt BillyHunter Michael Hughes

Outside Right Inside Right Centre Forward Inside Left Outside Left
Willie Humphries Darren Huckerby George Hudson Steve Hunt TomHutchison.

The attack would be so potent that we probably wouldn't need much of a defenceanyway.

David Kite is a long-suffering City fan whose dedicationgoes back to the 1940s. He contacted me recently to tell me about the Red Lionpub, which is located on Corley Moor. He tells me that in the donkey box(I don’t know what that is) on the Left Hand side of the entrance are twopicture frames, which contain Churchman cigarette cards of eight famousfootball players from the 1930s. Two players are of particular interest to himand he asked me for more information.

One is a certain W. McDonald of Coventry City, whom hebelieves was a Scottish international before the war and the other is the greatEngland centre forward Tommy Lawton, who played for Burnley, Everton, Chelseaand was subsequently transferred in 1947 to Notts County in the old ThirdDivision South whilst still an England player for an English record transferfee of £20,000. David wondered if the great Lawton ever appeared atHighfield Road.

Let me deal with Billy McDonald first. Hailing fromCoatbridge in Scotland he was an inside forward who joined City in the summerof 1936 from Tranmere Rovers and stayed three seasons. In 1936 City had justwon promotion from Division Three and manager Harry Storer saw the Scot as theideal replacement for Jock Lauderdale who was showing signs of his age. Billymade 96 appearances at inside forward and scored 23 goals and was a member ofthe team that was unbeaten in the first fifteen games of the 1937-38 season.That team looked set for promotion to Division One but ran out of steam afterChristmas and finished fourth. Billy had previously played for Airdrie andManchester United. He left City for Plymouth in 1939 just before the warstarted but retired from playing about 12 months later. He died in Scotland in1979, aged 71. Sadly, David, he never played for Scotland. The picture showsBill on the right with his City colleagues at the pre-season photo shoot (l tor): Walter Metcalf, Bill Morgan and Clarrie Bourton.

Lawton was a big star before, during and after the SecondWorld War. He made his First Division debut for Burnley, aged 16 and was soonon his way to Everton for £6,500, a massive fee for a teenager. A prolificscorer, especially with his head, he won his first England cap two weeks afterhis 19^th birthday in 1938 and scored in each of his first sixinternationals. His 34 goals in the 1938-39 season helped Everton to win theLeague Championship. After the war he joined Chelsea but failed to settle inLondon. David is right in saying that he moved from Chelsea to Third DivisionNotts County and in six seasons at Notts he scored over 100 goals and helpedCounty to promotion to Division Two in 1950. In total he scored 235 goals in383 league games and 22 goals in 23 full England internationals. I believe heplayed once at Highfield Road for Notts County, in 1951-52, and scored in a 2-0away win.

Jim's column 10.12.11

2011-12-11T18:31:00.001Z

City team at Coventry station leaving for Denmark 1946. Alf Setchell is kneeling on the right.

Coventry City’s poor run of form continued at Fratton Parkon Saturday with the division’s financial basket-case gaining a much neededthree points with a 2-1 victory. If, as many believe, Pompey are docked tenpoints because their parent company have gone into administration (andSouthampton set the precedent for this three years ago), then they will becomebasement bedfellows with the Sky Blues. Unfortunately the way things are goingwe will need two more clubs to go into administration in order to avoid thedrop.

The defeat sent City to the foot of the table, somewherethey haven’t been since 1996. On 7 December 1996 City lost 1-2 at home toTottenham and propped up the whole Premier League. Ten days later DarrenHuckerby inspired a famous win over Newcastle and a further three successivewins lifted City into mid-table. A spring slump however saw the Sky Bluessucked back into the relegation dog-fight and it needed wins at Anfield and atTottenham (famously on the last day) to avoid the drop.

This season the statistics are not good for the Sky Blues.In the last eleven seasons only four clubs in this division have had 13 pointsor less from the first twenty games, and all have been relegated. Theunfortunate four were:

Stockport 2001-02 12 points

Brighton 2002-03 12 points

Rotherham 2004-05 8 points

Southend 2006-07 12 points

In an effort to be positive I should point out that City’sworst 20-game start to a season during the same period (before this season) wasin 2005-06 when, despite the move to the Ricoh Arena, only 18 points were inthe bag at this stage. Then Micky Adams’ inspired signings of Don Hutchison andDennis Wise lifted the season from the disastrous to the ecstatic with a finalplacing of eighth. Me thinks Andy Thorn needs to find a new Dennis Wise!

2011 has been a miserable year to be a City fan with beforetoday only six league wins recorded. This is heading to be a new all-time lowunless two wins are gained before the New Year. The current record low is eightin 2003 when City managed just one win in 24 games between January 1 andSeptember 13. Gary McAllister’s team managed to win a further seven games outof the remaining 22 that year to reach the heady total of eight victories. That2002-03 side was undoubtedly the worst City team I had ever seen and would havebeen relegated if the season had gone on two more games. Anyone who thinks thecurrent team is the worst ever couldn’t have been around in 2003!

My brief obituary of Alf Setchell last week prompted hissons John and Alan to contact me to correct some of my facts and add some moreof their own. Alf, who sadly passed away two weeks ago, was born on 29 October1924, therefore was 87. He had made his debut as an eighteen year old in 1942in a 1-0 home win over Walsall but his wartime service in the Royal Navy robbedhim of what might have been a very successful football career. In addition tohis 18 war-time appearances for City he also appeared as a guest in the war forSouthport and Morton and possibly Rangers whilst on active service in the Navy.

After the war he was on City’s books until 1947 and aregular for the reserves in 1946-47 before joining Kidderminster Harriers, thena Southern League club. According to John, Kidderminster offered him more moneythan Coventry!

I was incorrect in saying that he played for LockheedLeamington but he did appear briefly for Hereford United, another SouthernLeague side, before becoming part of a strong Bedworth Town team that won theBirmingham Combination in 1948-49 and 1949-50. The Bedworth team includedseveral former City players including Stan Kelley (player-manager), Jack Evansand Norman Smith, with ex-City man Bob Ward as trainer. One of Alf’s playingcolleagues at Bedworth in 1953-54 was Jim Brockbank (from Earlsdon) who alsocontacted me this week to express his condolences and remind me that ‘Shad’Richards, the goalkeeper in that team, also passed away recently.

Outside of football, Alf worked at Dunlop Aviation Divisionfor a number of years before being elected to the position of Secretary of theUnicorn Social Club, Holbrook Lane, in 1972. He held this position untilhis retirement in 1993. He was therefore well known not only in the Holbrooksarea but also in the wider Warwickshire branch of the Club and Institute Unionorganisation.

Jim's column 3.12.11

2011-12-04T11:45:00.001Z

CCFC photographed in Denmark on tour in 1946. Setchell is far right in the front row.

City’s trip to the South Coast and the first visit to thenew Amex Stadium ended in defeat and disappointment for the 1900 City fans (thebiggest away league following for almost two years) who made the long trip. Onebright spot was the debut of Gary Gardner who scored after just eight minutesof his debut in a City shirt. According to my records he is only the fourthloanee to score on his first outing for the club. The three others are LeeMills (2001-02 v Crystal Palace – almost ten years ago to the day), JohnnieJackson (2002-03 v West Brom) and Micky Quinn (1992-93 v Manchester City).Quinn scored twice on his debut in a 2-3 loss and like Mills had his loanturned into a permanent transfer within weeks. Gardner’s goal however will godown as the fastest by a City loanee. Gary was also the first City debutantscorer for over four years – the last being Julian Gray on the opening day atBarnsley in 2007.

Cov kids Billy Gray and Alf Setchell were both on CoventryCity’s books in the period immediately after the Second World War. This week Ihad news of both of them but very sad news in the case of Alf. Two weeks ago hewas badly burned in a fire at his home in Holbrooks Lane and has subsequentlydied of his injuries.

Recent knowledge of Alf is vague but I do know that he wassecretary for a local football team and must have been in his mid-80s – havingappeared for City during the World War Two.

He was one of numerous good local players who filled induring the war for City when many of the first team squad were on activeservice in the hostilities. He made 12 appearances on the left wing in the1942-43 season playing alongside several City legends including George Mason,Alf Wood, Billy Frith and George Lowrie. City had a strong team - only three ofhis twelve games were lost - and Setchell managed one goal in a 2-0 win atFilbert Street. Another three appearances were made in 1943-44, with one goalin a 4-1 win at Notts County. He then disappeared off the scene for almost twoyears before popping up in April 1946 and making three further appearances nearthe end of the transitional regional league season.

In May 1946 City travelled to Denmark for some friendlymatches and Alf was in the 17-man squad who travelled across a war-ravagedEurope and scored a goal against crack Danish side Aarhus. (see picture). He must have been confident of being in thefirst team squad when the first post-war season kicked off in August 1946 buthe never played for the first team again. I believe he may have played forLockheed Leamington at some stage after the war but I do know he lived inCoventry for the rest of his life.

Alan Clowes gave me the latest news on Billy Gray. Billy,who celebrates his 80^th birthday today, moved to Northumberland withhis wife, Dot, a few years ago, to be closer to his family, but missesCoventry. He was a couple of years younger than Setchell and was one of anamazing crop of talented youngsters who played for Modern Machines FC which wasin effect City’s youth team in the late 1940s. The team were virtuallyunbeatable in the Coventry leagues and saved the club thousands of pounds inthe transfer market and Billy was a contemporary of players like Lol Harvey,Reg Matthews, Peter Hill, Frank Austin and Gordon Nutt. Billy played atwing-half where there was stiff competition for a first team place with DonDorman, Harry Barratt, Harvey and others vying for a place. Billy got hischance in October 1951 playing at right half in a 1-1 home draw with BirminghamCity. City’s form that autumn was not dissimilar to this season and the result,City’s fourth home game without a win, left them 21^st in the SecondDivision table. At the end of the season City were relegated.

Billy did enough to keep his place for a visit to Leicester thefollowing week but the 1-3 defeat at Filbert Street marked the end of Gray’sfirst team career. He appeared many times for the reserves in a six-year careerat the club but in 1954 he transferred to Kettering Town before reverting tolocal football with Morris Motors a year later.

Hopefully I can persuade Billy to sign up to the FormerPlayers Association and get him to the Ricoh for a game soon.

Former City player Paul Furlong was spotted playing for StAlbans City at Leamington’s New Windmill last weekend. The Londoner who playedfor City under Terry Butcher and Don Howe in the 1991-92 season, is now43-years old.

Jim's column 26.11.11

2011-11-28T16:44:00.001Z

Two tough home games in a week saw City end their dismal runof home defeats with a hard-won point against Cardiff City following defeat tothe Hammers on Saturday. The point enabled the team to avoid an unwanted recordas four home defeats in a row would have been the worst run since the move tothe Ricoh in 2005. You have to go back to the last winter at Highfield Road tofind a worse run; in the period December 2004 to February 2005 City sufferedfive successive home defeats, as first Peter Reid, then his replacement MickyAdams failed to win a game. Cardiff meanwhile continue to be a thorn in City’sside. The Bluebirds have not lost at the Ricoh since April 2006 and have wonthree and drawn three of the games since. Former City Academy youngster PeterWhittingham continued his excellent goalscoring record against the Sky Blueswith his fifth goal in five seasons.

Saturday’s gate of 20,524 was the second highest of theseason (behind the 21,102 who watched the opening day derby with Leicester) andincluded a massive following from East London, numbering 6,254. Italian-basedCity fan Federico Farcomeni alerted me to the fact that the BBC incorrectlydescribed West Ham’s large support as the biggest away following since theRicoh Arena opened in 2005. I’m not sure where they got their information frombut the cockney hordes numbered less than lastseason’s Leeds fans (6,274) and West Brom’s fans in 2007 (6,331). The Hammers' following did top Leicester's on the opening day (6,201).

This week marks the 50^th anniversary of thearrival of Jimmy Hill as manager of Coventry City. On the 25^thNovember the club were knocked out of the FA Cup by lowly Southern League sideKings Lynn and on 28 November manager Billy Frith and his backroom staff weresacked and Hill appointed as manager. The Kings Lynn defeat is always talked ofas the game which changed the club’s history but in actual fact Frith’s fatehad been sealed earlier, possibly as far back as September 1961 when City weredumped out of the League Cup by Workington. Either way a home league defeat toCrystal Palace a week before the Kings Lynn game was the final straw forchairman Derrick Robins and it was at a lunch at the chairman’s Leamington homedays later that Hill was offered the job. Hill asked for time to consider theoffer and took up an offer to attend the Kings Lynn game. In his autobiographyJH describes events:

‘For a number of reasons it was thought prudent to keep myintended visit to Highfield Road a secret. A ticket for the far stand arrivedin the post, not the stand in which the director’s box was situated. I sneakedinto my seat, tucked my collar up around my ears and pulled a trilby hat welldown over my forehead in the hopes that few people would notice me… not easywith a nationally known chin and here and there came acknowledgements, andstifled gasps of surprise that I should be at Highfield Road, the reason noteasy for them to detect.’

You can imagine in the modern day social networking sitesbuzzing with this sort of news and Hill’s presence at the game would have beencommunicated to all and sundry by Saturday evening but it is clear that Frithhad no inkling of what was coming.

On the day following the Kings Lynn game Hill telephoned ashocked Robins to tell him he had decided to accept his offer. Robins hadassumed that the appalling performance would have dissuaded Hill from takingthe job. Hill, who later said he had been courted by several clubs prior toCoventry’s approach, insisted that he had the power to appoint his own coachingstaff. Thus began a partnership that would take Coventry City from ThirdDivision strugglers to the First Division in five exciting seasons.

Long suffering South East-based fan George Ling is delightedto read that the club have recognised the Southern Professional Floodlit Cupsuccess in 1960. He watched many of the games in the run to the final andpoints out that along with promotion from Division 4 in 1959 it was the onlyhigh spot pre-JH. He has mislaid his programme for the final against West Hamand wondered who scored the goals. George, Ron Hewitt scored both City’s goalsin the 2-1 victory. City’s line up was as follows: Arthur Lightening, DonBennett, Frank Kletzenbauer, Brian Nicholas, George Curtis, Frank Austin,Johnny Stephens, Ron Hewitt, Ray Straw, Peter Hill, Alan Daley.

Jim's column 19.11.11

2011-11-21T12:30:00.001Z

After the international break weekend it is back to leagueaction this weekend and the visit of West Ham United today for what is theHammers’ first ever league visit to the Ricoh Arena. In 2007-08 they won here2-1 in a League Cup tie, ending what had looked a promising Cup run thatseason, following City’s memorable victory at Old Trafford in the previousround.

Several people have pointed out to me that the number ofCoventry-born players in the Sky Blues’ squad has increased this season andwondered when the club put out a side containing the most Cov kids. Fellow Cityhistorian Paul O’Connor tells me that in the club’s league history (that datesback to 1919) the club have only had 44 players who were born in the city –this excludes players born in Bedworth, Nuneaton or other local towns. Therehave been a number of famous ones including Reg Matthews (the first and onlyCoventrian to play for England), Bobby and Trevor Gould, Gary McSheffrey, KirkStephens and Marcus Hall but there have been few periods when there was a glutof local players. After World War 2 the squad had a number of locals includingRon Cox, Les Latham, Dennis Simpson and Stan Smith but all four never appearedtogether. Then in early 1950s the club’s youth team, playing under the name ofModern Machines produced quite a few including Matthews, Brinley Thomas, DerekSpencer and Billy Gray, and they combined with many youngsters signed fromHarry Storer’s heartland of Derbyshire including Lol Harvey, Frank Austin andRon Waldock saved the club thousands of pounds in the transfer market.

Now, suddenly, the Sky Blues have half a dozen ‘locals’ andthe Southampton game ended with four of them on the pitch together. SubstituteJordan Willis joined Cyrus Christie, Conor Thomas and the ‘old man’, GaryMcSheffrey to set what I believe is a club record of four Coventry-born playersin the team. If Jordan Clarke’s injury problems clear up quickly and strikerCallum Wilson’s progress continues we could see the city of Coventry supplyingover half the first team.

Readers of the Coventry City official programme may havenoticed an amendment to the Club Honours section on page three of theprogramme. Bedworth-based City fan Bob Howe contacted me a while ago suggestingthat recognition be given to the club’s success in winning the SouthernProfessional Floodlit Cup in 1960. the competition was played between clubsfrom the south of England from around 1955 when floodlights became commonamongst clubs. It was discontinued in 1960 because of the introduction of theLeague Cup, meaning that City were the last winners of the competition. In amemorable cup run City, then a Third Division outfit, defeated Southend, FirstDivision Fulham, Southampton and another First Division club, West Ham, 2-1 inthe final before a 17,000 Highfield Road crowd. As a result of Bob’scorrespondence the club have now included the Cup win in the list ofhonours.

Jim's Column 12.11.11

2011-11-14T19:10:00.001Z

Coventry City’s poor form continued last week with a homedefeat to the league leaders Southampton. Even with the club’s diverse recentrecords this was still a surprise to me as City have a tremendous recordagainst the Saints. Saturday’s match was the 55^th league encounterbetween the two clubs in Coventry and the victory was only Saints’ seventh winin the city, and the first since the opening day of the season in 1999. Between 1950 and 1987 the Saints travelledto Highfield Road for 26 league encounters and failed to win a single game withCity winning eighteen games including heavy defeats in Saints’ two promotionseasons 1959-60 (4-1) and 1965-66 (5-1). The latter being the momentous gamewhen George Hudson scored his memorable goal by flicking the ball over Saints’centre-half Tony Knapp and racing around the statuesque stopper to volley home.

Now the Saints are setting the pace in the Championship withan interesting blend of experienced players and youth from one of the most productiveyouth schemes in the country that in recent years has helped fund the club’srevival with sales of starlets like Theo Walcott, Gareth Bale and AlexOxlade-Chamberlain.

Another City youngster made his debut as a substitute lastweekend. Jordan Willis is just a couple of months past his 17^thbirthday but his appearance in a first-team shirt earns him a place in the topten youngest City debutants which now reads thus:-

1. Jonson Clark-Harris (Aug 2010) 16 years 20 days
2. Ben Mackey (Apr 2003) 16 years 167 days
3. Gary McSheffrey (Apr 1999) 16 years 198 days
4. Brian Hill (Apr 1958) 16 years 273 days
5. Isaac Osbourne (Apr 2003) 16 years 308 days
6. Perry Suckling (Aug 1982) 16 years 320 days
7. George Curtis (Apr 1956) 16 years 351 days
8. Dietmar Bruck (Apr 1961) 17 years 9 days

9. Conor Thomas (Jan 2011) 17 years 71 days

10=. Jordan Willis (Nov 2011) 17 years 73 days
10=. Colin Holder (Apr 1962) 17 years 73 days

Coventry-born Jordan, who is one day younger than ConorThomas when Conor made his debut as a substitute against Crystal Palace in theFA Cup in January, is the third youngster to join the top 10 in the lastfifteen months.

Jim Ridley wrote to me recently and remembers that in the1970s he watched Northern Ireland play a full international against Portugal atHighfield Road. He cannot remember the details and asked me to refresh hismemory and tell him if the great Eusebio played for Portugal.

The game, a World Cup qualifying game, was played atHighfield Road on 28 March 1973. The civilunrest in Northern Ireland at the time forced the Irish Football Association toseek alternative venues for their home games and this was the first game playedoutside the province. The Irish team featured several famous names includingTottenham’s world-class goalkeeper Pat Jennings, former City midfielder DaveClements, who had left City eighteen months earlier to join SheffieldWednesday, and Martin O’Neill of Nottingham Forest who would later become avery successful manager with Leicester and Celtic. Sadly George Best hadannounced his international retirement and did not play. The Portuguese, whilstnot the force they had been at the 1966 World Cup, were favourites to qualifyfrom a group that also included Bulgaria and Cyprus, the latter had severelydented Northern Ireland’s chances by beating them in Cyprus a month earlier.Two stars of the 1966 Portugal team were still in the team, Eusebio, the starstriker and Simoes, a classy winger in his day. Eusebio scored a penaltyequalising O’Neill’s earlier goal and the game, watched by a crowd of 11,273,ended 1-1. Later the Irish played internationals at Fulham’s Craven Cottage,Hillsborough, Anfield and Goodison Park.

On 16 March 1968 two brothers were taken to Highfield Roadfor the younger one’s birthday treat to watch the Sky Blues play ManchesterUnited for the first time in the First Division. The younger brother Paul Moseswas a United fan and emailed me with his memories of the game. They were on theterraces and as the crowd got bigger and bigger (the attendance was 47,111, thesecond highest in the club’s history) the police allowed children on to therunning track. City won a memorable 2-0 victory over the Reds who were threegames away from lifting the European Cup but whose supporters blamed the defeaton a long midweek trip to Poland. The result was a crucial one for both clubsas City eventually avoided relegation by just one point whilst United werepipped at the Championship post by their Manchester rivals by two points. Adifferent outcome that day would have relegated City and handed the title toUnited.

Paul and his brother Peter wanted to know City’s line upfrom that game. It was as follows:

Glazier: Bruck, Cattlin, Machin, Setters, Clements,Hannigan, Hunt, Martin, Tudor, Carr. Ernie Hunt and Chris Cattlin made their debuts for the Sky Bluesand Ernie Machin and Maurice Setters scored City’s goals.

Jim's column 5.11.11

2011-11-06T18:00:00.000Z

Millwall has never been a happy hunting ground for CoventryCity and Tuesday night proved to be no exception. It is 56 years since City wonin Docklands – Boxing Day 1955 to be precise – and 16 subsequent league and cupgames have failed to yield a victory. Millwall’s supporters already had areputation back then and Jesse Carver’s team (it was his penultimate game asmanager before a premature return to the Italian Serie A) upset them with aprofessional display, assisted by a stunning display of goalkeeping from RegMatthews as he edged nearer to his first England cap. Matthews kept therampaging Lions out and goals from Alan Moore and Ken McPherson ensured a 2-0win. After the match Reg was the hero again – jumping off a besieged team coachto confront some gruesome dockers. Even in City’s Second Division 1966-67promotion season City failed to win in New Cross, losing to a Joe Broadfootgoal.

Coventry City have now completed one third of the season andit is time for a review of their record. The Millwall defeat means they havegained only 12 points from 15 games – a poor record, which if replicated overthe season would almost certainly mean relegation with 36 points. It is theworst first third of the season since City were relegated from the Premiershipin 2001. In the last ten seasons City have averaged around 21 points from thefirst 15 games – the best, 31 in 2001-02 (under Roland Nilsson), the worst, 15in 2004-05 (under Peter Reid). City, of course, are generally good starters andhave a tendency to fall apart after Christmas, so here’s hoping previousseasons’ trends are reversed this term.

This start is the worst since the 2000-01 relegation seasonwhen they clocked 12 points from 15 games – but then it was more serious as theywere almost halfway through the 38-game season. The worst start in modern timeswas under Ron Atkinson in 1996-97 when they gathered a measly ten points from15 games. That season they won only one of their first sixteen games and bythen Big Ron had already paid the price. Fortunately his replacement GordonStrachan pulled City out of their nose-dive and kept them up on the final dayat White Hart Lane.

Their worst ever start, which hopefully will never beenrepeated, was that horrible first season in the Football League in 1919 – whereso many of the dreadful club records reside. That season they gained a pitifulthree points from the first 15 games but still managed to survive the drop butonly because they bribed their opponents!

Darius Henderson is in a rich scoring vein at the momentwith 8 goals in 11 games and six in his last three. Darius is no stranger tothe Sky Blues having netted for Watford against them in 2005-06 and again in2007-08. He was a key member of the Watford team promoted via the play-offs inthe former season and was the strike partner of Marlon King. From being one ofthe top scorers in the Championship he had a torrid time in the Premiership –failing to net until January 2007 and scoring only three goals all season. Here-discovered his scoring form for the Hornets back in the Championship beforea big money move to Sheffield United in 2008. He failed to live up to his‘star’ rating at Bramall Lane and then suffered a serious leg injury which kepthim out of the side for most of last season. By the time he was fit the Bladeswere as good as relegated and his wages were presumably too high for LeagueOne. Millwall took a punt and have been richly rewarded.

Finally, a big thank you to all who supported and helped metwo weeks ago at my book launch in Coventry. The management and staff ofWaterstones, G-Casino and Coventry City were fabulous. Thanks also to myfriends from the Former Players Association, especially Billy Bell and theformer players who turned out on the day. Not forgetting Dean Nelson for hisexcellent 1960s video. It was a great day and I appreciate everybody’s efforts.

Jim's column 22.10.11

2011-10-29T15:12:00.001+01:00

City’s run of good home formcontinued last Saturday with a 1-0 win over fellow strugglers NottinghamForest. Since losing to Leicester City on the opening day of the season the SkyBlues are unbeaten in five home games, with two wins and three draws. Thecurrent run is the best the club have had since the winter of 2009-10 whenChris Coleman’s team went unbeaten in seven, including six wins. That run,between December and March helped lift the Sky Blues into the edge of theplay-off places but once the run was ended Coleman’s team’s form collapsed andthey failed to win any of their last six home games.

In the years since relegationfrom the Premiership in 2001, numerous City managers have talked about buildingFortress Ricoh but none have really achieved it. The best home run since 2001was under Micky Adams just after the move to the Ricoh. Between November 2005and April 2006 City went twelve home games unbeaten, with the help of DennisWise. One interesting statistic is that since Andy Thorn took over as managerin March only one of 10 home games has been lost.

City’s second win of the seasoncoincided with another goalkeeping substitution by the Sky Blues. The othervictory, over Derby, also saw the injured Joe Murphy substituted by Chris Dunn.For Coventry City goalkeeping substitutions are a relatively modern phenomenon.During Steve Ogrizovic’s long reign as City goalkeeper he hardly ever had to besubstituted. I remember in the days before goalkeeping substitutes were allowed,in 1996, Oggy was injured at Millwall and David Speedie went in goal. Thenafter the subs were increased to five in 1996, Oggy was replaced by John Filanat Highbury after a blood-curdling challenge by Ian Wright left Oggy out coldon a stretcher.

Since the club’s relegation in2002 there were only three goalkeeper substitutions in seven seasons. Howeverin the last three seasons and a bit there have been eight goalkeepingsubstitutions, five of them involving an ‘injury’ to Keiron Westwood and now twoto Joe Murphy, the otehr being last season at Watford when loanee Iain Turnerwas injured and replaced by Michael Quirke. One wonders if goalkeepers aregetting soft.

Last week I mentioned thatcurrent QPR boss Neil Warnock had managed Scarborough to victory over the SkyBlues in 1992 and Dean Nelson reminded me that Warnock’s involvement withCity’s history goes even further back. Warnock was manager of Burton Albion against Leicester City in an FA Cup matchwhich had to be replayed behind closed doors at Highfield Road in 1985 aftercrowd trouble in the first match. Back in 1972 Warnock was also in theHartlepool side beaten in a League Cup tie at Highfield Road.

Talking of Dean - the man who hasa wonderful collection of Coventry City video clips - he has prepared anexcellent DVD of 1960s highlights which will be shown at the G-Casino today atmy Sky Blue Revolution book signing sessions, before and after the matchagainst Burnley. For the book signing I will be joined by 1960s City legendsMick Kearns, Dietmar Bruck and Ronnie Farmer.

Jim's column 15.10.11

2011-10-16T13:15:00.002+01:00

Jean-Guy Wallemme in 1998

Coventry City have had few French players in their team overthe years. Goalkeeper Fabien Debec comes to mind and Florent Laville, a dodgyloanee defender from Bolton in the Peter Reid era, come to mind. Laville had along and successful career with Olympique Lyon, winning two championships, butafter joining Bolton in 2003 struggled with fitness and form. City’s firstFrenchman, Jean-Guy Wallemme had a similar story – he was a star in France,especially in the northern mining town of Lens, captaining the town’s club towin the French League for the first time the previous season. Sadly he was amajor disappointment at City and fans wondered why City signed him. Wallemmehas been in the news recently having been appointed national coach of Congo.

Jean-Guyplayed just six league games for the Sky Blues in 1998 and looked impressive inhis early games. But his Waterloo came in a 1-5 home defeat to Newcastle. Froma fan’s viewpoint he was no worse than anyone in the City side but probably thefact that Alan Shearer, the man he was marking scored twice, made him one ofthe scapegoats. Shearer muscled him off to score his first and then later theFrenchman slid in to dispossess Shearer only to see the loose ball whippedupfield for Stephen Glass to score the fourth goal.

Wallemmewas axed for the next league game at Charlton and never appeared for the firstteam again. Less than a week later he told French football magazine L’Equippethat however happy he was playing at Coventry he was concerned for hiseight-year old son’s schooling and Bryan Richardson admitted that the Frenchmanand his family were having a tough time. It seems that from that point on hewas just not part of Gordon Strachan’s plans.

Bythe end of October it was a matter of when he moved back to France rather thanif and with his family back in France his mind was not on football. In Decemberhe signed for French club Sochaux withCity recouping most of the fee.

UnfortunatelySochaux were relegated that season and Jean Guy was on the move again, to StEtienne, newly promoted to the First Division after a period in the doldrums.By 2001 he was managing the Verts, as St Etienne are known, but they too wererelegated in his first season as manager and he returned to Lens, as a playerand helped them to runners-up position in the league.

Sinceretiring from playing he has managed at Rouen, SK Ronse in the Belgian seconddivision, US Royenne, a French amateur side and FC Paris. In 2008 he took overas manager of Lens and won promotion to the French First Division but lastseason they were relegated again and Jean-Guy was axed in January.

InAugust he was appointed as national coach to Congo (formerly Zaire). In hisfirst match his team were defeated 1-0 by Sudan in an African nations cupqualifier.

Alan Ward read my piece about late goals two weeks ago andgot in touch to tell me that last season City conceded 18 of their 58 leaguegoals (around 30%) in either the last five minutes of the first half or thelast five minutes of the second half including added time. Conversely theyscored only six goals in the same periods (two of them at Watford in August).This season four of thirteen league goals conceded (around 30%) were in thefinal five minutes of either half and to date City have yet to net in thosecrucial periods. Even Bury and last year Morecambe scored late goals in LeagueCup games against the Sky Blues. On checking City’s record since Andy Thorntook over in March I discovered that City have failed to net any late goals ineither half – a shocking statistic.

As CCFC historian I am expected toknow all the trivia and facts and figures about Coventry City but as the yearsgo on my memory doesn’t always work as it did when I was younger. A recentlypublished book by Steve Phelps will assist me.

The book 'Coventry City Miscellany',Steve’s fourth book about City, gives Sky Blues fans loads of facts and figuresabout their favourite club and it also enlightened me to quite a number ofinteresting things about the club. For instance I had forgotten thatgoalkeeper Magnus Hedman missed a penalty in the shoot –out at Peterborough ina League Cup tie on 11 September 2001 (the day New York’s twin towers wereblown up).

I also never realised, until Steve’sbook reminded me, that City never paraded the FA cup at Highfield Road in 1987.Nor that QPR manager Neil Warnock managed Scarborough when the Sky Blues werehumbled in Yorkshire in a League Cup tie in 1992.

Steve's skill is in pulling the statsand trivia from other sources and presenting them in an easy to read style. He generously acknowledges his sources but his book is more than a cut and paste job .For examplehe has done a lot of research into City's youth teams of 1987and 2000 - discovering where the prodigiousyoungsters ended up

Talking of new books, next Saturday (22^ndOctober) I will be attending booksignings for my latest book, Sky Blue Revolution, along with several legendaryplayers from the Jimmy Hill Era including Mick Kearns, Dietmar Bruck and RonnieFarmer. From 11 am until noon we will be at Waterstone’s bookshop in thePrecinct in Coventry. Then from 1.45 pm until 2.45 we will be at the G-Casino,next to the Ricoh Arena, and after the Burnley game we will be back in theCasino available to sign books from 5.00 pm. If you are unable to get to thesigning sessions but would like a signed copy please ring Waterstone’s on (024)76 334224 to reserve.

Jim's column 8.10.11

2011-10-12T19:39:00.000+01:00

Two weeks ago I wrote about a famous City player from the1920s Hugh ‘Rubberneck’ Richmond and the piece generated a lot of positivefeedback from readers. Today I will delve even further back thanks to an oldcigarette card sent to me by Bernard Poulten of Baughurst, Hampshire. Hisfather, who played for Tottenham Hotspur in the 1920s collected footballmemorabilia and when he died in 1970 Bernard found the card with a picture ofAlfred Fenwick in his belongings. Bernard wanted any information I couldprovide on Alfred Fenwick’s career.

Alfred(Alf) Randolph Fenwick was born in the mining village of Medomsley, nearConsett in County Durham on 26 March 1891. He was the son of a mining engineerand grew up close to the Hamsterley Colliery where his father worked.

Itis known that he played for local team Craghead United before joining Hull Cityin 1910. In 1914 just as war was about to break out he signed for West Ham.There is no record of his war-time activities but after the war he brieflyplayed for West Ham again before signing for City in December 1919. Hissteadying influence at left half helped the club pull out of the relegationplaces after a miserable first season in the Football League.

Hemade 53 appearances for City over two seasons and scored one goal. Afterleaving Coventry in 1921 he played for numerous other clubs including Lincoln,Notts County, Newark Town and Shildon Athletic. The last record of him playingwas with Bedlington United 1926-27, coincidentally Hugh Richmond finished hisplaying career with the same club. I have no details of his post-playing lifeand Alf died in Northumberland in 1975 aged 83. In 1921 Alf recommended hisnephew Austen Campbell to Coventry but he was released after one game but laterjoined Blackburn and became an England international.

Ifyou have any pictures of old City players that you would like to know moreabout please send them to me via email or via the Coventry Telegraph and I willtry and provide some background to the player.

My appeal, on behalf of Dean Nelson, for film footage ofOggy’s goal at Hillsborough in 1986 brought a positive response with tworeaders, Mike Young and a gentleman from Cheylesmore, offering Dean a copy ofthe great man’s only goal. Dean will now be able to complete his video of thefamous 1986-87 season. Dean reminded me that during that season Coventry Cityappeared for the first time in a live league game. In January 1987, two weeksbefore their famous FA Cup victory at Old Trafford, John Sillett’s team playedout a 0-0 draw with Arsenal at Highbury. If I remember rightly the London-basedITV commentary team were disappointed that City didn’t roll over and let theGunners thrash them but recognised that City had, after a few years in thewilderness, developed a team that was hard to beat and could be ‘going places’.Four months later the Sky Blues lifted the FA Cup.

My latest book, Sky Blue Revolution, telling the storybehind City’s amazing rise from the depths of Division Three to the FirstDivision between 1961 and 1967 is now in the shops. Two weeks today, on 22October, the day of the Burnley home game, I will be holding a book signing atWaterstones in Coventry between 11 a.m. and 12 and will be joined by a numberof City legends from that era, including Mick Kearns, Ronnie Farmer and DietmarBruck. Later in the day, both before and after the game we will be moving tothe G-Casino for a signing session and I look forward to meeting some of myreaders at one or other of the venues.

Jim's column 1.10.11

2011-10-05T10:52:00.002+01:00

Coventry City fans leave their seats at the Ricoh Arenabefore the final whistle at their peril and risk missing an exciting finale. OnTuesday night against Blackpool, City, once again, had victory snatched fromtheir grasp in injury time with Keith Southern’s header grabbing a point forthe Tangerines. This followed the drama last Saturday when Lukas Jutkiewiczmissed an injury time penalty that would have sealed three points for the SkyBlues over Reading. These late mishaps come hard on the heels of the two verylate goals at Crystal Palace which also cost City a victory. Perhaps it is timeAndy Thorn and Steve Harrison coached the team on how to play out the latterstages of a game. Early in his managerial career last season, Thorn was givenwarnings when injury time goals cost City dearly at Preston and Middlesbrough.Mind you Aidy Boothroyd hadn’t deal with the problem either. His team sufferedhome defeats from late goals conceded against Cardiff (Jay Bothroyd) andNorwich (Grant Holt) and what looked like a certain victory at Doncaster wasthrown away with James Hayter’s 88^th minute goal. This season sevenpoints have been lost in the closing minutes, points that would now have Cityjust outside the play-off positions instead of the relegation area.

Jutkiewicz’s penalty miss was the fifth by a Coventry playerat the Ricoh Arena, but the first in almost two years, home or away. The othermiscreants at the Ricoh have been Michael Doyle, Elliott Ward (possibly theworst City penalty ever v Southampton), Sammy Clingan and Leon Best. Best wasthe last City player to miss from the spot, in the 1-0 home win over Doncasteron Boxing Day 2009. Between then and Tuesday night City had netted eightspot-kicks. Clinton Morrison (1), Lucas Jutkiewicz (4) and Marlon King (3).

My prediction skills on Coventry City attendances went awryon Tuesday night. Based on recent seasons the midweek September home game isgenerally one of the lowest of the season and with City’s poor form this seasonI fully expected there to be under 12,000, possibly as low as 11,000 at thegame. The recorded attendance of 12,822 was boosted by a good following fromLancashire (over1,000 travelled with the Seasiders) and some Indian summerweather so it is hard to say whether City’s gates have bottomed out.

City fanatic Dean Nelson has built up a fantastic collectionof television film clips of Coventry City but has struggled to find one of themost memorable goals in the club’s history. In October 1986 at Hillsborough, SteveOgrizovic drop-kicked the ball from his own penalty area, the ball bounced onceand cleared Sheffield Wednesday’s ‘keeper Martin Hodge and ended up in the net.If anyone has a video clip of this goal or knows whether it was ever filmedshould contact Dean at dean.nelson27@ntlworld.com

Dean has developed film shows for differenteras and is planning a 1960s film night at the Transport Museum on 24 Novemberto coincide with the 50^th anniversary of Jimmy Hill’s arrival atCoventry City. Next year he is planning a 1987 film night at the CoventryMuseum as part of the 25^th anniversary celebrations of the FA Cupvictory.

On the subject of Jimmy Hill don’t forget thatmy latest book ‘Sky Blue Revolution’ retelling the story of City’s rise fromthe depths of Division Three to Division One under the bearded wonder, is nowfor sale at local bookshops, the club shop and the internet. A book signinginvolving some of the stars from that golden era is being planned for laterthis month.

Jim's column 24.9.11

2011-09-26T18:46:00.000+01:00

Hugh Richmond was one of Coventry City’s star players in theearly 1920s and I recently had correspondence from Hugh’s grandson SteveRichmond, who lives in the North East. Steve is researching his grandfather’slife, specifically his football career, and I was able to fill him in on someof the facts of his time at Coventry City. Steve was also able to give me afair bit of information about Hugh that I didn’t know about.

Hugh Richmond was born in the small town of Galston nearKilmarnock in Ayrshire, Scotland in 1894. He was on Kilmarnock’s books beforethe First World War but did not play for Killie’s first team. Like most youngmen he went off to the war, with the Seaforth Highlanders, but was sent backfrom the front to complete his apprenticeship in the Great Munition Works onthe River Clyde.

In 1916 he was recorded as playing for and captainingScottish Second Division club Arthurlie but soon after the war ended he headedsouth and signed for Leicester City in March 1919. A tall man, Hugh could playat wing-half or centre-half, and had prodigious heading ability, which resultedin him getting the nickname, ‘Rubberneck’.

At Leicester he was loaned out to Nuneaton Town for a spellin 1920 and in three seasons at Filbert Street he played only 24 first teamgames for the Foxes but according to Steve he captained the reserves to theCentral Alliance League title. He did however appear for Leicester’s first teamin a famous Second Division game against Stockport County on the final day ofthe 1920-21 season. Stockport’s Edgeley Park ground was closed by the FootballAssociation, presumably because of crowd disorder, and the game was switched toOld Trafford where it should have been behind closed doors. 13 spectatorsallegedly paid to watch the game, a Football League record low, althoughcontemporary reports suggest there were around 2,000 people inside the stadiumfor the match.

In 1922 he arrived at Highfield Road and was soon a regularin the half-back line but often got switched to centre-forward where hisheading prowess came to the fore. He scored twice in the 7-1 home win overWolves on Christmas Day 1922 and the following season he appeared more often inattack than defence and netted 14 goals in 30 games including a hat-trickagainst Nelson in November 1923 and another Christmas Day brace, againstSheffield Wednesday.

In 1924-25 he struggled to win a place in the first team andmade only 12 appearances, and in May 1925 he signed for Queens Park Rangers butplayed only 10 games in a frustrating season before heading to the North Eastto sign for Blyth Spartans in the North Eastern League.

Steve now takes up the story: In 1926 Hugh joined BlythSpartans as Player Manager, and also Blyth's first professional player. In hisfirst game at Blyth, they played the previous years champions Newcastle UnitedReserves. Headlines in the 'Sunday Sun' on 29th August 1926 read 'SHOCKS INNORTH EASTERN LEAGUE' - 'SPARTANS LOWER CHAMPIONS COLOURS'. Hugh scored 2goals, from centre half, in a 2-1 victory and 'Richmond was undoubtedly thestar performer'.

Hugh's duties at the club also included managing the BlythWednesday league team, and under hissupervision they finished as Champions of their league in their first season,and runners up in their second season. In 1929 Hugh had to leave Blyth Spartanswhen financial difficulties meant that the club could not offer him new terms.In three seasons with Blyth he played 111 games and scored 28 goals. He thensigned for Spennymoor United prior to the start of the 1929-30 season.

Spennymoor also hit financial difficulties part way throughthat season, although they finished the league campaign, they could not keeptheir professional players and Hugh played out his final season as a playerwith Bedlington United.

That was not the end of Hugh’s football career though. Stevetells me that in December 1937 he found a small piece written by 'Crofter' inthe Blyth News/Ashington Post - 'FORMER BLYTH PLAYER' 'Hughie Richmond theex-Spartans centre half is now acting as trainer for Ashington first team. I amglad to hear that Hughie has made a good impression in his new role, yet it wasjust the sort of information I could expect, because of having known him as areal enthusiast, with a likeable manner to earn the respect of officials andplayers met with in his football experience.

Hugh later worked as a fitter/turner in the workshops ofAshington Colliery. Ashington, of course is famous for its footballing sons,Jackie Milburn and Bobby and Jack Charlton. Hugh passed away in Bedlington in1962.

A great story and a big thank you to Steve Richmond forsharing it with me.

Following last week’s story about Coventry City’s longestdrought without a home goal, Mike Young, fellow Former Players Association committeemember, was in touch to firm up the record number of minutes without a goal. Hetells me that in 1919 City’s drought last 596 minutes. On 4 October Tommy Lowesscored City’s goal in the 1-2 home defeat to Leicester in the 50^thminute. There then followed six goalless home games (four of them 0-0) beforeBilly Walker netted in the 16^th minute of the 3-2 Christmas Dayvictory over Stoke City. City’s recent run that ended in the Derby home gamewas 413 minutes and we all hope that the 1919 record will never be tested!

If you would like to learn moreabout the advantages of joining the Association as an Associate Member (£10 perseason) please contact the Membership Secretary Mike Young throughthe website or on 07528016870.

Jim's column 17.9.11

2011-09-18T20:09:00.000+01:00

Finally the fans saw a goal for the Sky Blues at the RicohArena. After 413 goalless minutes Lukas Jutkiewicz's 58th minute penalty brokethe season’s home duck and was the first home goal since Marlon King's 5thminute effort on Good Friday against Scunthorpe United. In between there hadbeen three goalless home games, two 0-0 draws and the opening day defeat toLeicester (0-1).

413 minutes is a record for the Sky Blues at the Ricoh,topping the previous worst of 361 minutes which occurred over the last fourhome games of 2006-07 and ended in the first home game of 2007-08, a 1-1 drawwith Hull City.

The longest run without a home goal was set in thecalamitous first season in the Football League in 1919-20. Then the Bantams, asCity were known, failed to score in six successive home games. Goal-times arenot available for that season but it will have been at least 540 minuteswithout a goal, and possibly as many as 600. Gordon Strachan's relegation teamof 2001 went pretty close to that unwanted record, failing to score at home in536 minutes between John Hartson's Easter Monday goal against Sunderland and anown goal by Stuart Pearce of Manchester CIty in mid-September. The run includedtwo goal-less Premiership games (Liverpool and Bradford City) and the firstthree home games in the lower division (Wolves, Forest and Grimsby) after whichthe hapless Strachan was sacked.

Tim James emailed to say he found my piece on the lowestCity home crowds a couple of weeks ago interesting but wondered if City had hadlower crowds than the 12,292 for last season’s Doncaster game at HighfieldRoad. City’s lowest ever football league crowds at Highfield Road were asfollows:

2,059	Crystal Palace	1927-28	Div 3 South	*
3,000	Portsmouth	1924-25	Div 2	*
3,974	Newport County	1954-55	Div 3 South
4,000	Fulham	1922-23	Div 2	*
4,744	Hartlepools U	1925-26	Div 3 North
4,785	QPR	1953-54	Div 3 South
5,073	Ashington	1925-26	Div 3 North
5,329	Brighton	1930-31	Div 3 South
5,479	New Brighton	1925-26	Div 3 North
5,626	Crystal Palace	1956-57	Div 3 South

*midweek afternoon game

Three of the four lowest were for midweek games played inthe afternoon in the era before floodlights, whilst the three small crowds inthe 1950s were, if memory is correct, midweek 5.30 kick-offs (so that the gamecould be completed before dusk).The 4,744 versus Hartlepools United in 1925-26stands as the lowest Saturday home league crowd. The lowest Saturday crowd ofthe modern era (i.e. post 1967) was 7,478 against Watford on a miserably wetday in January 1986.

After City left the Premiership in 2001 there were nineleague crowds lower than the 12,292 for last season’s Doncaster game:

10,872 Wimbledon 2003-04

11,557 Crewe 2003-04

11,796 Wimbledon 2002-03

11,797 Cardiff 2003-04

11,862 Bradford C 2003-04

11,966 Gillingham 2004-05

12,148 Wigan 2004-05

12,157 Preston 2004-05

12,226 Watford 2003-04

Not surprisingly Wimbledon feature twice – their awayfollowings, which were never large, had dwindled to a handful – and, if memoryserves me correctly, Cardiff fans were banned from the 2003-04 game.

Jim's column 10.9.11

2011-09-13T16:01:00.003+01:00

Bill Hall emailed me this weekwith a couple of interesting questions. Firstly, he remembers back in the late50's, possibly 1959 or 1960) that Coventry had a key promotion game atHighfield Road and just before the game kicked off the loudspeaker announcerasked if Jack Boxley (a City player at the time) was in the ground.Unfortunately he was not, and, a young player appeared on the left wing for theCity. Bill wondered if his memory was playing tricks on him and asks if it istrue, then what were the circumstances. The game in question was a ThirdDivision game in February 1960 versus Bury. Jack Boxley's car broke down on theway from his home in Bristol to Highfield Road and third team full-back BrianShepherd had to play in his place. Shepherd had played 20-odd games for thefirst team, so it wasn't his debut. City lost 0-1 to the Shakers, a defeatwhich dented their promotion hopes. Bury went on to win promotion to DivisionTwo. I don’t think manager Billy Frith ever forgave Boxley as he rarely playedfor the club again that season and was released in the close season.

Bill also wanted to know City’s team in the FA Youth Cup final in 1970. In aclassic series of games with Tottenham Hotspur, the Sky Blues’ youngsters,coached by 60s star Ron Farmer, unluckily lost in the second replay after eachhad won their home leg and the first replay at Highfield Road ended all square.

City’s team for the first ofthe four games was David Icke: Ivan Crossley, Jimmy Holmes, Dennis Mortimer,Alan Dugdale, Bobby Parker, Trevor Smith, Alan Green, Colin Randell, MickMcGuire and Johnny Stevenson. For the second and subsequent games LesCartwright played in place of Smith.

Tottenham’s team includedseveral players who had either already appeared in the first team or who wenton to have notable careers away from White Hart Lane. Steve Perrryman wasalready a first team squad member and Graeme Souness went on to greater thingsat Middlesbrough and Liverpool. The centre-forward was Ray Clarke who had a goodcareer in the lower divisions, helping Mansfield put the Sky Blues out of theLeague Cup in 1975, and later becoming City’s European scout during GordonStrachan’s reign.

Last week’s comment about the fact that it had been 343 dayssince the club last signed an outfield player (between Marlon King and CodyMcDonald) prompted fellow City historian Paul O’Connor to send me an email.Whilst he thought the statistic interesting he thought it was a bitdisingenuous as we had bought players (Murphy and Dunn) in the meantime. It didhowever remind him of the stability of the squad in the John Sillett era whenhe signed Dougie McGuire on 10 August 1988 for £40,000 followed by KeithThompson on a free transfer from Oviedo in September 1988 (he wasn’t sure of date),but it was not until 28 June 1989 that he bought Peter Billing from CreweAlexandra for £120,000. He also pointed out that those were the days ofunrestricted signings during the season, until the traditional March transferdeadline. This had been the second consecutive season of little transferactivity as 1987-88 only saw the arrival of David Speedie and Gary Bannister and followed Sillett’s comments onsigning Speedie that ‘from now on Coventry City will be shopping at Harrods notWoolworths’.

The subscribers’ list for my new book ‘Sky Blue Revolution’has now closed but the book can be ordered at www.desertislandbooks.com . Thebook will be available in the shops before the end of the month.

Jim's Column 3.9.2011

2011-09-06T20:47:00.000+01:00

After all the bad news and poor start to the season the Sky Blues bounced back with a great 1-1 draw at Middlesbrough. It is only the third point out of 24 that City have gained at Boro’s Riverside stadium since it was opened in 1995. Back then City’s briefly exciting Brazilian (with a Portuguese passport), Isaias, became the first opposition player to score there but City lost 1-2. Since then City have also travelled there twice in Cup competitions and come home empty handed. The result also ended Boros’ excellent run of five victories and credit is due to Andy Thorn and his team for a gutsy display. Tony Mowbray’s team have picked where they left off last season and now have only lost once in 17 games. The former West Brom and Celtic boss is doing an excellent job after Gordon Strachan's disastrous reign at Boro. Like City Boro are now forced to sell their best players to make ends meet in the Championship but thankfully for them they have a fine array of homegrown talent to fall back on.

Michael Mifsud was back in the news again recently, for finally signing a long-term contract for a club. The diminutive Maltese striker who made such a strong impression at Coventry City in 2007-08 when he netted 17 league and cup goals has signed a four-year deal with Maltese club Valetta. Steve Nichols from Canley sent me this picture taken of Mifsud and the following week MM celebrated his good fortune by scoring both goals for his country in their 2-1 win over Central African Republic. I wonder if Michael reflects on his time in England and wishes he had re-signed for City when he had the chance in the summer of 2009 or joined Bristol City or Sheffield United that same year when he had what sounded like attractive offers on the table. Stories at the time suggested either he or his agent (or both of them) jettisoned the move by asking for too much money. Whatever happened Mifsud has spent almost two year in the wilderness but strangely still been selected for the Malta national team for whom he is the captain.

Few Coventry fans will remember Michael O’Neill a left-winger who made six appearances for the club between 1996-1998. His City career was blighted by injury and he never reproduced the form that earned him 33 Northern Ireland full caps. His managerial career has been slowly developing and last week he took his team, Shamrock Rovers to the group stages of the Europa League by virtue of a two-leg win over Partizan Belgrade.

For some years now those City fans who track down former players have tried in vain to find any information about Harry Bull, who played for Coventry City just after the Second world war. During the summer it came to light that Harry had died in Nottingham aged 80 on 4 April 2006. Harry’s story is one that has always touched me. Although born in Birmingham he was the son of a chef who moved to Nottingham where Harry grew up. A Nottingham friend of his, Dennis Daft, was invited to Coventry for a trial and Harry, just out of the Navy, and another friend, Peter Taylor, later to play for City and be Brian Clough’s number two at Derby and Forest, came along for the ride. Dick Hill, the Coventry trainer, saw Harry standing watching the trial match and asked him if he wanted to join in. Harry did well and was signed up by City whilst Dennis got the thumbs down and returned to Nottingham heartbroken. Harry only played one first team game for City at centre forward in the final game of 1948-49 season. He suffered a leg injury which curtailed his career at City and in 1950 he moved to Rugby Town. He worked in the maintenance department at Boots in Nottingham and subsequently became a milkman with Nottingham Dairies until his retirement in 1990.

As I write this it seems likely that the Sky Blues have signed an outfield player, Cody McDonald from Norwich City. Nick Cook emailed me to point out that it had been 343 days since the club last signed an outfield player and surely that was a record. Other than goalkeepers Joe Murphy and Chris Dunn, Marlon King was the last signing, last September. I am sure it must be a record, other than in wartime.

JIM'S COLUMN 27.8.2011

2011-08-30T14:28:00.000+01:00

Last Saturday the Sky Blues finally picked up their first point of the season against Watford and thus avoided the ignominy of having their worst start since 1919. By all accounts it was a scrappy game but a point is a point and if Andy Thorn can get some more of his injured players fit and perhaps get a striker in, the form should improve.

As I write this the takeover talks are moving slowly with, in my opinion, too much of the action being played out in the media. Many fans are angry that SISU are not packing up their tent and leaving town but, again, in my opinion, that won’t happen quickly, if at all. By some accounts the Gary Hoffman-led group seems to think that SISU will accept an offer of £1 and therefore take a bath for the £40 million plus they have allegedly put in. The majority of the club’s debts are with SISU, a similar situation to when they ‘bought out’ Geoffrey Robinson for a pittance four years ago. Then Robinson was persuaded to fall on his sword and swallow a loss estimated at £20 million, ‘for the good of the club’. Whatever happens any new owners will be carrying out their due diligence to understand the severity of the financial position, and that takes time.

Since Ray Ranson’s departure earlier this year SISU have shown far more interest in the football club, realising that drastic action was required to protect their investment, especially after Ranson’s lack of experience in running a football club was exposed. SISU’s overall strategy is still opaque but cost-cutting and a net outflow of players must have reduced the running costs considerably - although probably without turning the day-to-day losses into a profit. The new board have a thankless task, especially after the lack of signings and the poor start on the pitch, but I think the board and chief executive Paul Clouting are trying hard and neither they nor SISU are ready to throw the towel in for a pound!

There are signs that Man City and Chelsea apart, football’s financial problems are beginning to unravel. To read last week that Everton have serious debt issues is sobering and there will be many other similar stories this season. City fans thinking that Gary Hoffman’s group will be splashing massive amounts of cash on a raft of new players if their offer is accepted are living in cloud-cuckoo land. Gary is a passionate City fan with a wealth of experience in the financial world but that is no guarantee of success. Potential investors have seen too many buyers lose their shirt and are wary of promises of rich pickings, especially outside the Premiership.

I’ll step off my soapbox now and talk about more interesting historical matters.

Saturday’s gate for the Watford game was 13,043 and is the lowest Saturday home gate since the club moved to the Ricoh in 2005. No doubt a good number of City fans were still away on holiday and it still seems crazy to me to start the football season so early. City’s lowest ever crowd (soon to be threatened me thinks) is 12,292 against Doncaster for a early midweek game last season. The Blackpool midweek home game at the end of September could see the first sub-12,000 gate at the Ricoh.

Lowest league gates at the Ricoh 2005-11

1. 12,292 v Doncaster (2010-11)
2. 13,043 v Watford (2011-12)*
3. 13,169 v Derby Co. (2010-11)*
4. 13,481 v Swansea (2010-11)
5. 14,036 v Scunthorpe (2007-08)
6. 14,326 v Sheffield United (2009-10)
7. 14,370 v Hull (2010-11)*
8. 14,412 v Ipswich (2010-11)*
9. 14,432 v Burnley (2010-11)*
10. 14,573 v Barnsley (2010-11)*

* Saturday home games

City fan Andrew Berry remembers seeing a friendly game at Highfield Road between City and the Japan national eleven. He couldn’t remember the year and asked for more details of the game. City beat Japan 2-0 on 14 August 1978. Their line up was the full first team, warming up for the opening league game the following Saturday: Les Sealey: Keith Osgood, Bobby McDonald, Terry Yorath, Jim Holton, Gary Gillespie, Don Nardiello, Ian Wallace, Mick Ferguson, Barry Powell, Tommy Hutchison. City’s goals came from Yorath and Ferguson and there was a crowd of 5,232.

JIM'S COLUMN 20.8.2011

2011-08-21T20:03:00.000+01:00

It was a day of double celebration in the McSheffrey household last Saturday. Gary celebrated his 29th birthday by appearing for his home town club at the ground of his former club, Birmingham City. The other celebration was Gary's 200th appearance in a Coventry shirt in all competitions. Gary made his debut as a substitute at Villa Park in February 1999 aged 16 years 198 days and was the youngest ever City player at the time as well as the youngest Premiership player. Subsequently he has lost both records, the former to Ben Mackey and later Jonson Clarke-Harris, and the latter to Aaron Lennon. He is the 45th Coventry player to reach the 200 game milestone and the first since Michael Doyle.

Talking of young debutants, several readers have been asking where the current crop of youngsters stand in the chart of youngest ever City players. Despite Gael Bigirimana, Josh Ruffels and Conor Thomas being only 17-years old, Thomas is the only one to make the top ten youngest. All three were born in October 1993 and are therefore 18 in October. When Thomas debuted as a substitute against Crystal Palace in the FA Cup last season he was 17 years and 71 days placing him 9th in the all-time chart (62 days older than Dietmar Bruck) but the youngest to play an FA Cup tie. By all accounts none of the lads let the side down at Selhurst Park and we have to hope that they all have big futures ahead of them, preferably with the Sky Blues.

Similarly several readers were wondering if the team that finished the game on Tuesday evening was the youngest City team ever. My friend Geoff Moore tracks this record very closely and assures me that City have fielded younger teams. The average age of Tuesday nights final XI was 22.8 years. That is some way off the age of the side that played at Manchester City in November 1980 which was 21 years and 58 Days. The team that day by the way was: Les Sealey: Steve Jacobs, Harry Roberts, Andy Blair, Paul Dyson, Gary Gillespie, Peter Bodak, Garry Thompson, Mark Hateley, Danny Thomas, Steve Hunt. City lost 0-3. In 2003 Gary McAllister put out several City teams with an average age of under 22.

City's depressing start to the season continued at Selhurst Park losing to two late goals and you have to go back a long way to find the last time the team lost their first three league games. It has happened on only three previous occasions: 1968-69, 1949-50 and 1919-20. The good news is that in none of those seasons were the team relegated. In 1919-20, the club's first season in the Football League, the team lost their first nine games before staging a miraculous recovery to finish 20th out of 22, albeit with the help of some bribery. In 1949-50, Harry Storer's team rallied to finish 12th. In 1968-69 City were hampered by playing their first two games away from home because the new stand at Highfield Road wasn't ready but won their fourth game (4-2 against West Brom) and despite a long struggling season did enough to stay in Division One.

Fortunately for me I have been spared the sight of the Sky Blues this season. Owing to family health problems I am extending a stay in France and may not see my beloved Sky Blues for some time. The internet and in particular internet radio enables me to keep track of news and games but Tuesday night’s game left me with nails bitten to the quick and I forced to drain my sorrows with copious amounts of red wine!

JIM'S COLUMN 13.8.2011

2011-08-16T09:03:00.000+01:00

At Gigg Lane, Bury on Tuesday night the now annual League Cup disaster took place. Despite Andy Thorn putting out a strong side (on paper, if not on the pitch), the Sky Blues once again succumbed to an embarrassing Cup defeat in Lancashire. Lower league sides must rub their hands with glee when being drawn out of the hat with Coventry City and Bury emulated Morecambe and Hartlepool as the third successive team to send City out of the competition at the first hurdle. Just when the club and the fans could do with a lift, financially and spiritually, that a little Cup run would give, the team failed to perform. We won't have the annual depressing trip to Preston this season (where City have never won a league game) but the Lancashire hoodoo continues and the trips to Blackpool and Burnley are looking like ones to avoid.

A small crowd of 2,997 watched Tuesday night’s game, probably less than were rioting and looting in nearby Salford, but it wasn’t the lowest crowd to watch City in the the competition. In 1992 there was a crowd of 2,633 at Scarborough to see the Sky Blues throw away a two goal first leg lead and lose 3-0, and the previous year there was 2,288 at Spotland, Rochdale, as City lost 0-1 but went through by virtue of a 4-0 win in the first leg.

I thought I tempted providence by mentioning the Sky Blues' excellent opening day record last week. Not only did the team lose their first league game of the season for the first time since 2000 but as Paul O'Connor pointed out, they lost at home and had a midfield player sent off. In 2000 City lost 1-3 to Middlesbrough and had David Thompson sent off on his debut. It was the start of a depressing campaign that ended in relegation.

City fielded three debutants against Leicester on Saturday, less than normal on the opening day, and two of them were homegrown players. It has to be hoped that many of the latest flood of talent from the Academy will ‘make the grade’ and end a long period during which few home grown players have come through to be first team regulars. The next few years are going to be tough financially for Coventry City and the development of their own youngsters who, it is hoped will have more affinity with the club than high priced transfer signings, will save the club substantial sums of money. In the all-time numbering system Joe Murphy became player number 851, Cyrus Christie 852 and Gael Bigirimana 853.

The poor start to the season has not surprised many supporters and the fans seem to be turning again on the owners, SISU. With no replacement for Marlon King signed, the squad looks lightweight up front and as I said last week a lack of goals could be a problem. Communication from the Ricoh boardroom has again become patchy and there is a lack of clarity about SISU’s intentions and no updates on the cashflow which we were told in April would only last ‘through the summer’. Despite cost-cutting the losses must be continuing to rack up and it is hard to visualise SISU continuing the fund the club with the current business model. I see very little difference in their approach to the one taken by the previous regime which ended with Geoffrey Robinson taking a bath for £20 million when SISU took over. The club seem to be almost back where they were then in the autumn of 2007. There is no simple or quick answer to the situation and for things to change SISU would have to walk away and take a loss of £30 million or more. Gary Hoffman and his investors would presumably ride in with their alleged £30 million but would that change anything other than the faces at the top? Unless the stadium is purchased or the club won promotion the cycle would continue and 3-4 years down the road those new investors would be retreating nursing substantial losses. The board have made some interesting noises about the new Financial Fair Play regulations coming in next year and indicating that they are taking a more prudent approach to the club’s finances. nwith these new rules in mind. fortunately fans don’t want to hear this sort of talk and look at the lack of new players and poor results. However if this is the strategy then the board must get their story across with more vigour.

It was great to see that former manager Gordon Milne was at the Leicester game last week and trying to stay impartial having managed both clubs. His former assistant Ron Wylie was also a guest of the Former Players Association but unfortunately had a fall at Gordon’s home later in the day. He has been in hospital in Birmingham this week and I am sure all City fans wish him well in his recovery. Ron had a reputation as a tough talking, no-nonsense disciplinarian but when you speak to his former players they have nothing but respect and admiration for the strict Scot.

If Sky Blue fans want to be cheered up they should go along to Hawksmill Club in Hawksmill Lane, Allesley tomorrow afternoon to wallow in some 1987 nostalgia. Almost 25 years after winning the FA Cup a team comprising many of the ‘87 heroes take on a Lloyd McGrath XI to raise money for charity. Oggy, Trevor Peake, Micky Gynn and Brian Borrows are definites and more are expected. Kick-off is at 2pm and entrance is £3 with children and OAPs allowed in for £1.

JIM'S COLUMN 6.8.2011

2011-08-10T09:25:00.002+01:00

Another new football season starts today. For Coventry City it is the eleventh successive season in the Championship -following Preston’s relegation they are the longest serving club in the old Second Division - and my 50th season following the club. Little has changed at the football club in the close season with financial pressures and takeover talk dominating the local media and fans’ forums. Three of last season's better players have departed but none of the moves were surprising. Keiren Westwood has gone to the Premiership and will be tested by the best at Sunderland. Aron Gunnarsson will be plying his trade at Cardiff City but in my view will have a hard battle to get a game in one of the best midfields in the division last term. The third man, Marlon King, has departed acrimoniously for Birmingham City and must be wondering what he has walked into as the St Andrews club threatens to implode. My overall view on the moves is that only King's goals will be missed. Aron's form since his splendid inaugural season has been patchy and a fit Gary Deegan plus the emerging talents of Conor Thomas and Gael Bigirimana will amply counter the Icelander's departure. Joe Murphy too, should be good enough to fill Westwood's shoes. The problem will be goals and we can only hope that either a new striker is signed soon, or that the hugely promising Lukas Jutkiewicz adds more goals to his blossoming performances, or Freddy Eastwood finally fulfils the enormous expectations we all have for him. Whilst I am not as downbeat as most City fans about the prospects for the new season Andy Thorn and Steve Harrison will have to get more out of what is not a small squad than their two predecessors achieved. Injuries will again play a part and it is hard to believe that the Sky Blues will have the bad luck they had in that department last season when Deegan, McPake, Turner, Clingan and Bell were all out for long spells. I don't subscribe to the view that the club will have a relegation battle but then I don't expect them to be pressing for a playoff spot - not that they have been in that position for the last nine seasons. It may be that a sale of one of the better players is forthcoming to fund some purchases. Older fans may remember a similar scenario in early 1986 when with the City in a perilous state Terry Gibson was sold to Manchester United for an inflated £650,000 and most of the money was used to buy three new players (Nick Pickering, Alan Brazil and Jim McInally). Ultimately only Pickering of the trio was a success but just over twelve months later virtually the same squad won the FA Cup. In other words, sometimes a club has to sell to move forward.

Whilst on the subject of history I remember similarly depressing pre-seasons in 1969, 1977, 1986 and 1997 when after desperate relegation battles there was little or no money spent on players and the team was tipped to be favourites for the drop. In all these years the team defied their critics and had immensely successful campaigns. In 1969 Noel Cantwell’s team finished sixth and qualified for Europe. In 1977 Gordon Milne’s attacking team, spearheaded by Ian Wallace and Mick Ferguson, scored 75 goals and missed out on Europe by a whisker after the most entertaining season of the last 40 years. In 1986 John & George put a backbone into a mixed bag of players and won the FA Cup. Whilst in 1997 Gordon Strachan’s team left relegation worries behind them and but for a shoddy penalty shoot-out defeat at Bramall Lane may have got to Wembley again.

Two weeks ago Derek Henderson sadly passed away, aged 82. Nemo, which was his by-line for many of his 15 years as the main football writer on the Coventry Telegraph, kept City fans abreast of the news from Highfield Road in the era before multi-media and mass coverage of the sport. For most of his time reporting on the club he was the only source of news for supporters. He was there for the arrival of Jimmy Hill in 1961 and has often been credited as the man who came up with the nickname ‘the Sky Blues’ after Hill introduced the new kit in 1962. In those days Derek travelled to away games on the team bus and had virtual unlimited access to the manager and players. He never abused that privilege and was always the soul of discretion.

I was interested in City’s facts and figures from an early age and in the summer of 1969 I wrote to Derek asking for help in compiling some information. He replied promptly, inviting me, and a friend, to visit the Telegraph offices and access the personal scrapbooks of his time covering the City. Over a number of Saturdays I built up the basis of my club records, this is the days before the Rothmans and Sky annuals, and internet websites. His kindness at that time is impossible for me to forget and many years later, after he had retired to his beloved Devon, we had telephone chats and emails about the club’s history and his time in Coventry. His style of writing, which demonstrated a passion for football and for his adopted team, Coventry City, made reading his match reports a great pleasure and influenced my football writing years later.

I am tempting providence I know but on form City should win today. Since being relegated from the Premiership in 2001 City have never lost on the opening day of the season. They have won eight and drawn two of their 10 opening games and have won the last five. It is a remarkable record and lets hope they can keep the run going today against the Foxes.

JIM'S COLUMN 7.5.11

2011-05-11T08:22:00.002+01:00

It is sad to report the death of former Coventry City player Vernon Griffiths who passed away on 27 April in Birmingham. Born in 1936 Vernon’s talent was spotted at an early age and he was on West Brom’s books as an apprentice after leaving school. He was playing for Sheldon Town when City spotted him and signed him in 1954. After two seasons as a regular in the reserves Vernon, a lively wing-half was given his first-team chance in Billy Frith’s first game in charge in September 1957, a 3-1 win at Brentford. A week later, on his home debut, he scored his only goal, the winner against Colchester. He kept his place for twelve games in the dreadful 1957-58 season but after a run of defeats he lost his place to Iain Jamieson. Vernon showed some promise but found the competition from the likes of Iain Jamieson, Brian Nicholas and Ron Farmer too great. After appearing on the right-wing in the opening two games of the 1958-59 season he was back in the reserves. In 1959 he signed for Rugby Town. Lol Harvey remembers Vernon with affection: ‘He was a quick player and loved to attack. We met up at the Legends Day a couple of years ago and had a good chat about those days. I was really surprised to hear he had cancer and I feel very sad.’

Vernon’s funeral takes place at Lodge Hill Cemetery, Selly Oak, Birmingham at 1.30 pm on Tuesday 10 May.

The season ends at Carrow Road today and City fans will share Norwich City’s celebrations at their second successive promotion, the first such feat since Joe Royle’s Manchester City team in 1999 and 2000. All credit to Paul Lambert who has shown that shrewd purchases of good young players from the lower divisions allied to a passing style of football can pay rewards. Former Coventry City defender Elliott Ward has proved to many that he is good enough at this level after being ‘frozen out’ by Chris Coleman and another City reject, Leon Barnett played his part in the Canaries’ success before picking up an injury in February. Few City fans would have predicted success for the Canaries with these two in the centre of defence.

Richard Keogh played every minute of every league game this season. He is the first player to achieve this feat since Gary McAllister in 1996-97 not Brian Borrows in 1990-91. Thanks to Paul O'Connor for reminding me of this.

JIM'S COLUMN 30.4.11

2011-05-02T20:11:00.000+01:00

The end of the season is almost upon us and today is the final home game of the season. Thankfully Andy Thorn and Steve Harrison have steered the club away from tricky relegation waters before today as the final two games are, on paper, daunting tasks. My comments in last week’s column generated more than the average feedback with the vast majority of readers agreeing with my view that a long-term management appointment was premature until SISU’s intentions were clearer. I did not believe Thorn would commit to being the manager of a club in such turmoil and can only imagine that he has been given firm re-assurances that the club’s future under SISU is secure and that means either more money being ‘invested’ by SISU or an additional investor. Without one or the other the fans are still led to believe there will be a cashflow issue sometime over the summer. If , as rumours persist, a consortium is being gathered to buy City out then Thorn runs the risk of not being the choice of the new owners.

The other rumour that refuses to go away is that the council will not sell their share in the Ricoh Arena to SISU. If this is true then it is one more reason why SISU should seriously consider any offer to buy their shares in the Football club. Once again the supporters are being kept in the dark about their club and the owners’ intentions.

The promotion and relegation issues affecting the Championship are not totally resolved but it is now certain that City will renew rivalries with Brighton & Hove Albion next season. The south coast side, ably managed by former Chelsea and Spurs’ Gus Poyet, return to our league after a five-year interlude in League One., and next season will be playing in their new stadium on the outskirts of Brighton. Their promotion is timed perfectly and the new 22,500-seater stadium will be significantly fuller than the 8,000 capacity former athletics stadium at Withdean. The last time City played the Seagulls in league football was in early 2006 - a 2-0 home win with Dennis Wise scoring both goals.

As we welcome Brighton, and probably Southampton, who look set to take the second automatic place, we say goodbye to Preston North End. North End’s eleven-year stay in this league comes to an end and leaves Coventry City as the longest-serving club in tier two of the English game. Preston have, for most of that time, punched above their weight and reached the play-offs four times. Two frightening statistics - in the last ten seasons the Sky Blues have never won at Deepdale and have only finished above Preston on one occasion, 2004-05.

Sheffield United’s plight under former City boss Micky Adams also looks doomed. The Blades have been in this league for nine of the last ten seasons (the other season was that controversial one in the Premier League) and like Preston have only once been headed by the Sky Blues in a final table. When you look at these facts you realise how dreadful City’s performance has been in the last ten seasons and how lucky they have been not to be relegated.

I recently had some correspondence with Jim Dobbin, a lifelong City fan who now lives on the Isle of Man. His late father, also Jim, was the tailor to the Sky Blues in the Jimmy Hill era and knew a lot of the players well, especially goalkeepers Arthur Lightening and Bob Wesson. Jim has a pewter tankard given to his father by Lightening after City played a friendly game with then First Division Burnley in may 1962. The game was to commemorate the opening of the rebuilt Cathedral and Jim wanted the details of the game.

Burnley, who the previous week had lost the FA Cup final to Tottenham and finished runners-up to Ipswich in the league, brought a strong team to Highfield Road and outclassed City 4-2. It was the last time that City wore their pre-JH all white kit before switching to the famous Sky Blue strip that summer.

The match details requested by Jim are as follows:

Line-ups: City: Lightening: Sillett, Austin, Farmer, Curtis, Brian Hill, Humphries, Johnny Byrne (West Ham – a guest), Dwight, McCann, Imlach.

Burnley: Blacklaw: Angus, Buxton, Adamson, Cummings, Miller, Price, Bellamy, Pointer, Robson, Harris.

The scorers were: Robson (21 min), Price (37), Pointer (78 & 82), Byrne (87), Humphries (89).

Attendance: 7,416 (probably lower because the terrace admission price was increased from 2/6 to 5/-)

JIM'S COLUMN 23.4.11

2011-04-25T10:41:00.001+01:00

Three more points against Millwall last Saturday made the Sky Blues safe from relegation for another season. The replacement of manager Aidy Boothroyd with caretaker boss Andy Thorn has galvanised the team and eleven points from six games has put Thorn in with a shout of being the next City manager. However with little or no news on funding or ownership changes any talk of a long term appointment is a waste of time. Since the tsunami of news when the new board were appointed three weeks ago things have gone quiet at the Ricoh and no-one has elaborated on the comments that Sisu’s latest transfusion of money would only last until the summer. HMRC and other creditors (including presumably the football club who were owed money that caused the transfer embargo to be enforced) have been pacified for the moment, but players will need paying through the close season as will HMRC for the PAYE liabilities. A permanent appointment is highly unlikely until Sisu’s longer term intentions are clearer or a new owner comes over the hill on his white charger. Frankly, if I was Andy Thorn I would be loathed to take the job until the fog around City’s future clears.

Marlon King became the first Coventry player to score a brace in two successive league games since Micky Quinn achieved the feat in 1992. Since then Dion Dublin (1997-98), Darren Huckerby (1998-99) and Cedric Roussel (1999-2000) have done it including a Cup game, in fact Huckerby scored successive hat-tricks against Macclesfield and Nottingham Forest but no-one has done it since the club were relegated in 2001. In 1992 Quinn had a golden period when he arrived courtesy of new vice-chairman John Clarke’s £250,000 donation. ‘Quinny’ scored ten goals in six games including three successive braces at Southampton (2-2) and at home to Liverpool (5-1) and Aston Villa (3-0). Marlon, now on 11 goals, could be on target to take McSheffrey’s record of the most league goals (15) in a season since relegation.

Days after Portsmouth’s Haydn Mullins became the first City opponent to receive a red card this season Millwall’s Neil Harris became the second, and the fastest ever at the Ricoh Arena, his expulsion being timed at 67 seconds after coming on as a substitute. The previous record was held by Michael Mifsud, sent off after 11 minutes against West Brom in 2007. I believe Harris is only the second opposition substitute to be ordered off at the new stadium, the other was Colchester’s Teddy Sheringham in 2008. The mild-mannered Claus Jorgensen remains the only City substitute to be sent off at the Ricoh, although another affable substitute, Brian Borrows, received his marching orders at St James’ Park in the late 1990s and Carl Baker ‘saw red’ at Millwall this season.

Harris joins a select group of miscreants to be sent off as a substitute against the Sky Blues including Clive Allen, the first in 1992, when playing for Chelsea, Trevor Benjamin (WBA), Nicky Summerbee and West Ham’s Steve Lomas.

City’s fastest ever red card was timed at 24 seconds and received by loanee Peter Clarke at Cardiff’s Ninian Park in 2004.

JIM'S COLUMN 16.4.2011

2011-04-17T18:44:00.001+01:00

City’s upturn in form continued at Fratton Park on Tuesday evening with a convincing 3-0 win over Portsmouth. The win completed the club’s first ‘double’ of the season, after City’s opening day victory at the Ricoh. It ensured that the Sky Blues did the ‘double’ over at least one team for the eleventh season in a row. You have to go back to 1999-2000 for a campaign where City didn’t achieve the ‘double’, that team, boasting Robbie Keane, Gary McAllister and the Moroccans may have been dubbed ‘the Entertainers’ but failed to win a single away game.

As I said last week City have met Pompey very infrequently over the last 45 years but it was still the first win at Fratton Park since August 1966 when goals from Ray Pointer and Bobby Gould secured a 2-0 win. Tuesday’s victory was City’s biggest away victory for almost three years, when a 5-1 win at Colchester helped save City’s bacon and only the second time this season the team have scored more than two goals. Coincidentally two of those goals at Colchester were from the penalty spot, Elliott Ward the man on target at Layer Road. Marlon King emulated Ward’s feat at Fratton and took his tally of league goals to nine. His scoring form is excellent and although he is unlikely to better Gary McSheffrey’s 15 goals in 2005-06 (the best by a City player in the post-Premiership era) he may well reach 12 which would be the best total since Gary’s record campaign. Marlon’s goals per game ratio however is the best in the modern era with nine in 20 starts.King only settled in the side in November after fitness issues and the conundrum is why the team have they slumped to the lower reaches of the table whilst King has been relatively prolific with his goalscoring.

Portsmouth’s Haydn Mullins became the first City opponent to receive a red card this season for his handball offence ensuring that one record stays intact; it is 14 years since we went through a whole season with no opposing players sent off.

Next Friday, Good Friday, City play host to Scunthorpe in what will be the first Good Friday afternoon home game since the club joined the Football League in 1919. Traditionally Coventry factories worked on a Good Friday and were closed on Easter Monday and Tuesday and as result the club would usually play home and away fixtures against the same club on the Monday and Tuesday, with occasionally an away game on Good Friday. In the days before floodlights (i.e. pre-1955) the Tuesday game would take place in the afternoon and with few at work a big crowd was usually guaranteed. Only once in almost 100 years have City played at home on Good Friday, an evening game with Sheffield United in 1975. In 1913 and 1914, when City were a struggling Southern League side they played afternoon games on Good Friday. I understand that some Coventry firms still work on Good Friday and fans working for these are likely to miss the game and the decision to play on Friday will have upset many people of a religious persuasion.

JIM'S COLUMN 9.4.2011

2011-04-11T17:58:00.002+01:00

It was another memorable Legend’s Day at the Ricoh Arena last Saturday with 48 former players and relatives of former players attending the Watford game. Many thanks to everyone who attended and made it a day to remember!
I would like to say a big thank you to everyone at CCFC, Compass, who put on a marvellous lunch, and the G Casino who hosted the evening activities. They were fantastic on our big day and we couldn’t have done it with out you all!
The Former Players Association committee, plus our hard-working fundraisers Gill Young, Dave, Leslie, and Grant, all worked hard to make it a special day.
Thanks to all our patrons and the club’s associate directors, with special mention to John Clarke and Joe Elliott, for their generous donations to the CCFPA, it is much appreciated!
Finally to the most important people, the fans and the former players of Coventry City, you were brilliant. Billy Bell asked me to say that he was honoured to introduce the former players parade at half time and the reception they received was truly awesome! He said: ‘When Ernie Machin was wheeled on to the pitch to that wonderful reception, I have to admit it brought a tear to my eye.’
Billy went on: ‘Credit also to the Watford fans who treated the boys with the respect they deserve and gave them warm applause throughout. The fun in the E-On lounge before the game and the craic in the Casino was brilliant. I knew I had to many when I woke up on Sunday morning to find my suit in bed and I was hung up in the wardrobe! The messages of thanks from the former players for a cracking day, for me, makes all the hard work involved worthwhile.’ Here’s to the next one!
It was the fifth Legends Day and the 2-0 victory over Watford means the Sky Blues have never lost on Legends Day!
Photographs of the day (kindly taken by our own photographer Tony Thomas) and a report can be found on the FPA’s website www.ccfpa.co.uk
This week City travel to play two old foes from the Second Division days of the 1960s. Today they are at Derby’s Pride Park and on Tuesday it’s Fratton Park. Older fans will remember Easter 1966 when City’s defeats at Derby and Portsmouth wrecked the promotion hopes. City were well placed for promotion before a 2-0 defeat at Fratton on Easter Saturday, then, on Easter Monday afternoon, a late Alan Durban goal gave the Rams the points on the day Bill Glazier made his return after a year out with a broken leg. City lost only one of their remaining six games but were pipped at the post by Southampton.

City have not got a great record at Pride Park in recent years and have won only once in seven games since they were relegated in 2001. That was a 3-1 win in October 2003 near the end of Gary McAllister’s reign as manager, when Stephen Warnock and Patrick Suffo (2) netted.

The visit to Fratton Park is the first in the league since Pompey were promoted to the Premiership in 2003. That season City got a creditable 1-1 draw thanks to a Calum Davenport goal after losing 1-0 to a Peter Crouch goal the previous campaign. During City’s 34-year unbroken period in the top flight they only encountered Portsmouth once, in 1987-88, and drew 0-0. So you have to go back to August 1966 for City’s last win at Fratton but they have only met there on four occasions since, including last season’s 1-1 FA Cup draw.

JIM'S COLUMN 2.4.11

2011-04-05T08:42:00.002+01:00

It was a case of Déjà vu at the Ricoh Arena this week with the club’s desperate financial plight taking over as the main news item from last week’s story about the team’s vertical drop towards League One. A high-powered press conference, talk of administration, financial injections and a new team on the board with their serious talk and furrowed brows. Yes there are new faces in the boardroom, some of them allegedly with questionable pasts, but they make the same old noises. They blame all the problems on the previous regime, talk about making the club financially viable again and state the obvious that the club must own the stadium in the future. Call me cynical but most City fans could have written the script for the press conference on Wednesday.

An added ingredient this week was that HMRC sent their bailiffs to the Ricoh looking to seize the club’s assets in lieu of unpaid PAYE tax. It can only have been like something from a Monty Python sketch.

HMRC bailiff: ‘So there are no assets?
CCFC representative: ‘No, we own nothing, just eleven football shirts’ (according to Ray Ranson in 2008) ‘We have got a training ground, but we’ve mortgaged that now. If you had come in January we had a talented 17-year old but we sent him to Liverpool’.

Joking apart, this is a serious problem. In normal circumstances HMRC would commence bankruptcy proceedings against a non-payer, so someone needs to pay them pretty quickly. But what a state this football club is in – Derrick Robins and Phil Mead, the men who quietly and frugally built the club up in the 1950s and 60s must be turning in their graves at the thought of the bailiffs turning up.

The faces in the boardroom are mostly new but the owner, SISU, is unchanged and little was said to reassure the long-suffering fans that much will change. SISU have had three years to progress the stadium ownership issue and have achieved little. Before SISU, Paul Fletcher, easily the best Chief Executive in the modern era in my opinion, resigned in frustration at the lack of progress with the owners of the stadium (and too much tinkering from a chairman who thought he knew best). In the three years since SISU saved the club in the last crisis there has been little or no progress on the playing side. On Wednesday the new chairman got off to a bad start when his assertion that a meeting was planned with the council was exposed as a myth by council leader John Mutton.

One way forward may be for all the parties (including the politicians) to get off their high horses, stop posturing and sit down together and thrash out a solution that benefits the football club’s supporters and the city of Coventry. Until that happens our football club will just stagger from this disaster to the next.

Today is the fifth annual Legends Day organised by the Former Players Association and over 50 former players including family members of some of the late greats (George Mason, Ray Straw and Frank Austin) are expected to attend. A full list of all confirmed guests can be found on the Former Players Association website at www.ccfpa.co.uk Ensure you are in your seats at half-time to see the men who made Coventry City famous paraded on the pitch. It promises to be a great day with the celebrations starting in the Arena Exhibition hall at 11.30 where the E-type Jaguars are on display and carrying on throughout the day at the Ricoh and culminating in a party open to all at the G Casino after the game.

JIM'S COLUMN 26.3.11

2011-03-28T13:53:00.000+01:00

The Coventry City funfair has a new ride. As the team’s hair-raising drop towards League One accelerates we now have the Chairman’s Merry-go-round to add to the perennial attractions, the Manager’s Revolving Door and the Sky Blues Roller Coaster. According to press reports this week chairman Ray Ranson is set to leave the football club. The stories seem to indicate that he is going to resign because his power has dwindled but who knows what the truth is about goings-on at the Ricoh Arena.

Since SISU and Ranson arrived in December 2007 like knights on a white charger to save the club at the eleventh hour from the jaws of administration information regarding the club has been strictly limited. The new owners saved the club, sure, but from day one the owners have alienated the old shareholders, the supporters and the media. That was their legal right, I know, but no one knows what is going on at the club we all love and care for. Details of SISU’s £20 million plus investment were thin on the ground at the start and little has changed in the intervening 3 ½ years.

A condescending stance to shareholders was evident from day one and a similar approach was taken with the Supporters Consultative Group who, whilst not a powerful group did offer excellent feedback from the club’s customers.

Because of the secrecy surrounding our owners and the absence of plans and accounts no one outside the club has ever really understood what SISU’s strategy was, nor what the plans are now. Fans on the board, Gary Hoffman and Joe Elliott have been sidelined and new unknown men have arrived. The only true City fan left is John Clarke, promoted to vice-chairman this week, the man who holds the record for the shortest tenure as chairman (nine days in 1993). The way things are going this week he might soon hold the record for the shortest reign as vice-chairman! Then again he might be chairman again soon.

At least with Ranson departing the club will save the club some money as I understand he was the first paid chairman since the infamous Bryan Richardson. Mike McGinnity and Geoffrey Robinson, Ranson’s predecessors, certainly had their faults including sharing with Ranson an inability to recruit a decent manager, but at least they did the job for nothing.

City’s chairmen over the last fifty years are as follows:

1960-1973 Derrick Robins
1973-1975 Peter Robins
1975-1977 Sir Jack Scamp
1977-1980 Phil Mead
1980-1983 Jimmy Hill
1983-1984 Iain Jamieson
1984-1990 John Poynton
1990-1993 Peter Robins
1993 John Clarke
1993-2002 Bryan Richardson
2002-2005 Mike McGinnity
2005-2007 Geoffrey Robinson

Next Saturday is the fifth annual Legends Day organised by the Former Players Association and over 50 former players are expected to attend with a number making their first appearance including John O’Rourke, Kevin Drinkell and Ernie Machin. A full list of all confirmed guests can be found on the Former Players Association website at www.ccfpa.co.uk Ensure you are in your seats at half-time next week to see the men who made Coventry City famous paraded on the pitch.

Talking of Kevin Drinkell, the former City striker who had such a bad time at Highfield Road after an illustrious career at Grimsby, Norwich and Rangers, he is hosting a book signing and question and answer session at the Royal Warwicks Club on the ring road next Friday evening from 7.30 pm. His book ‘Drinks All Round’ was published last autumn but the bad weather forced him to cancel his signing session in Coventry at the time.

Next Saturday evening (2 April) sees the return of the Coventry City Quiz at the Queens Head, Cubbington, kick-off 7.30. If you want to enter a team of three (£6 per team) in this fun quiz with prizes and food laid on contact the organiser John Hannon at j.hannan@west-midlands.pnn.police.uk

JIM'S COLUMN 19.3.11

2011-03-20T18:06:00.000Z

The Coventry City manager’s revolving door was in operation last week as Aidy Boothroyd became the ninth City manager to lose his job since the club were relegated in 2001.

The full league record of those nine men is as follows:

Games W D L For Agst GD Points Wins % Goals/game

Gordon Strachan 183 52 52 79 203 262 -59 208 28.42% 1.11
Roland Nilsson 40 19 5 16 56 48 8 62 47.50% 1.40
Gary McAllister 68 17 25 26 73 91 -18 76 25.00% 1.07
Eric Black 23 11 3 9 38 24 14 36 47.83% 1.65
Peter Reid 29 9 8 12 36 45 -9 35 31.03% 1.24
Micky Adams 90 31 24 35 113 124 -11 117 34.44% 1.26
Iain Dowie 43 16 9 18 49 63 -14 57 37.21% 1.14
Chris Coleman 107 30 35 42 112 140 -28 125 28.04% 1.05
Aidy Boothroyd 36 11 8 17 38 46 -8 41 30.56% 1.06

Strachan’s record includes all his games in the Premiership and therefore his percentages are hardly comparable but the ranking (by wins percentage) of the other eight is:

1 Black
2 Nilsson
3 Dowie
4 Adams
5 Reid
6 Boothroyd
7 Coleman
8 McAllister

The frightening statistics show that in the last ten years:

· Only four managers have won more than one game in three.
· Five out of eight managers have been given less than 50 games in charge.
· Only Black and Nilsson have won more than they have lost.
· Only Black and Nilsson have a positive goal difference.
· Only Black and Nilsson have scored more than 1.3 goals per game.

I don’t have to remind City fans that it has been ten years of pain and mismanagement from top to bottom at the club. Goodness knows how much compensation has been paid out over the period to departing managers, not to mention departing directors. Probably enough to build a promotion side!

Aidy, the latest victim, was touted, like all his predecessors, as the one to get us back into the Premiership. Now nine months later he is victim number nine. I am not suggesting that the recent run of poor form does not warrant his sacking but one has to question the club’s managerial selection process. Anyone in business knows that time invested in recruiting staff can save you a lot of money - get the wrong person, spend money on their training and induction only to realise a year later that they are not very good and you have to release them and repeat the whole process. In football it is a double whammy, get the wrong manager and it costs you money and hampers the club’s progress. This is the single biggest reason for City’s failure to get anywhere near the play-offs in ten seasons.

I know it can be a lottery appointing a manager but I don’t believe good managers become bad managers overnight. Nilsson, Reid, McAllister, Black and Adams all have high-profile jobs in the game – in fact Nilsson will be in the Champions League next season after leading Malmo to the Swedish championship last season. Boothroyd will, I am sure, taste success again.

No, it is the Coventry City board that has take a long hard look at its recruitment policy and processes before diving in and appointing someone who has a good powerpoint presentation or comes over well in an interview or is a personal friend of a board member.

Preston North End are the only club that City have played in all ten seasons in this division. North End look odds-on to be relegated and bring an end to those meetings. There has therefore never been a better opportunity for City to win a league game at this bogey ground. In the last nine seasons City have picked up just two points and conceded 23 goals and in total City have never won in 14 league trips to Deepdale stretching back to 1949. A win today would go a long way to guaranteeing survival.

I received more suggestions for players with long careers against Coventry City. As I thought no one can top Peter Shilton’s record of playing against the Sky Blues 23 years after his first appearance but a few candidates for outfield players cropped up.

Last week I thought Teddy Sheringham might have held the record with 19 years and 12 days between his first and last appearance against City but Geoff Moore came up with Clive Walker, who first played for Chelsea in January 1978 and made his last appearance for Woking in the 1997 FA Cup tie (19 years 33 days). But he is beaten by Billy Bonds who played for Charlton as an 18-year old against the Sky Blues in March 1965 and made his final bow in November 1987, like Sheringham, aged 41.That is 22 years and eight months, just shy of Shilton’s longevity.

Last Saturday Hull’s substitute was 37-year old Nick Barmby who first played against City in early 1994. He would have to play for another six seasons to overhaul Shilts and Bonds.

14-year old David Woodfield who sits behind me in the Tesco Stand, celebrated his 100th Coventry City game last week (despite the disappointment of another home defeat). Dave is the third generation of the Woodfield family to be mad City fanatics following in the footsteps of his late grandfather Bert, whose memories of the great Clarrie Bourton could brighten the dullest day at Highfield Road, and his father Richard, the Bantam mascot in the early days of Jimmy Hill. Dave has seen little to cheer about in those 100 games and lets hope he sees some success in the near future. Well done Dave!

Aidy's gone

2011-03-15T08:01:00.000Z

Aidy Boothroyd became the ninth Coventry City manager to be sacked since City lost their Premiership status in 2001. I have some sympathy with Aidy. He was given little money and was hit by injuries to key players. His mistake was not signing a more prolific striker. Platt was never going to score a lot and Jukebox was always a gamble. King has scored goals and looked dangerous but we have only won 4 games out of 18 that he has started and we were 4th when he arrived. Maybe it was his arrival that sparked the slump.

After the success of Coyle and Lambert can't we find a bloody minded Scot.

JIM'S COLUMN 12.3.11

2011-03-15T07:59:00.000Z

A disastrous home defeat to Bristol City last week saw Marlon King receive his second red card of his short stay at the club – City’s fifth red card of the season. This is the club’s worst season for dismissals since 2002-03 when seven players were sent off. Seven in one season is the club’s worst campaign and was also the total in 2001-02. This season’s culprits are:

Carl Baker (Millwall away)
Aron Gunnarsson (Norwich home)
Marlon King (QPR home)
Martin Cranie (Leicester away)
Marlon King (Bristol City home)

Surely it is no coincidence that four of the red cards have been dished out during the current bad run started in December. Conversely no opponent has been sent off this season and if that situation continues until the end of the season it will be the first time since 1996-97 that no opposing player was given a red card. King emulates players like David Thompson, Kevin Kyle and Leon Barnett who received two red cards in one season.

Dean Nelson pointed out that David James, the Bristol ‘keeper on Saturday, played 18 years after his first appearance against the Sky Blues and wondered if it was some kind of record. 40-year old James first played against City for Liverpool in 1993 in a 4-0 defeat for the Sky Blues -almost 18 years ago last Saturday. Dean asked how many times he had played against City in that period and I make it 17 including the two games this season for Bristol City. He has only appeared on the winning side six times in that time and Saturday’s game was only the second winning side he has played in in Coventry. Considering that eleven of the 17 games were for Liverpool it is not that impressive. He was between the sticks at Anfield for all three of City’s great victories there – in 1995, 1997 and 1998.

As far as I know James’ record is topped by two players. When Teddy Sheringham appeared as a substitute (and was sent off) for Colchester at the Ricoh in 2007, aged 41, it was 19 years and 12 days since his first appearance against City, for Millwall in 1988.

The record however is held by Peter Shilton who first played against City for Leicester in December 1967 and played his last match in April 1991, over 23 years later, for Derby at Highfield Road. In total ‘Shilts’ played against City 42 times for five different clubs (Leicester, Stoke, Nottingham Forest, Southampton and Derby) and was on the winning side 19 times.

The longest City career (in time) is also held by a goalkeeper Alf Wood. Alf made his debut in February 1937 and although the war intervened, he made his final appearance over 21 years later in December 1958 at the age of 43 years.

City had three different captains during the match with Bristol, which must be some sort of record. Keiron Westwood captained the side from the kick-off but handed the armband to King when he went off at half-time. When King was red-carded he passed the band to Gunnarsson. Then on Tuesday Richard Wood was captain.

Today’s special guest of the Former Players Association at the Hull City game is Peter Bodak. Birmingham-born Peter played a big part in the 1980-81 League Cup run to the semi-final but was unable to attend the recent reunion of that team. He will be best remembered for two stunning goals, the first in the 5-0 quarter final victory over Watford, the second, the following season at Maine Road where his delicious chip clinched a famous FA Cup win and won Match of the Day’s goal of the season.
Fans will be able to meet him in the corporate areas before the game and after the game in the G-Casino.

Finishing touches are now being made for this year’s grand reunion of our former players at Legends Day 2011 (which is less than a month away). This will be held on Saturday 2nd April 2011 at the Sky Blues’ home game against Watford. Over 40 Former Players have already confirmed their appearanceand it is expected that 2011 will be the biggest and best Legends Day so far. We will reveal on the website www.ccfpa.co.uk who is coming nearer the date.
The funeral of former Coventry City defender Eric Dobbs will take place at Canley Crematorium on Monday 14 March at 11.30 am.

JIM'S COLUMN 5.3.11

2011-03-08T20:20:00.001Z

Saturday’s hard won point at Leicester’s Walkers Stadium was very welcome and ended a run of four away league games (five if you include the Blues cup-tie) stretching back to December when they got a point at Reading. This run was some way short of the worst ever run of 11 away defeats when City were in the Third Division North in 1925-26.

The four-game sequence was however the worst run since they lost seven in a row in 2007-08. Then, after beating West Brom at the Hawthorns in early December 2007 (the week before SISU’s takeover) the team lost at Blackpool, Bristol City, Hull, Preston, Burnley, Scunthorpe and Sheffield United before finally getting a 0-0 draw at Southampton on 22 March, by which time Iain Dowie had been replaced by Chris Coleman. During the disastrous league run Dowie did lead the club to an FA Cup win at Blackburn.

Talking of the FA Cup, Tim Wilding wrote to me after the defeat at St Andrews asking about results and gates at past big away FA Cup ties in the Midlands. Since joining the Football League in 1919 City have played the following games:

1934-35 Birmingham (R3) Lost 1-5 40,349
1945-46 Aston Villa (R3) Lost 0-2 40,000
1951-52 Leicester (R3) Drew 1-1 36,116
1964-65 Aston Villa (R3) Lost 0-3 47,656
1971-72 West Brom (R3) Won 2-1 26,472
1972-73 Wolves (R6) Lost 0-2 50,106
1978-79 West Brom (R3 replay) Lost 0-4 36,262
1981-82 West Brom (R6) Lost 0-2 27,825
1983-84 Wolves (R3 replay) Drew 1-1 19,204
1994-95 West Brom (R3 replay) Won 2-1 23,230
1997-98 Aston Villa (R5) Won 1-0 36,979
1998-99 Leicester (R4) Won 3-0 21,207
2010-11 Birmingham (R4) Lost 2-3 16,669

At the time I didn’t realise that the Blues was the first such game for 12 years and the first time City have lost such a game since 1982. By the way in the two ties that were drawn City triumphed in the replays at Highfield Road. The attendance at St Andrews was the lowest ever for such a ‘big’ game and illustrates the slump in FA Cup crowds in recent years. If the game had been played in any period up to the 1980s it would have attracted 40,000, as was seen in 1935. Older fans will remember the enormous City followings at Villa Park in ’65 and Molineux in ’73 and the massive disappointment on both occasions, more especially in ’73 when Gordon Milne’s exciting team failed to turn up and Derek Dougan and John Richards knocked them out to reach the semi-finals.

Elderly City fan Les Raven was present at St Andrews in 1935 and was featured in these pages at the time. He wanted to know the City XI that played that day and here it is:

Bill Morgan: Vic Brown, Charlie Bisby, Billy Frith, George Mason, Harry Boileau, Bob Birtley, Charlie Wilson, Clarrie Bourton, Les Jones, Fred Liddle. Jones scored City’s goal (a penalty after 4 minutes) and it was 1-1 at half-time before Blues ran riot. Les felt the scoreline flattered Birmingham and put the defeat down to a poor display from full-back Bisby.

Today’s special guest of the Former Players Association is Ian Gibson. ‘Gibbo’ was one of the most popular Sky Blues of the 1960s and played over 100 games between 1966 and 1970. Fans will be able to meet him after the game in the G-Casino.

The funeral of former Coventry City defender Eric Dobbs will take place at Canley Crematorium on Monday 14 March at 11.30 am.

Ian Gibson

JIM'S COLUMN 26.2.11

2011-03-01T09:08:00.002Z

It is sad to report the death earlier this week of former Coventry City player Eric Dobbs who passed away months after his 90th birthday.

Eric, a full-back, played only five first team games just after the Second World War but played a good number of reserve games over three seasons in the days when the club had a professional squad of 30 or so players.

Eric was born in October 1920 in the rural Norfolk village of Hingham – in the Angel Inn pub, which his family ran. In 1926 the Dobbs family left Norfolk to come to Coventry -presumably to work in the booming industrial town. They lived in Aldermans Green but later moved to Bedlam Lane, Foleshill. Eric’s nephew Chris Wilson tells me that their house would have been on the site of the Arena Park shopping centre, adjacent to the Ricoh Arena.

He attended Foleshill Church of England School but left at 14 to work as a painter and decorator with his father. In 1936 he was playing football for the Miners Arms team in Aldermans Green and from 1938 he was in City’s ‘A’ team as an amateur. In 1940 he enlisted with the Coldstream Guards, first as a PT instructor but later he saw action in North Africa and in Italy. In 1944 he was involved in the famous but bloody battle of Monte Cassino and was shot in the thigh.

He joined Coventry City as a professional in 1946, following his demobilisation, and played for the ‘A’ Team and the Reserves, occasionally playing at centre-forward. On Easter Tuesday 1947 he got a surprise call-up to the first team to play Swansea owing to injuries to Charlie Elliott and Billy Frith. Eric had to mark Swansea’s dashing winger Norman Lockhart, who later joined City.

On a wet afternoon City won 3-2 and Nemo commented on Eric’s debut: ‘Dobbs showed up prominently in conditions that did not help him at all’. Eric got another first team game before the season was over, playing in a 2-1 home win over Leicester.

His further three games came the following season and he played right-back in home wins over West Brom (1-0) and Fulham (5-2) and a home defeat to Leeds (1-2). At the end of the season he was released and joined Bristol Rovers. Sadly he failed to break into Rovers’ first team and a year later was back in the Midlands playing briefly for Kettering Town before signing for Lockheed Leamington under his former City team-mate Les Latham. Eric’s arrival at the Windmill Ground in 1949 coincided with the Brakes’ first season in the Birmingham Combination and the team finished last but one in the league. The following season however saw the team improve to ninth and win the Birmingham Senior Cup for the first time and Eric was in the team that beat Hereford United Reserves in the final after a replay. The first game, at Nuneaton, ended 2-2 but Lockheed won the replay at their own Windmill Ground 3-1 in front of a ground record 3,500. Earlier that season Eric scored a rare goal (from the penalty spot) in an 11-2 home win over Atherstone. The team picture, kindly supplied by Chris Wilson, shows the successful Lockheed team of 1950-51 with Eric far left on the back row.

Former City player and director Micky French played with Eric both for City Reserves and later at Lockheed. He remembers Eric fondly and used to get a lift to training in Leamington on the pillion of Eric’s motorcycle. I spoke to Micky this week and he had this to say: ‘Eric and I hit it off at Coventry and played a few reserve team games together. When I finished my National Service in 1950 and went to play for Lockheed he was there and we took up where we left off. He was a popular but quiet man who was very kind and honest. But on the field he was a good footballer with an extremely hard tackle and it was best to avoid him in training. He was a real old-fashioned defender and took no prisoners’.

After he left professional football Eric became a painter and decorator and later joined the machine tool company Skelcher and Rowe where he worked as a maintenance man. He was a keen golfer and played at Cosby Golf Club in Leicestershire. He is survived by his wife Joyce. Eric was one of the early members of the Former Players Association when it was formed in 2007 and attended the first Legends Day. He will be sadly missed by his friends and former team-mates in the Association. Until his death he was the oldest former city player, a mantle now taken up by Colin Collindridge who lives in Nottingham and was 90 last November.

Eric Dobbs

JIM'S COLUMN 19.2.11

2011-02-20T12:04:00.000Z

Coventry City ended their appalling run of 10 winless league games with a hard-won 2-1 victory over struggling Crystal Palace at the Ricoh. Hopefully my extensive coverage of previous bad runs last week had the effect I intended and helped remove the ‘Indian Sign’ from City’s form. The team’s results over the last two months have wrecked their play-off chances and also dramatically affected the mood and confidence of the supporters. The dreadful run has also prompted some strategic reflection at SISU, the club’s owners, and the directorial moves over the last two weeks demonstrate that all is not well in the boardroom. City are now virtually condemned to an 11th season in the second tier of English football and it would appear that our latest owners now realise that there is no quick fix for the club’s financial situation.

Marlon King was on target again, scoring the second goal – his fourth in successive games – and has showed his Premiership pedigree in recent weeks. King has scored in the last three league games and at St Andrews in the FA Cup. No City player has scored in four successive games since 2003 when Andy Morrell scored in five successive league games (but failed to net in a League Cup tie in the run).

Morrell scoring run was:

13 Sep 2003 H Stoke Won 4-2 Suffo, Barrett, Adebola, Morrell
16 Sep 2003 A Preston lost 2-4 Staunton (pen), Morrell
20 Sep 2003 A Reading won 2-1 Adebola, Morrell
27 Sep 2003 H Wigan drew 1-1 Morrell
1 Oct 2003 H Crewe won 2-0 McAllister, Morrell

So King’s run is the best in all games since 1992-93, the first season of the Premiership when Mick Quinn scored in each of his first six league games for the club after arriving on loan from Newcastle United.

Mick scored two on his debut at home to Manchester City, a game which City lost 2-3, then netted singles against Sheffield United (a) (1-1) and Ipswich (h) (2-2). His form really took off then with three successive braces, at Southampton (2-2), at home to Liverpool (5-1) and in a Christmas cracker at home to Aston Villa (3-0). A stunning total of ten goals in six games!

Mick was the only City player in 34 years in the top flight to score in five or more successive league games although Terry Gibson did net in seven successive league and cup games in 1985-86 but this included two League Cup ties with Chester and a meaningless Full Members Cup game against Millwall.

The club record is held by Clarrie Bourton, the famous goalscorer from the 1930s. Bourton netted in 10 successive league games during the 1931-32 season, 11 if you include an FA Cup goal during the run. In that spell he managed 19 league goals including five goals in a 6-1 home win over Bournemouth and a hat-trick in the 4-2 home victory over Clapton Orient. Clarrie went on to score 49 goals that season and was the leading goalscorer in the whole Football League.

Michael Green e-mailed me with a question on behalf of Derek Craig, his 87 year old neighbour. Derek told Michael that his dad who had originated from Durham and played for Coventry City around the time of the First World War. He asked me if I had any information on his father.

Robert Craig was an outside left or left half who was born in Newcastle sometime before 1900. City signed him from North Shields Athletic in 1913 and over the next two seasons he played 25 Southern League games (City did not join the Football League until 1919) and scored one goal (on his debut at Gillingham).

After the Great War he joined Nuneaton Town for one season before joining Hinckley United where he appears to have stayed for five years before retiring in 1925.

If you like to wallow in some Coventry City nostalgia get along to the Coventry Transport Museum this coming Thursday (24 February). Dean Nelson and the Former Players Association are hosting a film night especially dedicated to displaying archive film material covering some past games of the Sky Blues (culled from his extensive archive). Dean will be showing Coventry City highlights from TV and celluloid coverage of old games from across the years. Last Saturday after the Palace game the 1981 players were surprised to see the goals from the famous win over West Ham, albeit very grainy images. The event is timed to last from 7pm – 9pm. Tickets will cost £1 each and can be booked by telephoning Coventry Transport Museum – Tel: 024 7623 4270

JIM'S COLUMN 12.2.11

2011-02-13T18:29:00.003Z

Some readers criticise me for ‘putting the mockers’ on good form when Coventry City are in a good run, rare though it may be. Last December I wrote about City’s strong run and their successive clean sheets, but that day they lost for the first time in a long time and haven’t won a league game since. Last March, I seem to remember, I waxed lyrically about City’s four straight wins under Chris Coleman that pushed City into the top eight and speculated about their play-off chances, only for the Sky Blues to collapse with a run of 11 games without a victory.

So today I thought I would write about the dreadful run without a win that Aidy Boothroyd’s are having right now, put it into a historical context and hopefully help end the run!

After 10 games without a win we are getting close to the club’s worst run for eight years. The worst league sequences since City fell out of the Premier League are:

2003 16 games over two seasons under Gary McAllister.
2009-10 11 games at the end of the season under Chris Coleman.
2010-11 10 games under Aidy Bothroyd.
2009-10 10 games in mid-season under Coleman.
2004-05 9 games in early season 2004-05 under Peter Reid.
2008-09 8 games at the end of the season under Coleman.
2003-04 8 games pre-Christmas under McAllister (incl 7 draws).
2002-03 8 games in Jan & Feb 2003 under McAllister.
2006-07 7 games prior to Micky Adams’ departure.
2001-02 7 games at the end of the season under Nilsson which cost a play-off place.

The club’ worst ever series of results was back in 1919 when, after joining the Football League they failed to win any of their first 19 games and finally broke their duck with a 3-2 win over Stoke City on Christmas Day. The current sequence is beginning to look similar to the dreadful times in Division 1 in 1983 and 1984 when in both seasons City collapsed after Christmas after being in top six positions early in the New Year. In February 1983 Dave Sexton’s young team were fifth in the league after beating Manchester City 4-0. Garry Thompson was sold over the head of Sexton and the team’s form imploded. They went 13 games without a win and only a face-saving 3-0 win at Stoke pulled City out of their seemingly suicidal plummet towards Division Two. The following season, under Bobby Gould’s inexperienced management, another 13-game slump saw City fall from sixth to sixteenth before Gould pulled them out of their freefall and avoid relegation on the last day of the season.

The above list is a terrible indictment on the Sky Blues recent history and it is no surprise that we are the only club (apart from seemingly doomed Preston) of being in this division consistently for the last ten years. At least Preston have reached the play-offs three times and before this season had an enviable home record stretching back a number of years. City regrettably have never beaten Preston at Deepdale in that time.

Another bogey side Crystal Palace are in town today, supported by a large following which may help their team to continue their amazing five-game unbeaten league run at the Ricoh but will at least boost City’s depleted coffers by £100,000 or more. Let us hope that the recent FA Cup victory over Palace has banished this particular bogey.

Manchester City fans paid tribute to the late Neil Young last week. Young, who died after a long fight against cancer, was one of the classiest players I ever saw at Highfield Road and had a remarkable record against the Sky Blues. Between 1964 (when City came up from Division Three) and 1971 (when Young was prematurely losing his touch following the sudden death of his younger brother) he played 10 games for the Manchester Blues against City, was never on the losing side, consistently tormented Mick Kearns and other City defenders with his classy left foot and scored six goals. The only time he was on the losing side was in a League Cup game at Maine Road in 1965 which Coventry won 3-2. Young was somewhat overshadowed by the bigger names in Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison’s team of the time, namely Mike Summerbee, Colin Bell and Francis Lee, but the record books show he was the top scorer in both the Second Division (1966) and First Division (1968) Championship sides as well as scoring the winning goal in the 1969 FA Cup final and in the Cup Winners Cup final a year later – not bad for a player considered to be a midfield player. When you look at the mediocre players selected for England in the modern era it is a travesty that Neil Young never played for his country.

Make a note in your diaries for Thursday 24 February. That night the Coventry Transport Museum, supported by Dean Nelson and the Former Players Association are hosting a film night especially dedicated to displaying archive film material covering some past games of the Sky Blues (culled from his extensive archive). Dean will be showing Coventry City highlights from TV and celluloid coverage of old games from across the years. The event is timed to last from 7pm – 9pm. Tickets will cost £1 each and can be booked by telephoning Coventry Transport Museum – Tel: 024 7623 4270

Neil Young

JIM'S COLUMN 5.2.11

2011-02-08T19:46:00.000Z

What a miserable ten days in Coventry City’s history. Before their trip to Loftus Road two weeks ago only Nottingham Forest in the earlier game at the City Ground, had come from behind to beat Aidy Boothroyd’s side. Then, like London buses, we get three in a row, culminating in Tuesday night’s capitulation against an average Forest side who didn’t look anything like as good as last year’s team that reached the play-offs.

At St Andrews I felt we were lucky to go two goals ahead (Blues had two great chances in the first ten minutes) and we know from recent Cup experiences (Man United and Blackburn (twice)) that for City to get a result against top flight opponents they need to be on top of their game for ninety minutes and the opposition need to be ‘off’ their game. There was evidence of neither on Saturday with City having a good 20 minutes in the first half but under the cosh to a strong-looking Birmingham for the majority of the game. David Bentley and Aleksandr Hleb are international-class players and proved a handful for City and although Conor Thomas battled manfully to keep a grip on Hleb the Belarussian was the most influential player on the park. Bentley, of course, was in the Blackburn side trounced 4-1 by City in 2008 and repeated his stunning goal that day with an unstoppable shot for Blues’ first goal.

Many fans asked me when we last lost after being two goals up and the facts are we have only done it twice in the last ten years. Two seasons ago Watford came from 0-2 to win 3-2 at the Ricoh Arena and in 2002-03 Ipswich came from 0-2 to win 4-2 against a very young and inexperienced City team that included players like Ben Mackey, Andy Whing, Gary Montgomery, Tom Bates and Craig Pead. City led 2-0 at the break but where overwhelmed with four goals in 17 second-half minutes with Marcus Bent and our nemesis Pablo Counago each getting a brace.

Prior to that City last lost from 2-0 away from home at Villa Park on that fateful day that saw us relegated from the Premiership in 2001. City, unfortunately don’t have a great record for coming from two down, although they got a draw at Watford this season and at home to Middlesbrough last season after being two down. The last time City won after being 0-2 was in a League Cup tie against Tottenham in 1995-96. City trailed to goals from Chris Armstrong and a David Busst own goal but bounced back to win with goals from Peter Ndlovu, Busst and John Salako. Before that you have to go back to 1986 to find a 0-2 scoreline turned into a win. On that occasion Southampton led 2-0 at half time but goals from Dave Bennett, Nick Pickering and Alan Brazil gave City a 3-2 win. I think there are only two other instances of City coming back from two down to win since they won promotion to the top flight in 1967. The famous League Cup semi final first leg against West Ham when City scored three second half goals to win 3-2 and the 4-3 win at Derby in September 1970 when the Sky Blues were two down after 13 minutes and won 4-3.

Talking of that famous semi final game in 1981 it is thirty years ago this month that City and West Ham battled for a Wembley place in what was Coventry’s first ever major semi-final. To celebrate the anniversary the Former Players Association are hosting a reunion at next Saturday’s home game with Crystal Palace. A number of the players who appeared for Gordon Milne’s dazzling young team, including Garry Thompson (the hero and villain of the first leg), Danny Thomas and Andy Blair, will be presented to the fans at half-time and mixing with the fans at the G-Casino after the game. The picture was taken in the dressing room after the 5-0

quarter-final replay win over Watford.

Congratulations to John Clarke on his appointment this week to the Coventry City board of directors. John’s elevation is well deserved after many years hard work for the club as an Associate Director and I am sure the appointment will mean stronger links between the football club and the people and businesses of Coventry. John was a director before of course. Back in 1992-93, with City in dire financial straits (when were they not!) he came up with the £250,000 required to sign Mick Quinn. Quinn’s prolific goal scoring (17 goals in 26 games) pushed City briefly into the top six in that first-ever Premiership season. In the summer of 1993 John briefly became chairman and was on the verge of becoming the major shareholder when ‘dark forces’ were unleashed and he was forced to resign and Bryan Richardson took over. John was chairman for nine days and in his own words: ‘he has taken 18 years to get back on the board’. John has been an avid City fan for years and was the Founder Patron and a great supporter of the Former Players Association. He understands the importance of the club’s history and heritage to the fans and we can never have too many of his type in the boardroom.

Help required

2011-01-31T09:06:00.002Z

I need the help of my column readers!

I am writing a book about the JH era, from just before his arrival in Nov 1961 to his departure in October 1967. I intend the book to be one of match by match stats (like my previous books), the factual story, photos, and memories (players and fans). The plan is to publish in November to coincide with the 50th anniversary of his arrival.

I would like to hear your memories of that glorious time.

I would like to start with 1961-62 season. What was supporting City like before JH's arrival like? What memories of games before November? The dreadful Crystal Palace home defeat on a Friday night that supposedly convinced Robins that change had to be made? The Kings Lynn game, The players who did not survive after 61-2 viz. Billy Myerscough, Ron Hewitt, Stewart Imlach, etc.The early games under Hill, the first pop and crisps (Xmas 61), the kit, the ground, or just how you felt when JH arrived. Even if your memories are second hand (from your dad or a relative).

Please save your memories of later seasons under Hill for a couple of weeks whilst I capture these memories.

JIM'S COLUMN 29.1.11

2011-01-30T16:47:00.000Z

Birmingham City are the Sky Blues opponents in the fourth round of the FA Cup today and the clubs will meet for only the third time in the competition. The last time the teams met was in 1980-81 when City beat the Blues 3-2 at Highfield Road and 29,500 saw two goals from Gerry Daly and one from Andy Blair see City through to a fifth round meeting with Spurs. The first meeting was even further back, in 1934-35 when the teams met at St Andrews in a Third round game with First Division Blues winning 5-1 over Third Division Coventry. City boss Harry Storer dropped a bombshell in the run up to the game by axing centre-half and captain Tommy Davison and goalkeeper Hubert Pearson for a breach of club discipline. In their places he selected youngsters George Mason and Bill Morgan and although they both played well they couldn’t stop a rampant Blues. Despite a third minute penalty from Leslie Jones Blues had equalised through Freddie Harris by half-time and ran City ragged after the break with Harris completing a hat-trick, Dave Mangnall (a penalty) and Bill Guest scoring.who won with. That day a crowd of over 40,000 was present (including around 10,000 from Coventry) which with the reduced capacity now at St Andrews cannot be bettered today. There is a brief Pathe News clip of the game at:
http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=82628

Michael Doyle left Coventry City this week to be reunited with his former City boss Micky Adams. Since signing from Celtic in the summer of 2003 ‘Doyler’ has been a great servant to the club and his final game at Loftus Road last Sunday was his 297th first team appearance. Since making his debut against Peterborough in a League Cup tie at Highfield Road in 2003 his record is as follows:-

Starts Subs Goals
League 256 9 20
FA Cup 19 0 1
League Cup 11 2 1

Total 286 11 22

His total puts him 17th in the all-time City appearance table ahead of such luminaries as Cyrille Regis, Brian Hill, Alf Wood and Ronnie Rees. In that time he has played under seven different managers(excluding caretaker managers): Gary McAllister (who signed him), Eric Black, Peter Reid, Micky Adams, Iain Dowie, Chris Coleman and Adie Boothroyd. During his time at the club he has played alongside around 140 different players and only Isaac Osbourne has been at the club longer. If he hadn’t spent last season on loan at Leeds he may have been pushing 350 appearances.

‘Doyler’ was not every one’s cup of tea. Some say he lost his bite 2-3 years ago when the referees got him down as a marked man but he always gave 100% and his athleticism was legendary. I remember someone quoting the statistics of how far he had run during City’s win at Old Trafford four years ago and although I can’t recall the distance it was a phenomenal statistic and far more than any other player on the park. He scored some good goals, showing that when he did push forward and get in the box he was a clinical finisher. His best goal was undoubtedly the winner at home to Preston in 2006-07, a thunderous drive five minutes from time. I also remember the freak goal he scored in a League Cup game with Sheffield Wednesday in 2004 when the goalkeeper was distracted by Stern John and Doyle’s curling free-kick from out near the touchline crept in. He is still under 30 and a new challenge at Bramall Lane may kick-start his career.

JIM'S COLUMN 22.1.11

2011-01-25T11:01:00.001Z

City travel to Loftus Road tomorrow to take on the league leaders Queens Park Rangers. It will not be an easy trip for the Sky Blues who face a team that has lost only three league games all season and have only lost once at home (to Watford). They travel however with the knowledge that they have not lost in their last five trips to the ground, winning three and drawing two, since September 2004 when they lost 4-1. That was an horrendous night for Peter Reid’s team and was their fifth game without a win leaving them 18th in the table. Jamie Cureton scored a hat-trick and former Sky Blue Paul Furlong the other with Graham Barrett replying. Reid’s team that night makes interesting reading:

Steele: Carey, Staunton, Sherwood, Mills, Shaw, Jorgensen, Doyle, John, Morrell, Barrett. Subs: Suffo, Whing, Johnson.

Of the 14 on duty that night, eight of them had gone by the start of the following season and Sherwood and Mills only played one more game for the club. Reid managed to survive until the New Year when he was sacked with City in 20th place and heading for relegation.

Since that dreadful night the results have gone City’s way:

1-0 (McSheffrey pen), 1-0 (Adebola), 2-1 (Mifsud & Kyle), 1-1 (Fox), 2-2 (Best & Wood).

QPR are currently heading for their best finish in the division since they were promoted from League One in 2004. In the last six years their best finishing position is 11th and over that period their record is not dissimilar to the Sky Blues. Now of course they have wealthy owners who have allowed Neil Warnock to invest considerable sums in the squad and promotion back to the Premiership for the first time since 1996 looks a distinct possibility.

Last week’s obituary on Jack Kendall prompted some correspondence. Alan Blackwell, a close friend of Jack’s, sent me the picture below of Morris’ cricket team from around 1960, a team captained and coached by Jack (centre of front row). The football team picture shown last week prompted John Beardow to contact me. He was a friend of Jack's for 48 years. Jack had shown him the team photo some years ago. He knows the match was played on GEC's Copsewood ground (where City trained in those days) and the photo was taken there but he cannot remember the circumstances of the game.

Peter Barratt pointed out that his grandfather Dick Hill, City’s trainer for many years was in the photo on the far right of the back row. Diamond Club member John Green pointed out that the referee (middle row, far left) was Dai Evans. John worked with him at AWA Baginton in the late 1950s and early 1960s and says: ‘Being much older than myself I never suspected he was involved in any sport. Now having reached four score years myself I realised what opportunities young folk miss by not questioning their seniors’.

JIM'S COLUMN 15.1.11

2011-01-18T09:56:00.001Z

The Sky Blues were fortunate that Crystal Palace did not start playing until the hour mark last week and they were able to end the Palace bogey and end the South Londoners’ excellent run of four wins and a draw at the Ricoh Arena. A hard won victory saw City through to the Fourth Round of the FA Cup and avenged that defeat from 1908. The gate of 8,162 was I admit higher than I expected but like many attendances around the country was pitifully low.

Another promising youngster Conor Thomas made his debut last Saturday as a substitute. Good judges tell me that great things are expected from young Thomas, certainly better than other recent ‘bright young things’ like Adam Walker and Ashley Cain, who sadly disappeared without trace. Thomas was 17 years and 71 days which makes him the ninth youngest City debutant – the youngest being Jonson Clarke-Harris who was 16 years and 20 days when he came on at Morecambe earlier this season. He is however the youngest City player to play in the FA Cup. I believe the previous youngest was Dennis Mortimer who was three months short of his 18th birthday when he played against Liverpool in January 1970. He is also the 850th first team player for the club since they joined the Football League in 1919.

It is sad to report the death of former wartime Coventry City player and local footballer and cricketer Jack Kendall. Jack passed away on 7 January aged 89 years. Born in Lentons Lane, Aldermans Green in 1921 Jack had outstanding ability at football and cricket and played cricket for Coventry Boys and football for Longford St Thomas as a teenager. When war broke out he was working as an engineer at Brico in the city and was excused a call up to the services because his job was vital to the war effort.

He was never strictly on City’s books and was playing football for Morris Engines in 1944 when manager Harry Storer called him up to play as a guest for City, covering for a regular who was away on service duty (many of the city’s top amateur players played for the club in this period). In 1944-45 season he made 10 appearances, at left half. His daughter Helen Ewing sent me the photograph which I have never seen before. It is possible that it may have been taken before one of those games and bearing in mind the quartered shirts it was probably an away game. Then again it might have been taken in Memorial Park. Jack is second from the right on the front row, to the right of Tommy Crawley and Charlie Elliott, George Mason, Billy Frith and Harry Boileau are on the back row. If readers can identify the occasion and any other people in the photograph please let me know.

Jack made one appearance in 1945-46 season and also appeared as a guest for Leicester City earlier in the war. He was involved in local football and cricket for many years after the war, captaining and coaching the very successful Morris cricket team throughout the 1960s and coaching cricket at colleges until the age of 69. Friends put Morris’ success down to Jack’s ability and man-management skills. He was an amateur on Warwickshire C.C.’s books for a number of years playing mainly as a wicket-keeper for the Second XI and in 1948 played 4-5 first XI games. Jack was courageous behind the stumps, standing up for some very fast bowlers. His friend Alan Blackwell once asked the famous old England wicket-keeper Godfrey Evans whether he knew Jack and Evans’ reply was: ‘he was one of the best wicket-keepers I ever saw’.

He loved football and was always asking how the City had got on. He was involved in coaching Rugby Town under the famous Eric Houghton in the 1960s and continued working for Brico as tool-room foreman up until his retirement in the 1980s.

His funeral will take place at Canley Crematorium on 24 January at 10.45 and all his old friends are welcome.

JIM'S COLUMN 8.1.11

2011-01-12T16:16:00.001Z

A miserable Christmas period saw the Sky Blues win one point from five games and slip out of the play-off positions to 11th position as I write this. They now have 35 points from 26 games and are four points off the play-off positions. The division continues to throw up more and more strange results and although the Sky Blues have more points at this stage than all but two of the last nine seasons (2001-02 and 2002-03 the exceptions) a chance has been missed to consolidate a position in the top six.

The last few weeks has seen a glut of managerial changes, the majority of them being sackings. It is sad to report that two ex-City players were victims of the sack just before Christmas. Sam Allardyce was very unfortunate to get the order of the boot from Blackburn Rovers and his departure means that no ex-City players are managing in the Premier League. His replacement, for the time being anyway, is former City assistant boss Steve Kean who had two years at the Ricoh under Chris Coleman.

Paul Trollope of Bristol Rovers is another ex-City manager to be sacked before Christmas. He only played a handful of games for City, at the fag-end of the disastrous 2001-02 season (a Jim Smith signing if I remember correctly) but had had a five-year spell as manager at Rovers. Interestingly four of the last five Rovers’ managers were ex-City men with Trollope preceded by Ray Graydon, Gerry Francis and Garry Thompson.

The Championship’s struggling clubs have been changing managers like a merry-go-round in recent weeks with Preston, Crystal Palace, Burnley and Sheffield United all having changes. The Blades’ change was enforced on them by Gary Speed’s elevation (is that the right word) to Welsh national boss. Blades’ fans did not seem unduly worried about Speed leaving as they languish near the foot of the table and it offered an opportunity to former City boss Micky Adams to return to the Championship. After leaving Coventry, some say unluckily, Micky had a bad time at Brighton but has rejuvenated his managerial credentials with a spell at Port Vale in League Two. Now he has landed his dream job, managing the team he has not only supported since he was a boy but also started his playing career with. His next league game will see him returning to the Ricoh Arena almost exactly four years to the day of his departure as manager.

Talking of former players Ken Jones of Finham sent me a nice letter a few weeks ago with a cutting from The Packet, a Cornish newspaper. It was a match report of Falmouth Town’s 2-1 win over Witheridge in the South West Peninsula League. Former City midfielder Sean Flynn, now aged 42, is the Assistant manager/player for Falmouth. Flynn (pictured below) joined City from Halesowen Town in November 1991 and made his first team debut on Boxing Day and scored in a 3-0 win at Bramall Lane. Between 1991 and 1995 he made over 100 appearances for the Sky Blues scoring 10 goals.

Today is FA Cup Third Round day, a day that used to be such an exciting one in the football calendar. Now for all but a handful of non-league or lower division sides it is a damp squib day. The FA Cup has lost its glamour and all across the country season ticket holding fans will be expected to cough up extra money to pay for a cup tie, just after they have maxed out on the credit cards in the run up to Christmas and in the January sales. Gates across the country will be pitifully low with a gate of well under 10,000 expected at the Ricoh for the visit of unattractive Crystal Palace. Last season just over 7,000 attended the Portsmouth replay and after City’s miserable Christmas results I think today’s gate may struggle to top that. Palace may well be buoyed by a new manager (or caretaker Dougie Freedman) and they will not need reminding that they have never lost at the Ricoh with four wins and one draw since 2005. When you consider that in the only other FA Cup meeting between the clubs (in 1908) Palace won 4-2 at Highfield Road the omens seemed stacked against City. That game back in 1908 by the way was a memorable one in the club’s history. They had reached the equivalent of the Third Round for the very first time, as a Birmingham League club, and their efforts not only attracted a Highfield Road record crowd of 9,884 but also brought them national press exposure for the first time. Although beaten by their South London opponents City were, within six months, voted into the Southern League and the club never looked back.

JIM'S COLUMN 18.12.10

2010-12-21T19:15:00.001Z

The Sky Blues kept another clean sheet in the 0-0 draw at Reading last week, making it four in a row, the best run since 2002. It is now 398 minutes since they last conceded a goal, the Darren Ambrose penalty early in the second half at Crystal Palace last month. The run in 2002 was four games in December that month, which incidentally was enough to earn Gary McAllister his manager of the month award. In all the team went 487 minutes without goalkeeper Morten Hyldegaard conceding a goal. The man who ended the run was Crystal Palace’s Ade Akinbiyi. Amazingly City’s form slumped immediately and they won only one of their remaining 20 games. The games were:-

14 December 2002 Wolves (a) 2-0
21 December 2002 Derby (h) 3-0
26 December 2002 Reading (h) 2-0
28 December 2002 Sheffield U (a) 0-0

The last time City kept five clean sheets in a row was the previous season, in October 2001, when Roland Nilsson’s team were on an 11-game unbeaten run. The fifth clean sheet was a 2-0 home win that briefly lifted them to first place in the league. That run lasted 491 minutes and was finally broken by Preston’s Richard Cresswell, a striker who has haunted the Sky Blues for many years.

There was also a run of five clean sheets during the Don Howe era in 1992. In one of the most boring periods of the club’s history the run consisted of a 1-0 win at Crystal Palace followed by four 0-0 draws (Liverpool (h), Southampton (a), Man United (h) and Norwich (h). In the following game an 83rd minute goal by Sheffield Wednesday’s Viv Anderson meant Steve Ogrizovic had gone 572 minutes without conceding.

The club record for successive clean sheets was set in 1934 when the Bantams, a Division Three (South) team, were more renowned for their goalscoring feats than their defensive abilities. In the five seasons between 1931 and 1936 the team scored 502 league goals with the legendary Clarrie Bourton notching 164 of them. The first of the six clean sheets (which were spread over two seasons) came at Highfield Road as City recorded their record league victory, 9-0 over Bristol City, a week later in the final game of the 1933-34 season there was a 0-0 draw at Clapton Orient. The next season started:

Northampton (h) 2-0
Clapton (a) 1-0
Bournemouth (a) 2-0
Clapton (h) 4-0

In those days goal times are notoriously difficult to rely upon but my estimate is that the team went 649 minutes without conceding before Watford’s Jimmy Poxton put one past City’s keeper Horace Pearson.

At last week’s excellent Diamond Club lunch I bumped into City fan Dennis Cox who reminded me that I had not answered a question he posed some months ago. It concerns former City players Brian Nicholas and Lol Harvey and their arguments over the years about when they faced each other in City v QPR clashes. Brian played for QPR for six years but only once did he come face to face with Lol during that time. It was 29 January 1955 at Loftus Road and Rangers ran out 3-2 winners with goals from Smith, Cameron and Kerrins with Tommy Capel netting twice for City. Lol always reminds me of how he was in the team that 4-0 at Loftus Road in 1952 but unfortunately Brian wasn’t in the QPR side that day. On the subject of Brian it is great to see him back watching games at the Ricoh. He was very poorly earlier in the season but last week he looked back to his best. He won’t thank me for putting this picture from 1951 in the newspaper!

JIM'S COLUMN 11.12.10

2010-12-14T23:56:00.000Z

Another home win last Saturday over struggling Middlesbrough took Coventry City to 33 points, a rare feat in the wilderness years since the club were relegated from the Premier League. In fact that total has been bettered only once in that time, the first season down in 2001-02 when the management partnership of Roland Nilsson and Richard Money looked set to take City straight back or at least get into the top six for a crack at the play-offs. That dream was shattered with a disastrous run of six defeats out of seven in April 2002. At this stage (20 games gone) in 2001 City had reached 34 points and the table shows the record in subsequent years with the manager responsible.

2001-02 (Nilsson) 34 points
2002-03 (McAllister) 27
2003-04 (McAllister) 25
2004-05 (Reid) 25
2005-06 (Adams) 18
2006-07 (Adams) 29
2007-08 (Dowie ) 28
2008-09 (Coleman) 24
2009-10 (Coleman) 19

Strangely the season with the lowest points at this stage, 2005-06, saw City achieve their best finish in those nine seasons by virtue of the influence of Dennis Wise and Don Hutchison. Their introduction to the side, around this time of the year, saw the final 26 games yield 45 points. Now if Aidy Boothroyd’s team could get 45 points from here that would give them a final total of 78 and a virtual shoo-in to the play-offs. One can but dream!

Aron Gunnarsson, assuming he plays at Reading today will become only the seventh overseas player to reach the 100 league game milestone for the club. Aron, now in his third season with the Sky Blues has some illustrious names ahead of him:

1 Peter Ndlovu (Zimbabwe) 177
2 Dele Adebola (Nigeria) 163
3 Arthur Lightening (South Africa) 150
4 Mo Konjic (Bosnia) 138
5 Magnus Hedman (Sweden) 134
6 Youssef Chippo (Morocco) 122

(I have not included any naturalised overseas players e.g. Cyrille Regis)

Talking of overseas players, Geoff Moore who keeps immaculate records of who has played at the Ricoh since it was opened in 2005 tells me that 76 different nations have been represented at the stadium in five years. On Saturday Boro’s striker Tarmo Kink would have been the first Estonian but sadly stayed on the bench. Earlier this season we saw the first Uruguayan at the Ricoh; Barnsley’s Diego Arismendi who is on loan from Stoke. Until Geoff mentioned Arismendi to me I was unaware of him yet Stoke paid almost £3 million for him in 2009 and he has only played one half of a League Cup tie for them. He has apparently won two caps for his country but it does make you wonder how these people get work permits.

Since the move to the Ricoh in 2005 only four penalties have been missed by opponents and on Saturday Boro’s Leroy Lita became the first player to miss two. Westwood saved his spot-kick as did Stephen Bywater did in September 2005 when Lita played for Reading in a 1-1 draw. The other two misses were also both Westwood saves, from Wolves’ Ebanks-Blake in 2009 and Scunthorpe’s Gary Hooper last season. Over the same period four City players have missed spot-kicks: Michael Doyle, Elliott Ward, Sammy Clingan and Leon Best.

JIM'S COLUMN 4.12.10

2010-12-06T17:20:00.000Z

Last Saturday’s win at Scunthorpe’s Glanford Park was not only City’s first victory at the Irons’ new ground but also the first in the town. City had never played a league game there until 2008 but had lost on their two visits prior to Saturday as well as losing an FA Cup tie in 1935 when Scunthorpe were a Midland League side.

Even accounting for the freezing weather the attendance on Saturday was a pitifully low 4,397, making it the smallest league crowd to watch City since 2,077 were at Selhurst Park in 2002 to see City beat Wimbledon 1-0 with a Gary McAllister penalty. It was also the lowest crowd to watch any game in the Championship since 2006 when 4247 watched Colchester v Barnsley.

I have been reading Bobby Gould’s autobiography recently and if you want a Christmas present for a Coventry City fan I can certainly recommend it. His story is amusing and fascinating and takes you from Gould’s Coventry roots through a playing career that spanned 19 years and a management career that was even longer. To use an old cliché Bobby had more clubs than Jack Nicklaus and rarely stayed at any football club for very long.

By virtue of the fact that he had almost six years at Highfield Road as a player and two spells as a manager, the Coventry coverage in the book is quite substantial. Before Jimmy Hill signed him as an apprentice in 1962, Bobby had been ‘heartbroken’ to be told by Billy Frith that he wouldn’t make the grade with the team he supported. When Hill reversed that decision Bobby vowed to ‘run through a brickwall’ for JH and City supporters of a certain age will readily confirm that he did. His first team career did not start well and in 1966 he was given the unenviable task of replacing the ‘King’ of Coventry City, George Hudson, who had been controversially sold by Hill. The immensely skilful Hudson, in the fans’ eyes, could do no wrong whilst Gould for all his running and physical approach could never wear the mantle of Hudson. A year later however City were promoted and Gould had proved the doubting Thomas’s wrong by netting 24 goals.

There are some amusing stories of his time as a City player and he sheds new light on one of the more controversial days in the club’s history, the day Hill lost it with Ian Gibson. ‘Gibbo’, a club record signing in 1966, had not been too impressive in his first couple of months at the club and things came to a head at an away game at Carlisle. It is known that JH let rip at Gibson at half-time at Brunton Park and that the player came close to leaving City as a result but Gould reveals that Hill’s patience had been stretched by Gibbo’s antics on the long train journey north when in Bobby’s words: ‘he demonstrated a flatulence habit by using a naked cigarette lighter flame as a prop’. Gibson was left in the cold for six weeks before Hill buried the hatchet and recalled Gibson and City went on a 25-game unbeaten run that clinched promotion.

In 1983 Gould, a rookie manager with less than two years experience, was handed the City manager’s job for the first time. He walked into a dressing-room full of players angry at the treatment of previous manager Dave Sexton and in the main determined to leave the club. Gould’s career is littered with instances where he didn’t stay anywhere where he wasn’t wanted and when he arrived at Coventry he was determined not to try and keep any player who didn’t want to play for the club. As a result a whole generation of homegrown players were allowed to leave, many for less than their true worth but Bobby replaced them with a squad of players who would not only fight to the death but would also form the nucleus of the 1987 Cup winning team. Peake, Gynn, Bennett, Kilcline, Ogrizovic and Regis were all signed by Gould during this time. One funny story of that period concerns Les Sealey and the Coventry club car that he failed to return. Chief Executive George Curtis went with a chauffer and dozens of spare keys to Luton’s ground (Sealey had joined the Hatters) and emptied Les’s belongings onto the ground in his parking space before driving the recovered car back to Coventry.

Bobby admits that after a dream first six months he ‘lost it’ and City were lucky not to be relegated. He lasted less than 18 months in the job but in 1992 he returned for a second spell, an older and wiser man, having led Wimbledon to their 1988 FA Cup win in the meantime. Again things went well for a while and his wheeling and dealing made City a stronger outfit. Then Bryan Richardson became chairman and things went downhill fast. My one disappointment about the book is that it sheds little new light on their relationship and the reasons for Bobby’s resignation in the Loftus Road toilets after a 5-1 defeat. Many people involved with City during the Richardson era have remained silent over the man’s antics because of a so-called confidentiality clause in his severance agreement and maybe Bobby sensibly wants to avoid a libel case. Either way we will have to wait longer for the real reasons for his departure to come to light.

Bobby Gould is signing copies of his book 24 Carat Gould in Waterstones (Smithfield Way) next Wednesday (8th December) at 5pm.

JIM'S COLUMN 27.11.10

2010-11-28T11:02:00.000Z

Since the formation of the Former Players Association in 2007 many ex-Coventry players have been tracked down and brought back to Coventry for a game or a function but a few have been very elusive and virtually impossible to find. Until recently one of those hard to find players was Alan Dugdale. Then, a few weeks ago I received an email from his brother Dave Dugdale who had found the FPA website (www.ccfpa.co.uk) whilst looking for memories of his brother on the internet. It transpired that Alan was making a rare visit from his home in the USA and we managed to get him from his brother’s home on Merseyside for the Leeds game. It was his first visit to Coventry for over 35 years and he was able to meet up with former colleagues Alan Green, Donal Murphy, Jimmy Holmes as well as former Physio Norman Pilgrim who treated Alan when he broke his ankle in 1972.

Whilst Alan was in the country I was able to interview him and I put the following questions to him:

Alan, how did you come to join Coventry City in 1969?

I was playing for Kirkby Schoolboys on Merseyside and Coventry’s Lancashire scout Alf Walton encouraged me to come down for a trial. I played at centre-half and they offered me apprentice terms with another Kirkby lad called Dennis Hogg, but Dennis never made the grade. I think Alf was responsible for finding Dennis Mortimer, Mick McGuire and Ivan Crossley, we all came from his patch (Jim: he also discovered Ernie Machin).

You were a member of arguably City’s finest youth team in 1970. What are your memories of the team?

It was a great bunch of lads who lived and played together. I remember the Youth Cup final with Spurs. They had a strong team which was quite physical with Graeme Souness , Steve Perryman and a good ‘keeper in Barry Daines. We drew over two legs and we drew a replay at Highfield Road before Spurs won the fourth game at Tottenham. I remember big crowds at Highfield Road and the matches were all hard-fought and there was little between the sides.

The following year you were in the England side that won the Little World Cup. What was that like?

There were three Coventry players, myself, Bobby Parker and Mick McGuire in the England team. I played out of position at right-back and the tournament was in Czechoslovakia. There was so much talent in the England squad with Trevor Francis, Peter Eastoe, Steve Daley and Martyn Busby. Most of the team were already regulars in their club’s first team. We beat Portugal in the final, 3-0 I think and Eastoe got a couple of goals. I think the former Wolves player Bill Shorthouse was the coach.

You made your first team debut against Chelsea at Highfield Road in 1972. Who was in the team at the time?

Joe Mercer and Gordon Milne had not long been there and I got picked at left back but I got carried off when Bill Glazier landed on my left ankle and it broke! Willie Carr, Dennis, Chris Cattlin, Mick Coop, Ernie Hunt were all at the club and Colin Stein and Tommy Hutchison arrived soon after and they brought a real buzz to the club. I was out injured for a few months but didn’t get a regular place until about a year later.

You were a regular first team player until 1977. Which City players did you really rate?

Tommy Hutch was the most skilful, Mick Ferguson was a great target man who could hold the ball up well and Barry Powell and Dennis were very skilful midfielders. The best defender, and I played alongside a lot in my time there, was John Craven. He and I just clicked when he arrived in 1973. My best friend was Alan Green – we used to room together on away trips.

In that time you played against all of the top British strikers. Who did you rate?

Malcom Macdonald and Trevor Francis were very hard to play against. Supermac was so strong and you couldn’t give him an inch, else he would unleash one. Franny Lee of Man City was difficult to play but the best was undoubtedly Kevin Keegan – he was so quick and you could never relax against him.

What happened after you left Coventry City?

I joined Charlton in 1977 but wish I had stayed to fight for my place at Coventry. Everything went wrong at Charlton. I didn’t get on with the manager Andy Nelson and I broke my leg playing for the reserves. I only played 30-odd games before I had a loan spell with Barnsley. In 1980 I went to play in USA with Tulsa Roughnecks. We had a good team with Alan Woodward (ex-Sheff United), Billy Caskey (ex-Derby) and Steve Earle (ex-Fulham). It was funny because one of my worst tackles (and there were a few!) was against Woodward at Highfield Road. My brother found it on youtube and we couldn’t believe I wasn’t sent off. We had some great times. After I finished playing I worked as a salesman for Pepsi Cola and Budweiser and have lived in the Tulsa area ever since. These days I live with my American wife in a mall town called Peggs about 50 miles from Tulsa. We have nine acres and we keep horse, they have become my passion in life. My health isn’t great but I love the outdoor life and cannot see myself returning to England.

The passing of City’s oldest former player Norman Smith was covered earlier in the week. Norman was the last living player to play for the club before the Second World War (he made three appearances in the 1938-39 season). His death means that the oldest living player is now 90-year old Eric Dobbs who made is first appearance in April 1947.

Norman’s funeral takes place at Holy Trinity church on December the 8th at 12.30pm followed by a short cremation service at Canley crematorium at 1.30pm. It will be family flowers only and any donations if desired, will be going to the Help for Heroes charity via the funeral directors which are Grimmett and Timms, 118 Albany Rd, Coventry.

Geoff Moore tells me that Jack Cork’s appearance for Burnley at the Ricoh Arena last week means he has appeared for five different clubs at the stadium, all on loan. It’s a pretty amazing feat considering he is only just 21-years old. In addition to Coventry and Burnley he has played for Southampton, Watford and Scunthorpe. Several players have played for four different clubs including Chris Iwelumo, Wayne Brown and Jon Stead.

JIM'S COLUMN 20.11.10

2010-11-21T19:09:00.000Z

Watching England lose 1-2 to a rebuilt French side at Wembley Stadium on Wednesday night, Nick Cook pointed out that the game ended with three former Coventry City players on the pitch in an England shirt.

2009 loanee Jordan Henderson made his England debut in midfield but was unable to make much impression in a game bossed by a strong French midfield. Henderson made ten appearances for the Sky Blues and looked impressive at the time but it is a sad indictment on the state of the national team that someone with so little experience in the Premier League (he had started only 23 games before this season) is thrown into the national team. One can only hope that the lad doesn’t let his mediocre display hinder his progress in the game.

Jay Bothroyd was also given his first cap as a second-half substitute and almost scored. At 28, Jay has far less time than Henderson to make his mark but his call-up is a testimony to his consistent performances over the last couple of years at Cardiff, where this season he has already notched 15 goals. Jay, who I believe is out of contract next summer, will undoubtedly go to the Premiership either with a Bosman move or with the Bluebirds. People say his time at Coventry was not a happy one but he is arguably one of the most skilful players seen in a Sky Blue shirt in the last ten years and he scored 17 goals in a side that thought they had the divine right to go straight back up after relegation. He scored some superb goals including a brace at Stoke in 2002 and a delightful chip at Crystal Palace the same year. He was on the England radar back in 2001 when he scored for England under 21s with a stunning overhead kick at Filbert Street. Nine years later he gets his chance.

The third ex-City man was Stephen Warnock who had an impressive season-long loan from Liverpool in 2003-04 and is the only loanee to be voted City’s player of the year by the fans. Arguably the best City loanee of all time, Stephen turned down a permanent move to Coventry believing he could make it at Anfield. Finally he had to move to Blackburn and then to Villa to further his career and on Wednesday won his second full cap.

To add even more local interest to the French game Leamington-born former Racing Warwick goalkeeper Ben Foster, won his fifth cap for his country. Ben is the first Leamington-born full England international since George Green of Sheffield United won eight caps in the 1920s.

Mark Stickings wanted to know who scored City’s goals at Crystal Palace in 1980-81 season. On 17 February 1981 City won the game 3-0 (against a very poor Palace side heading for relegation) and Gary Bannister and Tommy English (2) were City's goalscorers, all in the first half.

Dean Nelson tells me that he spotted that former City forward Eddie Johnson has signed for Portland Timbers who will be playing in the MLS for the first time next year. Johnson, who played for City in 2004-05, on a season-long loan from Manchester United, was the USSF Division Two’s joint leading scorer last season with 15 goals playing for Austin Aztecs, managed by former City assistant boss Adrian Heath. Eddie scored on his debut against Sunderland but managed only five goals in 26 league appearances and was given few opportunities following Peter Reid’s departure and Micky Adams’ arrival.

I have become aware of a new website for reading and recording memories of Coventry. Launched by the Transport Museum anyone can leave their memories, however brief, about the city generally, the Football Club and other sports teams or just their life in Coventry. The site, www.coventrymemories.co.uk is very quickly getting populated with memories and images and I noticed lots of great memories of the 1987 Cup Final including several from players at the time.

JIM'S COLUMN 13.11.10

2010-11-18T09:58:00.002Z

Coventry City teams seem to have an aversion to large crowds at the Ricoh Arena. Last Saturday in front of the biggest league crowd since the move from Highfield Road in 2005, 28,184, admittedly boosted by over 6,000 Leeds fans, the Sky Blues came a cropper. It was the tenth occasion that over 25,000 have been at the stadium in its five-year life and the ninth time that the team have failed to win. The solitary victory came in January 2006 when high-flying Wolves were defeated 2-0.

The 25,000-plus crowds at the ground are as follows:-

31,407 Chelsea (FA Cup) 2009 lost 0-2
28,184 Leeds 2010 lost 2-3
28,163 West Brom (FA Cup) 2008 lost 0-5
28,120 Middlesbrough (FA Cup) 2006 drew 1-1
27,997 Wolves 2008 drew 1-1
27,212 Birmingham 2006 lost 0-1
26,856 Wolves 2006 won 2-0
26,723 Leicester 2006 drew 1-1
26,643 Leeds 2006 drew 1-1
26,343 West Brom 2007 lost 0-1

Even accounting for the large contingent of Leeds fans last week, I was staggered by the size of the crowd. I believed that it would take a lot more consistency from the team to bring the missing fans back to the Ricoh and that it would be a gradual thing. One parallel was in 1986-87 season when, after three years of surviving relegation on the last day of the season, John Sillett and George Curtis got the team playing attractive, winning football. The crowds that season, apart from a juicy League Cup tie with Liverpool and that epic Christmas game with Tottenham, only slowly increased from the 11,000 that watched the first game of the season against Arsenal to around the 13-14,000 level. The week before the quarter-final tie at Hillsborough under 13,000 were at Highfield Road to watch City play Wednesday in a league game. Two weeks later, admittedly with vouchers for semi-final tickets available almost 24,000 turned up for a league game with Oxford United.

Last week the crowd was 93% higher than the Barnsley crowd two weeks earlier and prompted Rod Dean to pose the question: when was the last time the City attendance doubled from one game to another?

I think the answer is 1993 when a home game with Southampton (2-0, Quinn and John Williams) was watched by 10,455. Nine days later 24,410 watched City lose 0-1 to championship chasing Manchester United, an increase of 133%. The post war record leap in gates was in 1962-63 season. On the first Saturday of December 1962 a crowd of 8,876 watched City beat Carlisle 3-2, at City’s next home game on 29 December there were 25,399 to see a 3-3 draw with Third Division leaders Peterborough. Christmas games back then traditionally attracted higher than normal crowds and three days earlier Jimmy Hill’s team had won 3-0 at Posh plus the fact that on the day of the Carlisle game heavy rain fell in the city, affecting the gate.

The record leap in home crowds however occurred in 1925 when on a wet Thursday afternoon in February an estimated 3,000 watched City beat Portsmouth 2-1 in a Second Division match. Nine days later for the visit of Sheffield Wednesday there was a crowd of 14,242, an increase of 350% on the previous game. Before the introduction of floodlights in the 1950s rearranged games were often played on midweek afternoons and drew low crowds.

City are at Crystal Palace today and should beware Spaniard Pablo Counago. Currently on loan at Selhurst Park from Ipswich, Pablo has an amazing record against the Sky Blues with seven goals in eight appearances for Ipswich. Last season he came off the bench to score the winning goal at Portman Road – lets hope Messrs Wood and McPake have learned their lesson.

Aidy Boothroyd was forced to change his starting line-up on Tuesday night after playing the same starting eleven for five games running. This is an extremely rare occurrence and last happened in December 1996 when Gordon Strachan was able to select this line up for five games in a row:

Ogrizovic: Telfer, Shaw, Paul Williams, Daish, Dublin, Richardson, McAllister, Huckerby, Whelan, Salako.

In those five games City won four and drew one game. The wins were at home to Newcastle (2-1), Leicester (a) (2-0), Leeds (a) (3-1), Middlesbrough (h) (3-0) and Sunderland (h) (2-2). The club record for number of games unchanged to my knowledge is seven. This occurred at the start of the 1954-55 (six wins and one draw), 1964-65 season (five straight wins and two defeats) and at the start of the 1973-74 season (four wins out of seven). It is not a coincidence that an unchanged side usually means good results.

JIM'S COLUMN 6.11.10

2010-11-11T10:30:00.002Z

Cyrille Regis is a legend amongst Coventry City fans. Not only was he a member of the 1987 FA Cup winning team but he earned his place in City fan’s hearts with his skill, industry and above all the memorable goals which helped keep City in the old First Division before 1987 and made City such a strong outfit under John Sillett over the subsequent 3-4 years.

His autobiography, Cyrille Regis – My Story, was published last month and he is at today’s game with Leeds United signing copies of the book in the club shop immediately after the game. Cyrille played for Coventry City for seven seasons but freely admits that he didn’t really want to come to Coventry from West Brom in 1984 – he thought a big club was going to come in for him but the Sky Blues were the only interested party. His first two seasons at Highfield Road were a non-event and again he admits that he was not emotionally committed to Coventry until John Sillett and George Curtis took the reins in 1986. Bobby Gould signed Cyrille for £250,000 and was sacked two months later and Gould’s successor, Don Mackay, never played to Regis’ strengths but one story in the book surprised me. Apparently during Mackay’s reign City, supposedly desperate for cash, tried to sell Cyrille to Second Division Wolves for £40,000. Thankfully the City board had second thoughts and within twelve months Cyrille and City were a whole different proposition.

Cyrille speaks highly of Sillett’s role in rejuvenating his struggling career and the way Sillett changed the emphasis of the team’s game from using Regis as a target man to giving him the ball at his feet was a major factor in the club’s remarkable 1986-87 season. That season (and the FA Cup win especially) quite rightly get a lot of coverage in the book as does the post-Wembley celebrations which make modern-day footballers look like choirboys.

One major change in Cyrille’s life whilst he was at Coventry was his conversion to Christianity and the chapter dealing with his reasons sees Cyrille talk candidly about the emotional torment he went through.

The book reminded me of the phenomenal impact that Cyrille had when he arrived on the football scene with West Brom in 1977. City had a golden year but Cyrille’s emergence at the Hawthorns took the limelight away from Ian Wallace and Mick Ferguson’s goalscoring feats. The two teams vied to be the top West Midlands side that season and Albion, managed by Ron Atkinson, pipped City by one place, finishing sixth. Cyrille started the season as an unknown and finished as a First Division regular. His first appearance against the Sky Blues resulted in a 2-1 win for Albion but my notes of the game record that Regis, who had scored five goals in his first five games for the Baggies, was well shackled by Jim Holton. A year later ‘Big C’ was on the score-sheet twice as Albion hit City for seven at the Hawthorns but his finest goal against the Sky Blues was undoubtedly the sizzling 25-yarder in the 1982 FA Cup degeat at the Hawthorns, a goal not dissimilar to the one for City at Hillsborough in the quarter final tie in 1987.

He scored many other fine goals for the Sky Blues too including the winner when City won at Anfield for the first time in 1989 and one of the goals that ended the 51-year Villa hoodoo in 1988.

I have met Cyrille on a number of occasions and he is a charming man who talks knowledgeably about the game he loves. He is also a great supporter of the Former Players Association. His book is a down to earth honest assessment of his career and life, warts and all, and deserves to be a success.

Unlike many fans and media correspondents I refuse to get too excited about City’s elevation to fourth place last Saturday following the victory at Bramall Lane. There is a long way to go this season and I remind friends that the last time City were in such an exalted position, in April 2002, they managed to lose six of their last seven games, miss out on the play-offs and snatch disaster out of the jaws of success.

JIM'S COLUMN 30.10.10

2010-11-03T16:32:00.000Z

Last Saturday was one of those days when everything in the Sky Blue garden looked rosy. A convincing 3-0 home win over Barnsley and a memorable celebration of the 40th anniversary of the club’s one and only European campaign.

Eleven former Coventry City players from 1970 returned for the day and the non-appearance of Ernie Machin and Ian Gibson (through health issues) did not mar a wonderful occasion. A number of the squad, for example Willie Carr, Roy Barry, Chris Cattlin and Mick Coop, have become regular visitors since the Former Players Association was formed almost four years ago, but Ernie Hannigan made his first visit to a City game for over 30 years during what was a flying visit to the UK from his home in Western Australia. The former flying winger, Noel Cantwell’s first signing as a manager in 1967, has retained his broad Scottish accent and had the party in stitches with his stories.

Noel Cantwell’s daughter, Kate, who was born in Coventry in 1970, represented her late father and was accompanied by Noel’s two grandsons. Her father finally received some recognition in Coventry after his death in 2005 was ignored by the club. Saturday’s occasion sadly coincided with the death of one of Noel’s closest friends in football, Malcolm Allison. Allison, who with Joe Mercer, guided Manchester City to so much glory in the late 1960s and early 1970s, was offered the Coventry manager’s job in 1967 but leaked the news to the press forcing chairman Derrick Robins to withdraw the offer and hand the job to Cantwell.

The star of Saturday’s show however was Bulgarian legend Dinko Dermendjiev. The man who played for Trakia Plovdiv in both games against City in 1970 flew in from Bulgaria with his interpreter Nicky Dafovsky. Nicky, it transpired, has been a City fan since the 1980s and speaks fluent English. Dinko, we discovered is revered in Bulgaria and considered to be the finest player ever produced by the country. He was a charming man and was overwhelmed with emotion for the reception he received from the former players and Coventry fans. Reminiscing about the games in 1970 he told me that in Bulgaria Trakia had been strong favourites to beat Coventry but the Sky Blues were one of the best organised foreign sides ever to play in Plovdiv and outclassed Trakia and the fans still talk about the games 40 years later. As he left Coventry an emotional Dinko said that Coventry would always be in his heart and vowed to return soon.

After the game the whole party was introduced on the stage at the G-Casino and the biggest cheer of the night was reserved for Dinko, who very quickly learned the words to the Sky Blue Song and joined in a vociferous rendition of the club song. Later in the evening Dinko talked to Willie Carr for half an hour and despite neither being able to speak each other’s language managed to communicate through the global language of football. The atmosphere in the casino was absolutely electric and thanks go to Quintin Korsma Of the G-Casino for his wonderful support. Additional thanks go to Jason and the lads the Jade Studios for sponsoring Dinko’s trip and the CCFPA patrons and club’s Associate Directors, especially John Clarke, for their financial support for the event.

There are some excellent photographs of the day’s events at the FPA website www.ccfpa.co.uk

On the field City recorded their biggest win for over two years, since the 4-1 home victory over Southampton in October 2008. The most common question I was asked in the casino on Saturday evening was regarding City’s goalscorers against Barnsley. Carl Baker and Jordan Clarke both scored after coming off the bench, the first time this has ever happened in a league game. There was one occurrence in an FA Cup tie in 1999 when Cedric Roussel and John Eustace came off the bench to score in a 3-0 win at Norwich.

It was also a rare occurrence for two Coventry-born players (McSheffrey and Clarke) to score in the same game. The only other occurrence in the club’s league history was in January 2002 at Selhurst Park when McSheffrey and Marcus Hall netted in a 3-1 win over Crystal Palace.

Finally, the win lifted the Sky Blues into the top six of the Championship, the first time they have been as high in the table (other than very early in the season) since January 2003. Perhaps at last there is a glimmer of hope for City’s long-suffering fans. A note of caution however, back in 2003 Gary McAllister’s team won only once in 20 games and slumped from sixth to end the season in 20th place.

1970 reunion a massive hit

2010-10-24T19:09:00.001+01:00

What a fantastic day at the Ricoh Arena yesterday as 10 members of Coventry City's 1970 squad who qualified the club for European competition for the one and only time were reunited. They were presented on the pitch at the half time and entertained after the match well into the night at the G-Casino next door. The atmosphere in the casino was electric as all the players were presented on the stage and then a rendition of the Sky Blue Song rocked the rafters. Also present was Bulgarian legend Dinko Dermendjiev who flew over for the weekend and was overcome with emotion by the fantatsic ovation he got at the game and at the evening's entertainment.

JIM'S COLUMN 23.10.10

2010-10-24T19:03:00.000+01:00

Today is another opportunity for the fans of Coventry City to honour past heroes of the club as the club celebrate the 40th anniversary of the club’s one and only European football campaign. The Former Players Association have worked tirelessly to reunite the Coventry City players from 1970 to celebrate the outstanding achievement of that year’s team.

The team achieved the highest ever final position in the club’s history, finishing sixth in the old First Division and qualifying for the European Fairs Cup.

Around a dozen players from the first team squad of that year will be here today and will be presented to the crowd at half-time. In addition there is a special guest. ‘Dinko’ Dermendjiev was a star player for City’s first ever European opponents, Bulgarian side Trakia Plovdiv, and he has flown to England today to take part in the celebrations and meet up with his Sky Blue opponents from September 1970.

Also on the guest list is Kate Cantwell, the daughter of Noel Cantwell, City’s manager in 1970. Kate, who was born in Coventry in that memorable year, will be making her first visit to the Ricoh Arena and will be accompanied by Noel’s two grandsons.

Finally half a dozen of the 30-odd City fans who travelled to Plovdiv for that first tie in September 1970 will be attending the match as guests of the Former Players Association and will make an appearance at half-time.

Amongst the group will be Alex Broomfield who tells me he went to Plovdiv after winning the trip in a Coventry Telegraph competition where he came up with a winning caption. Alex will be bringing some mementoes of the trip to the game. Another Plovdiv ‘veteran’ Paul Howard of Courthouse Green sent me some lovely memories of the trip. He tells me that after the match the City fans were invited to the banquet held for the two teams and were bought champagne by City chairman Derrick Robins. Later that night whilst a large group were enjoying a few beers in a hotel room there was a knock at the door and several members of the City team were there asking if they could join the party. Somehow I can’t see that happening in the modern day.

After today’s match celebrations will continue in the G-Casino where fans will be able to mingle with City’s former stars and all are welcome.

The players hoped to be present today include Roy Barry, Jeff Blockley, Dietmar Bruck, Willie Carr, Mick Coop, Chris Cattlin, Ian Gibson, Bill Glazier, Ian Goodwin, Trevor Gould, Ernie Hannigan, Ernie Machin, Dennis Mortimer and Billy Rafferty. Dermendjiev, nicknamed ‘Chiko’, played for Trakia against the Sky Blues in both games. Dinko holds the Trakia record for appearances, playing 447 games and scoring 194 goals in a twenty-year career at the club and I am sure City fans will give him a warm reception.

Former City defender Kirk Stephens has played a key role as President of the Former Players Association since its formation and it is sad to report the recent death of his father Bill. The FPA sends its condolences to Kirk and his family at this sad time.

JIM'S COLUMN 16.10.10

2010-10-21T19:11:00.000+01:00

Arthur Lightening was a larger than life Coventry City goalkeeper between 1959-1962 who was a hero to many young City fans in that era. A couple of weeks ago I had an email from a lady called Elna Hosier asking for some information about Arthur’s whereabouts. Sadly I had to tell her that Arthur died over 10 years ago in his native South Africa.

Elna said that Arthur used to spend time at her house during summer vacations in the 1950s and I am trying to ascertain where Elna was living at the time. It may have been South Africa or possibly Coventry but I have asked Elna to elaborate a bit.

Arthur joined Coventry in 1959 from Nottingham Forest where he had been the regular goalkeeper for the reserve team. He played 160 games for City before joining Middlesborough early in the 1962-63 season when the Teeside club, a division higher than the Sky Blues at the time, paid a substantial fee for him.

With a surname of Lightening, Arthur was a dream for football headline writers and they had a field day after his debut for ‘Boro, a 6-1 defeat at Newcastle. “Lightening thunder struck," was the headline in the Daily Mirror the following morning.

Lightening made just 14 more Football League appearances for Boro, interrupted by a Quarter Sessions appearance for receiving stolen beer, wine and spirits at his room in the Royal Hotel, Redcar.
Though found guilty, he was given an absolute discharge after the judge described him as "honest, truthful and manly."
Lightening, the court heard, earned £25 a week with an extra fiver for first team appearance money.
In May 1963, he was given permission by the club to attend his brother’s wedding in South Africa, sailed off and never returned. "I though it strange that he only booked a single ticket," the travel agent told the Northern Echo's investigating reporter.

Arthur lived for many years in the Glenwood area of Durban and was closely involved with local side Stella F.C. Bob Weeks, famous for tracking down former City players communicated with Arthur up until his death and discovered that Arthur lost a number of toes on his left foot as a result of a boating accident. He did tell Bob that he always looked for City’s results and had fond memories of his time at Highfield Road.

Planning for next weekend’s 40th anniversary reunion of the Coventry City team that qualified for and played in European competition is well advanced. Around 12-13 former players are expected to attend the Barnsley home game for an event organised by the Former Players Association. Amongst those expected to attend are Willie Carr, Bill Glazier, Ernie Hannigan, Mick Coop, Chris Cattlin, Jeff Blockley, Ian Gibson, Dennis Mortimer, Ernie Machin, Trevor Gould and Ian Goodwin. Neil Martin sadly can’t be with us, he has just had a hip operation and not fit to travel down from Scotland. Nor can new FPA member Brian Joicey. Brian, who would have loved to meet his old colleagues as well as see two of his former teams play (he played for Barnsley after leaving City), cannot get time off work. John O’Rourke and Ernie Hunt are also possibles to attend. Whilst the former players will be entertained in the corporate areas at the game there will be an opportunity for fans to mingle with their former heroes after the game at the G-Casino and all are welcome to attend. A good day is in store!

Jim's column 9.10.10

2010-10-14T22:17:00.002+01:00

With a break from league action this weekend I thought I would catch up with a few questions I have received from readers over the last few weeks.

Roger Maddison has been watching the Sky Blues for 46 years and remembers a game between City and the Japan National XI at Highfield Road. Unfortunately none of his friends can remember it and he is questioning his own memory. City did play Japan in a pre-season friendly on 14 August 1978 and won 2-0 with goals from Terry Yorath and Mick Ferguson. A crowd of 5,232 and City’s line up was as follows:

Sealey: Osgood, McDonald, Yorath, Holton, Gillespie, Nardiello,

Wallace, Ferguson, Powell, Hutchison

Natalie Jones recalls a match at Highfield Road in which Spurs were the visitors and had to play in Coventry’s change strip. The game in question was on 27 December 1986 and the story goes that Spurs didn’t realise they would need to change their normal kit as there seemed to be no clash with the Sky Blues blue and white striped shirts and white shorts. In fact Spurs rarely changed their kit at Highfield Road prior to this incident. The referee disagreed and made Spurs wear City’s change kit of yellow shirts with their normal navy blue shorts with the shirts displaying City’s sponsors Granada on the shirts. City won a thrilling game 4-3 with Cyrille Regis netting the winning goal in the dying seconds. Strangely when the clubs met later that season in the FA Cup final at Wembley Spurs wore their normal white shirts with white shorts whilst City wore their normal shirts but with navy blue shorts. However there was more controversey with Spurs’ kit in the final as several players played with shirts without the name of the team’s lager-making sponsors Holsten.

Dave Terry asked me to confirm that Coventry City are the only club to have played in seven different English divisions. The fact is correct Dave, City have played in Divisions 1-4 plus Division Three North and South plus, of course the Premier League. City only spent one season in Division Four (1958-59) and one season in Division Three North (1925-26). The latter season was because of an imbalance of Northern teams in Division Three North (City were the most southerly of the 22 sides) but the following season they were switched to Division Three South. A number of clubs have appeared in six different divisions including Hull City, Grimsby, Watford and Crystal Palace.

It is only two weeks to go before the 40th anniversary reunion of the Coventry City team that played in Europe organised by the Former Players Association. The latest former City player to indicate his attendance is Brian Joicey who just last week joined the FPA after being tracked down in Sheffield where he has lived since playing for Sheffield Wednesday in the early 1970s. Brian scored one of City’s goals in the 2-0 home win over Trakia Plovdiv in the first round second leg game at Highfield Road and is looking forward to meeting up with some of his old teammates from City on 23 October. Just a reminder that any fans who travelled to watch City in Bulgaria forty years ago should contact me as they will invited to attend the celebrations.

Jim's column 2.10.10

2010-10-07T10:16:00.000+01:00

What a mixed week for the Sky Blues. Saturday’s 1-2 defeat to Preston was a travesty after all the pressure exerted on the visitors’ goal but then on Tuesday night Doncaster went home rightly aggrieved that they had not won a game they dominated for long periods.

Donny’s boss Sean O’Driscoll has built an excellent side capable of playing lovely passing football and in John Oster he had the man of the match. Oster covered every blade of grass, made Billy Sharp’s goal with a delicious through-ball and showed why back in the 1990s he was a £1.5 million player. In the last 10 years John has played for nine different clubs and rarely spent more than one season in the same club.

Gary McSheffrey scored City’s winning goal with a superb diving header – the first of his second spell at the club. This was the 54th senior goal for the club and he is now 15th in the all-time leading scorers chart, with only Mick Ferguson (58), George Lowrie (59), Ian Wallace (60), Cyrille Regis (62), Jock Lauderdale (65) standing in the way of his entry to the all-time top ten.

Championship pacemakers QPR’s first goalless game (a 0-0 draw with Millwall) means that City are the only side in the division to score in every league game this season. This is City’s best start to a season in this respect since 1954-55 when Jack Fairbrother’s team scored in every one of its first eleven games. The club record was set in 1932-33 when with Clarrie Bourton in his pomp the Bantams netted in the first 16 games with Bourton netting 13 of the team’s 37 goals.

Coventry City have long had a reputation for having good cricketers on their books with a number being good enough to play county cricket including Don Bennett (Middlesex), Freddie Gardner (Warwickshire), Charlie Elliott (Derbyshire), John Mitten and Jack Lee (Leicestershire), Patsy Hendren (Middlesex & England) not to mention legendary manager Harry Storer who played cricket for Derbyshire. I didn’t realise till this week that there is a new entrant in this exclusive club. In August former City goalkeeper Gary Montgomery made his county cricket debut for Lancashire, a year following a switch in codes after being released by Grimsby Town. In all he appeared in three Clydesdale 40 games for Lancashire.

Gary made his debut for the Sky Blues against Chelsea in a League Cup tie in 2001 and played a further eight league games the following season but was never on the winning side for the club and joined Rotherham in 2003. Leamington-born Gary, who is still only 28 years old, was the first boy from my old school, Warwick, to play for City and the first for many years to play county cricket.

Plans for the 40th anniversary of City’s 1970 European campaign on 23 October at the Barnsley home game are well advanced and after last week’s revelation that former Coventry MP, the late Bill Wilson, was on that first trip to Bulgaria, two of his fellow travellers have been in touch with me. Rod Dean and Steve Pittam were among the 37 fans who travelled out to Bulgaria for the first leg of the first round European Fairs Cup tie with Trakia Plovdiv. The Former Players Association would welcome any of that select band who are still around to join the celebrations in the Casino after the game on the 23 October and meet City’s players from 1970 and Plovdiv legend Dinko Dermendjiev. If you were on that long trip to Plovdiv please contact me.

JIM'S COLUMN 25.9.10

2010-09-27T20:09:00.000+01:00

Last Saturday’s 2-1 win at Ashton Gate was a welcome result after three games without a victory and, as has been widely reported, was City’s first league victory at Ashton Gate since 1963. Having said that, City have only played nine league games there in the intervening period, and have drawn four of those nine. In addition there have been three cup ties at Ashton Gate resulting in two draws and one win - a Mick Ferguson goal in 1976 gave the Sky Blues a victory in a League Cup tie.

Back in 1963 it was a solitary Ken Hale goal that earned the points in an evening game and took City four points clear at the top of Division Three. Ken’s goal, after only four minutes, was a shot that deflected of a defender’s leg and flew over Mike Gibson the Bristol keeper. Gibson had a much busier night than his opposite number Bob Wesson, who had little to do on his 23rd birthday.

I have said before that if City are going to be serious challengers for a top six place then a number of their bogey grounds will have to be more productive. City have failed at Millwall and Swansea but the win at Ashton Gate gives City fans some hope that other bogeys, such as Leicester, Cardiff and Preston may be exorcised.

This month is the 40th anniversary of City’s first ever European cup tie. In September 1970 City travelled to deepest Bulgaria to face Trakia Plovdiv in the first leg of their first round European Fairs Cup tie with Trakia Plovdiv. City won the away leg 4-1 with a hat-trick from John O’Rourke and a Neil Martin goal and then beat the Bulgarians 2-0 in the second leg with goals from Brian Joicey and Jeff Blockley.

The Former Players Association are planning a reunion of the 1970 City squad at the home game with Barnsley at the end of October and have organised for Trakia’s star player of 1970, Dinko Dermendjiev, to travel to Coventry for the reunion. With the sponsorship of Jason Dickens of The Jade Studio, the graphic designers, Dinko and an interpreter will be flying in from Bulgaria to attend the match and meet City’s players from 1970.

40 years ago a small band of around 50 City supporters travelled out with the team to Bulgaria and one of them, Rod Dean, informs me that another of the group was Bill Wilson, MP for Coventry South at the time. Rod also told me that Bill had passed away last month aged 97, a fact that had passed me by. Bill was not only an avid City supporter having been born and bred in the city, but also an outspoken shareholder whose objectivity would have been useful in the club’s boardroom at some periods over the last 50 years. Unlike other MPs who have jumped on the football bandwagon since the game attracted large amounts of money in the Premier League era, Bill had followed City’s fortunes since the 1920s and could wax lyrically about the golden era of the 1930s.

JIM'S COLUMN 18.9.10

2010-09-19T15:13:00.002+01:00

There is an interesting match in the Conference Premier today when the Holdsworth brothers, David and Dean, become the first ever twins to face each other as managers. David is manager of Mansfield Town who travel to South Wales to face Newport County, managed by former City player Dean.

Dean, a striker in his playing days, had a brief spell at Coventry City in 2002-03 season making 17 league appearances and three cup appearances but managing just one goal in arguably City’s worst side of the last forty years. His sole goal however was a stunning curling shot against Cardiff in an FA Cup replay, City’s only home victory between Boxing Day and the end of the season in a slump that almost resulted in relegation. In March 2003 with City’s bankers on the doorstep demanding cost reductions Dean was released and joined Rushden & Diamonds.

Prior to joining the Sky Blues Dean had had a good career after starting as an apprentice at Graham Taylor’s Watford in the mid-1980s. In 1986, along with goalkeeper David James, Tim Sherwood and his twin David, he was part of an outstanding Watford youth team beaten in the FA Youth Cup by an even better City youth team who went on to reach the semi final, a year before they lifted the trophy. His first team chances were limited at Watford however and he went down the leagues to join Brentford where he was a success.

Dean had five years at Wimbledon followed by a similar period at Bolton and scored a good amount of goals for both clubs and after his spell at City he played for MK Dons, one of the few players to appear for the two Dons’ clubs. Later he became chairman of the PFA and has been boss at Newport since 2007. Last season he led his club to the championship of the Conference South with a record 103 points.

Unlike Dean, David, a central defender, did make the grade at Watford and made over 250 appearances for the Hornets between 1986-96 before shorter spells at Sheffield United and Birmingham City. He played his part in the Sky Blues history when in 1998 he scored the very late equaliser for the Blades in the FA Cup sixth round replay at Bramall Lane. The goal took the game to extra-time and ultimately a heartbreaking penalty shoot-out which ended City’s hopes of a semi-final appearance that their performances that spring probably deserved.

David managed Ilkeston Town prior to arriving at Mansfield’s Field Mill in 2008 and his team have made a good start in their third season in the Conference. I will be looking out for the result of this unique game with interest.

There have been a lot of negative comments from City supporters since last weekend and I find it hard to join the chorus of criticism. City have picked up just one point from their last three league games, a home draw sandwiched by away defeats at Millwall and Swansea. Let’s put those results in context. Millwall are unbeaten at home in over 20 games stretching back to last November and are always difficult to beat on their own patch. When Carl Baker was sent off City were holding their own at 1-1 and with 11 men would have got a result. Swansea too are a hard nut on their own ground, losing only three games at the Liberty Stadium in the whole of last season. After a woeful first half City had chances to level the game with a much improved second half performance. The Leicester performance was dire but in mitigation it was a local derby and they are rarely thrillers. Paolo Sousa has got Leicester playing the passing game and they keep possession well making it hard for opponents to get the ball and play themselves. For all the visitor’s possession however City defended well (something they often failed to do last year) and got a valuable point. Leicester showed that the early form was deceptive with a good victory over Cardiff in midweek. Some fans are saying that we are worse off than last season but after six league games last season we had lost our home record (to Swansea) and got a terrible thumping at Blackpool. I think City fans should be patient and judge progress when the season is more advanced than now.

JIM'S COLUMN 11.9.10

2010-09-16T08:29:00.000+01:00

Today is the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 disaster in New York when over 3,000 people lost their lives when terrorists flew airplanes into the Twin Towers in Manhattan.

Geoff Wakelin tells me he is giving away his sister-in-law at her wedding today. He and the groom are both ardent City fans - Geoff watched my first City game 53 years ago when Ray Straw scored the winning goal – but he doesn’t say which game!

He was preparing his speech for the wedding reception and wanted to know whether City have ever played and won in any year on September 11th.

They have played 18 league games on that fateful day plus two League Cup ties, one of which, at Peterborough, was on the evening of the awful events in 2001. I remember that night very well – everyone was numb from watching the tragedy unfold in Manhattan on television and the game seemed very insignificant after the goings-on across the Atlantic. Gordon Strachan had been sacked two days earlier and Roland Nilsson and Richard Money were in charge of a City team desperate for a result for the new management team. The game sparked into life in the last two minutes of the ninety minutes when first Magnus Hedman punched a corner into his own net to make it 2-1 to Posh, then with 10 seconds left on the clock Lee Carsley hit a right-foot drive from just inside the penalty area to level the scores and take the tie to extra time. There were no further goals in the extra thirty minutes and the game went to a penalty shoot-out. City won the shoot-out 4-2 but not before Hedman crowned a miserable night by failing to score City’s fourth penalty to clinch the tie. His weak shot straight into the goalkeeper’s hands meant Lee Carsley had to send the Posh keeper the wrong way to secure the victory.

Looking at the list of previous games on this day, it is 34 years since City last won on 11 September. They beat Norwich 2-0 with goals from Mick Ferguson (his fourth in four games) and a Duncan Forbes own-goal. A disappointing game was watched by only 12,948, City’s smallest home gate for over 10 years.

A more memorable game was in 1999 when a strong Leeds side came from behind twice to win 4-3 at Highfield Road. Proving what famous football writer Brian Glanville calls the immutable law of the ex, Gary McAllister scored a penalty for City against his former club before Darren Huckerby netted for Leeds. Huckerby had left City just weeks earlier for £6m but would be a flop at Elland Road scoring just two goals in 40 appearances. John Aloisi and Youssef Chippo were City’s other scorers whilst Lee Bowyer, Ian Harte (penalty) and Michael Bridges netted for Leeds.

Sep 11 1919 h Leeds C L 0-4 1919-20 League
Sep 11 1920 a Blackpool L 0-4 1920-21 League
Sep 11 1926 h Charlton Ath W 1-0 1926-27 League
Sep 11 1937 a Bury W 2-0 1937-38 League
Sep 11 1946 a Newcastle U L 1-3 1946-47 League
Sep 11 1948 h Bradford PA W 2-0 1948-49 League
Sep 11 1950 h Birmingham W 3-1 1950-51 League
Sep 11 1952 a Northampton L 1-3 1952-53 League
Sep 11 1954 a Torquay U W 2-1 1954-55 League
Sep 11 1962 a Watford L 1-6 1962-63 League
Sep 11 1965 a Bristol City D 1-1 1965-66 League
Sep 11 1971 h Nottm Forest D 1-1 1971-72 League
Sep 11 1973 h Man. City W 2-1 1973-74 League
Sep 11 1976 h Norwich C W 2-0 1976-77 League
Sep 11 1982 h Arsenal L 0-2 1982-83 League
Sep 11 1993 a Aston Villa D 0-0 1993-94 League
Sep 11 1999 h Leeds U L 3-4 1999-00 League
Sep 11 2001 a Peterborough W 2-2* 2001-02 League Cup
Sep 11 2002 h Colchester U W 3-0 2002-03 League Cup
Sep 11 2004 a Leeds U L 0-3 2004-05 League

* City won 4-2 on penalties, after extra time.

JIM'S COLUMN 4.9.10

2010-09-07T17:13:00.003+01:00

After City’s defeat at the New Den last week manager Aidy Boothroyd described City as ‘soft’ and any fan knows that soft sides do not get results at Millwall. The defeat means it is 55 years since City’s last victory in Docklands – 15 league and cup games. Most City fans know what Aidy means and have watched too many ‘soft’ capitulations by the Sky Blues over recent seasons. If City want to be serious promotion contenders they will have to toughen up and grind out results at places like Millwall. The last Coventry City team to win promotion, Jimmy Hill’s 1967 team, were past masters at picking up points when playing poorly. Mind you the 1967 team failed to win at Millwall, losing an early season game 1-0.

Last week I commented on the small crowd at the Ricoh Arena for the home game with Derby County – the smallest crowd to watch a City home game since 2005 – and last Saturday I noted the dip in attendances across the Championship as a whole.

Of the 12 games played last weekend only two were watched by a crowd higher than last season’s average crowd. At Millwall just over 11,000 watched City’s defeat compared to last season’s average of 10,834 and at Doncaster’s Keepmoat Stadium a similar crowd watched the Yorkshire derby with Hull City. All other 10 games were watched by smaller than last season’s average crowds including Sheffield United 19,000 (last season’s average 25,000), Derby 25,000 (29,000) and Leicester 19,000 (24,000). Whilst all three of the clubs above have had mediocre starts to the season I know that they all have less season ticket holders than last campaign. In addition the gates at Ipswich, Forest, Scunthorpe and Swansea confirm the downward trend in this league.

So Coventry City are not the only club affected by falling attendances and I suspect it is a result of the economic situation the country finds itself in combined with England’s poor showing in this summer’s World Cup.

Dean Nelson sent me a picture of an old programme (see image) recently asking if I could provide more information about it. In February/March 1989 the Bermuda Football Association invited the Sky Blues and Middlesbrough to their island for a series of friendly games. City were lying in fourth place in the old First Division when they left the cold English winter for a warm break in the sun, one place behind Millwall where they had lost 1-0 the previous Saturday. The opening game saw City facing Boulevard Community Club, a team of Rastafarian amateurs who were one of Bermuda’s top club sides. Goals from Gary Bannister, Dean Emerson, Cyrille Regis and Dave Bennett gave City a 4-0 victory. City ended their brief sojourn on the sunny Atlantic island with a 2-1 victory over ‘Boro with goals from Regis and a late winner from substitute Howard Clark. City’s players described the rock hard pitch at the PHC Stadium where all the games were played, as ‘disgraceful’. Manager John Sillett was a little more diplomatic, calling it ‘a little bumpy’.

JIM'S COLUMN 28.8.10

2010-09-01T18:54:00.002+01:00

Last Saturday’s 2-1 home win over Derby County lifted the Sky Blues to fourth place in the Championship after three games. It meant that the team had won its first two home games for the first time since moving to the Ricoh Arena in 2005 - in fact it was the first time since 2002 when Gary McAllister’s team beat Sheffield United and Crystal Palace in their first two home games.

Sadly the attendance was a pitifully low 13,139 - the lowest home league crowd ever at the Ricoh and the lowest since February 2005 when 12,148 were at Highfield Road for a 1-2 defeat to Wigan. No doubt the poor weather and the Sky live television coverage had an impact last week but the prices charged to ‘walk-up’ supporters is undoubtedly a big factor in these economically trying times. Even more worryingly about Saturday’s gate is that it is almost two thousand lower than the previous lowest Saturday home gate, set against Barnsley last January. Perhaps the low crowd will persuade Ray Ranson and his team to review their policy in this area.

Lowest gates at the Ricoh 2005-10

1. 13,139 v Derby Co. (2010-11)*
2. 14,036 v Scunthorpe (2007-08)
3. 14,326 v Sheffield United (2009-10)
4. 14,621 v Burnley (2008-09)
5. 14,992 v Cardiff (2008-09)
6. 15,031 v Barnsley (2009-10)*
7. 15,035 v Barnsley (2008-09)
8. 15,149 v Swansea (2008-09)
9. 15,165 v Reading (2009-10)*
10. 15,190 v Peterborough (2009-10)*
* Saturday home games

Who would bet on a City victory at Millwall this afternoon? It is the Sky Blues’ first visit to the New Den for five years and history and form is against them. City have not won at Millwall (Old or New Den) in 14 league and cup games stretching back to their last win on Boxing Day 1955. Millwall have a tradition for strong home form and hold a Football League record of 59 unbeaten home games between 1964 and 1966. They are currently unbeaten at home in 19 league and cup games, the last defeat being by Wycombe Wanderers last November.

Alan Wainwright asked me about a great goal of the past. He wanted to know at which end of Highfield Road did George Hudson score his memorable goal against Southampton. After checking with my fellow City historian Rod Dean I was able to confirm that ‘The Hud’s’ classic goal was scored at the Covered End (the City end) in September 1965.

George scored many great goals for the club but this was arguably his most memorable goal when, with his back to goal he flicked the ball over Southampton centre-half Tony Knapp's head, turned, then casually headed past a startled keeper. City won the Tuesday evening game 5-1, having lost 1-0 to the Saints at the Dell a week earlier. At the end of that season the Saints pipped the Sky Blues to promotion by one point.

Kevin Ring tells me that former City youngster Craig Faulconbridge is still playing professional football at the age of 32. The Nuneaton-born striker was on City’s books for several years as a teenager and got close to a first team call-up after a couple of substitute appearances in pre-season friendlies in 1996 before a broken leg hampered his progress. Manager Gordon Strachan let him go on loan to Dunfermline in 1998 and he scored a memorable goal for the Pars which effectively wrecked Celtic’s title hopes and handed the league to Rangers. Competition for striking places at Coventry was fierce with Dublin, Huckerby and Whelan in great form and a further loan to Dunfermline and another to Hull City preceded Craig’s release from City in 1999. Craig joined Wrexham and played over 100 games in three years at the Racecourse Ground before another three years at Wycombe Wanderers. After spells at Oxford City and Carshalton he joined Woking last season and helped them reach the Blue Square South play-offs and Kevin tells me that this season he is a fixture in Woking’s first team.

Jim's column 21.8.10

2010-08-24T11:10:00.003+01:00

Coventry City’s woes with goalkeepers continued at Watford last Saturday with Everton loanee Iain Turner lasting only 18 minutes before succumbing to injury but allowing promising youngster Michael Quirke to have his day in the limelight. Michael is three weeks short of his nineteenth birthday and he is the youngest goalkeeper to play first team football for the club since Perry Suckling made his debut in 1982 as a sixteen year old.

Quirke became the fourth goalkeeper used by City in three matches this season which I am confident is a record for the club. I have been enquiring with other football statisticians and discovered that in 1968 Nottingham Forest used four different keepers in four consecutive games. City rarely use more than two keepers in a season but in 2001-02 (the first after relegation from the Premiership) they used five keepers. Chris Kirkland played in the opening game at Stockport. Chris was sold to Liverpool days later and Magnus Hedman took over. Then the big Swede was injured and Andy Goram came in on loan, making seven appearances. Goram was however cup-tied and could not play against Chelsea in the League Cup and reserve Gary Montgomery stepped in for his debut, just a day after his 19th birthday. After Christmas Hedman had more injury problems and Tim Flowers came on loan to make it five ‘keepers in one season.

In 2004-05 four different players donned the ‘keeper’s jersey. Scott Shearer, Luke Steele and Ian Bennett all started games and Stephen Hughes pulled on the jersey when loanee Bennett was sent off against Stoke City at Highfield Road.

Paul Walker asked me to settle an argument regarding former England international full-back Mick Mills. Paul believed that Mills’ only involvement was as assistant manager to Terry Butcher in the early 1990s but his friend argued that Mills had joined City as a player and appeared for the first team. Paul is correct Mills, who had managerial experience with Stoke City and Colchester, was appointed by Butcher soon after the former England captain took over as manager in October 1990. A year later however the new regime (including chairman Peter Robins and director Bryan Richardson) forced Butcher to jettison Mills for cost-cutting reasons, and replace him with Don Howe. Weeks later Butcher was relieved of his duties and replaced by Howe in a caretaker role. Mills, a right-back in his playing days, was a key member of Bobby Robson’s outstanding Ipswich team of the 1970s and had many memorable head to head duels with Tommy Hutchison.

Dave Perkins asked me to publish City’s all-time record against Manchester United which is:-

League Pl W D L for agst
Home 37 13 8 16 44 52
Away 37 6 8 23 26 72

Total 74 19 16 39 70 124

In addition there have been nine Cup meetings of which City have won four, drawn one and lost four. City have won their last two Cup meetings at Old Trafford (1987 and 2007).

Derek Paterson, a City fan based in New Zealand, sent me an email recently giving me news of former City goalkeeper Jonathan Gould. Gould, now aged 41, is the assistant coach (and goalkeeping coach) for the New Zealand-based Wellington Phoenix, the only NZ team playing in the A-League (the Australian professional league).

Derek tells me that last season Gould had to sit on the bench as substitute goalkeeper on five occasions because of an injury crisis at the club but fortunately was not called upon. The Phoenix became the first NZ team to reach the A-League play-offs by virtue of finishing fourth in the league season. They failed to reach the play-off finals but hugely improved the image of New Zealand football.

Jonathan, the son of former City player and manager Bobby Gould, played 25 games for the Sky Blues between 1992-96 before a successful career with Celtic and Preston. He also won two international caps for Scotland, despite being born in London.

Jim's column 14.8.10

2010-08-16T09:51:00.002+01:00

After the promising opening-day victory over financially troubled Portsmouth last Saturday the League Cup hoodoo struck again at Morecambe on Tuesday evening but at least it was a night for records. The Sky Blues became the first team to play at The Globe Arena, the Shrimps’ new stadium, in what was their first ever meeting with Morecambe who had never been in the Football League until two years ago.

With just over 20 minutes of the game remaining manager Aidy Boothroyd used his second substitute of the evening, bringing on Leicester youngster Jonson Clarke-Harris for David Bell. The Academy youngster, just 20 days past his 16th birthday, became City’s youngest ever first team player, breaking Ben Mackey’s record set in 2003 by almost six months.

The ten youngest City debutants are now:-

1. Jonson Clarke-Harris (Aug 2010) 16 years 20 days
2. Ben Mackey (Apr 2003) 16 years 167 days
3. Gary McSheffrey (Apr 1999) 16 years 198 days
4. Brian Hill (Apr 1958) 16 years 273 days
5. Isaac Osbourne (Apr 2003) 16 years 308 days
6. Perry Suckling (Aug 1982) 16 years 320 days
7. George Curtis (Apr 1956) 16 years 351 days
8. Dietmar Bruck (Apr 1961) 17 years 9 days
9 Colin Holder (Mar 1961) 17 years 73 days
10. Lol Harvey (Nov 1951) 17 years 101 days

Coventry City seem to have a problem with trips to West Lancashire, perhaps it is the cool breezes off the Irish Sea. City have failed to win at Blackpool since the 1920s and have been thumped at Bloomfield Road heavily in recent years. A few miles down the road at Preston they fare no better and have never won a league game in almost 20 visits stretching back to 1949 - although they did win a League Cup tie at Deepdale in 2000. Even Southport was an unhappy hunting ground for City with an FA Cup defeat to the then non-league side in the 1920s. This week City’s first visit to Morecambe ended in an embarrassing defeat for a strong ‘reserve’ team containing many of last season’s first team regulars including Wood, McPake, McIndoe and Bell.

Goalkeeper Colin Doyle’s stay at Coventry City will probably go down as the shortest career in the club’s history. He arrived on loan from Birmingham on Tuesday morning, played in the discomforting defeat at Globe Arena, and on Wednesday morning was recalled to St Andrews owing to Ben Foster’s injury. Sadly he will bracketed with the Italian goalkeeper Rafaele Nuzzo whose only first team appearance was in the 5-1 League Cup defeat at Tranmere in 1999.

Last but not least it is sad to report the death last week of former Coventry City Commercial Manager Arthur Pepper. Arthur was a larger than life man who played his part in the Sky Blue’s history and always had a smile on his face. I remember his happy and jovial personality cheering up City’s long-faced fans on the flight back from Munich following City’s hammering in 1970.

Jim's column 7.8.10

2010-08-12T13:16:00.000+01:00

The new football season opens today, far too early for my liking. Many football fans are still on holiday (myself included) and will be unable to make the opening game at the Ricoh against Portsmouth. Starting the season on the first Saturday in August is a relatively new phenomenon; a hundred years ago the League had an agreement with the Cricket authorities not to start the season until the first of September and for many decades the football campaign did not commence until the third Saturday in August. To start the season this early in the 1950s and 60s would have been crazy when the majority of Coventry’s factories closed down during the first two weeks of August and the city resembled a ghost town with the majority of families leaving town for the seaside or sunnier climes.

It has been another summer of change at Coventry City with new manager Aidy Boothroyd making adjustments to his squad. Gone are Marcus Hall (without a fan’s farewell), Clinton Morrison (not surprising but his going leaves a gap to be filled) and Stephen Wright (no tears spilled). A slew of new players have arrived including two players who return for a second spell with the club. Both Lee Carsley and Gary McSheffrey appeared for City in both the Premiership and the Championship before leaving to improve their career elsewhere. Carsley has had a long career in the Premiership and now aged 36 is presumably seen as the experienced defensive midfielder that helps get you out of this desperate division. In my opinion City have not had an effective ‘tackling’ defensive midfield player since Youssef Safri and in the interim period have had to see numerous ineffective players in this role. Sammy Clingan showed glimpses last season of filling the role but before him Stephen Hughes, Michael Doyle, Guillaume Beuzelin, Tim Sherwood and numerous others failed to understand the role that is crucial in English league football and , as we saw to England’s cost in South Africa, the World game. All of the best teams in the World Cup had at least one of these players, some , like Brazil, had two. The archetypal player in this role was Nobby Stiles, who could win the ball in the tackle (as well as man-marking the opposition’s top player) and feed it to the players who could make things happen. Similarly Coventry City’s Lloyd McGrath did the job to a tee, going about his job in a quiet and efficient way, rarely getting into the opposition’s penalty area, let alone scoring.

I’m hoping Carsley can play an important role in City’s team but note that he played only nine games for Birmingham City last term. His age however means that we will be relying more on his experienced football brain than his aging legs.

Several readers have asked me about other players like Carsley and McSheffrey, who returned to the club for second spells and there are several including Marcus Hall, Gary Bannister, Gary McAllister, Roland Nilsson and 20-odd years ago Mick Ferguson and Les Sealey returned for brief loan spells. Roy O’Donovan, of course, also rejoins for a second spell, having played for the youth team ten years ago without ever appearing for the first team and Colin Hawkins trod the same path a few years ago. In 1952 manager Harry Storer, seeking goals desperately to keep City in the Second Division, turned to former City legend George Lowrie for salvation. Lowrie had scored 50-odd goals in three seasons for City in the late 1940s before a big money move to Newcastle but his return to Coventry was not a success, he was over the hill and failed to save City from relegation.

JIM's End of Season review

2010-05-10T07:13:00.003+01:00

Another disappointing season came to miserable end last Sunday with an embarrassing home defeat to Watford. The defeat was the final act of the Chris Coleman era and the likeable Welshman was summarily relieved of his duties on Tuesday morning. Strangely it was the biggest home defeat of his time in charge and the biggest since the game preceding his arrival in February 2008, a 0-5 FA Cup thumping from West Brom.

They say one week is a long time in politics but seven weeks is a very long time in football. On 16 March a win over Cardiff would have lifted Coleman’s men into the top six in the Championship with a reasonable chance of a play-off place if they could maintain their impressive post-Christmas run. Eleven games later and with only five points out of a possible 33 the club are, like Gary McAllister’s team in 2003, fortunate that the season didn’t go on to 48 games. Like 2003 City were never going to pull out of their dreadful slump which took them from 8th place to 19th.

Coleman’s record (a league win ratio of 28%) is worse than all his seven predecessors in this division, bar McAllister. The quality of the football was poor too but in my opinion he has left City a better legacy than his predecessor Iain Dowie and on the whole the quality of his signings was far superior. A new manager will have good players at this level such as Keiren Westwood, James McPake, Martin Cranie, Richard Wood and Carl Baker. Under Coleman however there have been far fewer highlights than in the Dowie era. Last season there were superb wins over the two promoted clubs Wolves and Birmingham plus a memorable Cup replay win over Blackburn and the visit of the mighty Chelsea. This season it is hard to come up with a real highlight other than the hard-fought victory over high-flying Nottm Forest.

Points: The team collected 54 points, exactly the same as last season’s total. 49 of those points came before 10 March in 35 games, the remaining five came from the 11 games since 10 March. This is almost a replica of last season.

Home Form: The home record was won 8, drew 9, lost 6, almost identical to last season. Goals scored were one more at 27 and 29 were conceded, three more than in 2008-09. Between the Newcastle defeat in December and the Cardiff game in early March the team went eight unbeaten at home and then failed to win any of the final six home games. In early March the home form was quite impressive and only Newcastle and Swansea had lost less home games, then the wheels fell off!

Wins: City won only thirteen league games, the same number as last season. Only the three relegated teams won less games. In December they did however win three in a row for the first time since October 2007.

Away Form: Five away games were won, the same number as last year. All five wins were against teams who finished in the bottom third (Plymouth, Peterborough, Crystal Palace, Barnsley & Watford). They failed to win at the seven grounds they have never won at (Leicester, Swansea, Cardiff, Preston, Doncaster, Scunthorpe and Middlesbrough).

Biggest win: The biggest victory was a 3-1 home win over Barnsley, only one of two occasions that the side won by two clear goals, the other was at Barnsley. For only the second time since the side were relegated from the Premiership they failed to score more than three goals in a game.

Biggest defeat: The 0-4 defeat to Watford last weekend was the heaviest defeat.

Goals: Once again goals were hard to come by with only 47 goals scored, only one more than in 2002-03, the worst season since relegation from the Premier League. Only three teams scored less (Plymouth, Peterborough and Swansea).

Final position: The final position of 19th means that the Sky Blues have finished in the top ten only once in eight years of second tier football. But for Crystal Palace’s ten point deduction City would have finished 20th. They are the only club, bar long-serving Premiership clubs and recent promotees from the Conference, not to have been promoted or reached the play-offs since the play-offs were introduced in 1987. City are now the second longest serving Championship club, after Preston. During the same period Preston have reached the play-offs on four occasions.

Leading scorers: Clinton Morrison was top scorer with 11 goals (all league). Leon Best netted 10 before his move to Newcastle in January and Freddy Eastwood scored eight.

Doubles: City did the double over two sides – Barnsley and Peterborough. Four clubs, Reading, Derby, Cardiff and Newcastle achieved the feat against City.

Appearances: For the second season running Keiren Westwood started the most games, missing just two league games and one League Cup game. Clinton Morrison however appeared in all 46 league games and all three Cup games, coming off the bench in eight league games. In his two seasons at the club Clinton has only missed one game out of 102 – an impressive record. Four players failed to start a league game but made substitute appearances (Gary Madine, Shaun Jeffers, Ashley Cain and Leon McKenzie) although Cain & Jeffers did start the League Cup game. Nathan Cameron and Callum Wilson appeared as subs in the League Cup but did not start a game.

Players used: Thirty one players were used in league games. In addition Adam Walker, Cameron & Wilson made one League Cup appearance. Of the 34, 17 players made their debuts during the season, six of them loan players. In addition to the 34 players used, five more, Danny Ireland, Curtis Wynter, Michael Quirke, Conor Grogan and Jacob Blackwell all sat on the bench as substitutes but were not used.

Records: At the end of his final season Marcus Hall reached 308 first team appearances for the club, leaving him in 15th place in the club’s all-time appearance chart. With Marcus leaving and Elliott Ward likely to follow shortly the leading appearance makers remaining at the club are Michael Doyle (278) and Isaac Osbourne (135). It remains to be seen whether Doyle will be with us next season.

Substitutes: Freddy Eastwood made the most substitute appearances (16). Loanee Gary Madine made nine appearances from the bench without starting a game, a club record. Three City substitutes scored goals: Morrison (twice) and David Bell.

Average attendance: Home 17,305 (2008-09 17,411). Away 17,426 (2008-09 17,592). The home average attendance fell by less than 1%.

Highest home attendance: The biggest league crowd was 22,207 for the visit of Leicester City in October.

Lowest home attendance: 14,326 v Sheffield United. (the lowest ever at the Ricoh was v Scunthorpe in 2007-08 – 14,036). The Barnsley ‘gate’ of 15,031 was the lowest for a Saturday home game since the stadium opened in 2005. The Hartlepool League Cup crowd of 6,055 was the lowest for any first team game at the Ricoh. The Portsmouth FA Cup crowd was the lowest at home in the competition since before City joined the Football League – you have to go back to 1909 when City were in the Southern League for a lower ‘gate’.

Highest away attendance: The biggest league crowd was 39,334 at Newcastle in February – the largest to watch City in a league game since 39,761 watched their final Premiership away game at Villa Park in 2001.

Lowest away attendance: 5,013 v Scunthorpe. The lowest to watch a City away league game since September 2002 when 2,077 watched them play Wimbledon at Selhurst Park.

Won from behind: (1) Watford (a). 1-2 down and won 3-2. The best comeback however was from 0-2 down at home to Middlesbrough to draw 2-2, the first time they have achieved that at home in 14 years.

Lost from in front: (6) Preston (a), Derby (a), Ipswich (a), Newcastle (a), Cardiff (h) & Portsmouth FAC (h). Three of those defeats came from goals in added time. In a further five games City took the lead only to be pegged back for draws. Six defeats from in front equalled the worst season in the last 43 years.

Firsts: City won at Plymouth for the first time since 1965 and at Watford for the first time in six visits and beat Scunthorpe for the first time ever in a league game. There was still no win at Blackpool and Bloomfield Road is becoming a bogey ground. Preston’s Deepdale also remains a bogey ground – City have now played 14 league games there and failed to win.

Hat-tricks: (1) Freddy Eastwood notched City’s first league hat-trick since 2002 against Peterborough.

Opposing hat-tricks: (0) None. However Grzegorz Rasiak of Reading scored three goals in his sides two wins over City and has now scored seven goals in seven appearances against the Sky Blues including every game he has started. Ipswich’s Pablo Counago and Sheffield United’s Richard Cresswell scored their eighth goals against City this season.

Own goals: For City: (1) Baptiste (Blackpool)

Own goals: By City: (1) Wright (v Portsmouth FAC (h))

Penalties: For City: (1) Morrison (Doncaster h). Two were missed: Clingan (Swansea h) and Best (Doncaster h).

Penalties: Against City: (7) Adam (Blackpool a), Clarke (Sheff Wed a), Whittingham (Cardiff a), Lovenkrands (Newcastle a), Church (Reading a), Davidson (Preston h), Graham (Watford h). In addition Konstantapoulos saved Hulse of Derby’s penalty in the game at Pride Park and Westwood saved Gary Hooper’s against Scunthorpe at home.

Fastest Goal scored: 3 minutes: Morrison (Ipswich a).

Fastest Goal conceded: 1 minute : Rasiak (Reading h).

Red cards: Coventry: (4) Jordan Clarke (Derby a), Stephen Wright (QPR a), Leon Barnett (Newcastle a) & (Scunthorpe h)

Red cards: Opponents: (2) Kozluk (Barnsley a), Ormerod (Blackpool h)

Television: City appeared on live television five times, three times on Sky, once on ITV4 (Portsmouth h) and once on BBC1 (Leicester a). Of the three Sky games City won one (Ipswich (h)) but lost at Derby and Scunthorpe.

Cup form: City were unable to beat Premiership opposition in the FA Cup for the third year running. Despite a good draw at Fratton Park Pompey, the eventual finalists, beat the Sky Blues in the replay with an extra-time goal. In the League Cup Chris Coleman gave little respect to the competition by playing eight reserves or youth players against League One side Hartlepool and the Sky Blues were beaten at home at the first hurdle by a lower division side for the first time since 1984 when Walsall defeated them.

Man of the Match awards: The leaders in Andy Turner’s man of the match awards were: Eastwood (6), Baker (6), Clingan (5), Westwood (4), Morrison (4), Wood (4), Best (4).

Finally a first: In the home game with Nottingham Forest Amy Hearn, the substitute referee, became the first female to referee a Football League game.

JIM'S COLUMN 1.5.10

2010-05-05T07:22:00.000+01:00

Another season comes to close tomorrow and after the euphoria of early March it has to be said the season has finished with a whimper, again. It is forty years ago this month that the Sky Blues last finished in a top six position, a record second to none in the Football League. In April 1970 Noel Cantwell’s side qualified for European football by finishing sixth – above, believe it or not, Arsenal, Manchester United and Tottenham. The European place was clinched with a win at Molineux (the tenth away win of the season) on the Friday night before the FA Cup final between Leeds and Chelsea. An early Brian Joicey goal was enough to clinch the points and send a large Sky Blue following in the 23,000 crowd delirious. It was the second away win in four days – on the Tuesday night a John O’Rourke hat-trick earned a 4-1 win at Forest’s City Ground. In September the Former Players Association are planning to reunite the squad from 1970 at a City home game.

I am afraid the death of former City player Ken Watkins last November passed me by. Ken, who passed away on 26 November 2009, aged 86, lived on Hipswell Highway.

Ken was a right-half who played for Humber FC during World War 2 and was one of many promising young local players called in by City when the first teamers were away in the war. Ken never played in a peacetime game for the club, his 14 appearances coming in the wartime period 1943-1945, eight of them in the transitional 1945-46 season when City played in a Southern regional league with many First Division clubs. In August 1945 Ken played at right half in a 2-0 win over Arsenal (the first ever competitive game against the Gunners) in front of the biggest League crowd of the season, 20,943. Ken also made one guest appearance for Port Vale in 1946 and later played for Rugby Oakfield before coaching Humber after the war. He was also a talented cricketer and I believe he played the odd game for Warwickshire and was a top player for a number of years in the Coventry leagues.

Kieron Beaman emailed me recently. He is the Grandson of Joe Beaman, a City player and manager from before the First World War. Kieron read about Ken Satchwell’s appearance at the Legend’s Day and remembers ‘Satch the Snatch’ scoring four goals in a game for City – against Wrexham on Christmas Day 1959. He asked how many City players have scored four in a game.

The following have all scored four or more in a league game:

Clarrie Bourton (3 occasions)
George Lowrie (3)
Arthur Bacon (2)
Billy Lake (2)
Bill Paterson (1)
Jimmy Rogers (1)
George Stewart (1)
Ken Satchwell (1)
Mick Ferguson (1)

Two players achieved the feat in a League Cup game:
Cyrille Regis
Steve Livingstone

Lowrie had a golden period in 1947 scoring four goals on three separate occasions between April and November. In the same period he also netted three hat-tricks.

Mick Ferguson was the last City player to score four in a league game, in a 4-1 victory over Ipswich in December 1979.

Next week is my final column of the season when I will present my customary Review of the Season.

JIM'S COLUMN 24.4.10

2010-04-25T10:48:00.000+01:00

Today Coventry City face their former manager Gordon Strachan for the first time in a competitive game since he left the club in September 2001. Strachan did bring his Celtic team to the Ricoh for Richard Shaw’s testimonial game in 2006 but the game at Middlesbrough’s Riverside Stadium is a landmark. Some eagle-eyed folk did spot the wee man in the Ricoh stands at the fixture between City and Boro’ earlier in the season, some weeks before his predecessor Gareth Southgate was sacked and his subsequent selection as Southgate’s successor was not a big surprise. Gordon didn’t have a very good record against Boro’ whilst managing City, winning only two games out of eight. Many fans will remember the opening game of what turned out to be the relegation season in 2000 when an average Boro’ side won 3-1 at Highfield Road with debut boy Alan Boksic scoring twice and giving poor Colin Hendry the runaround. That day many City fans realised that City’s 34-year stay in the top flight was going to be seriously under threat.

The Riverside is one of several Championship grounds where City have never won. Opened in 1995, City had the honour of scoring the first opposing goal there (Isaias netting), but in five league visits they have picked up only one point, as well as losing two cup ties there.

Last August I highlighted that there were seven away grounds where City had never won a league game: Leicester’s Walker’s Stadium, Doncaster’s Keepmoat Stadium, Scunthorpe’s Glanford Park, Preston, Boro’s Riverside, Swansea’s Liberty Stadium and Cardiff’s new stadium. I said that if City failed to win at all of these grounds then the chances are they will not be in the play-off mix come next April. Here we are at the final away game of the season and barring a surprise win today City have not won at any of the seven grounds and are not in the play-offs.

I spoke to former City player Lol Harvey at last week’s game and he reminisced about the late Charlie Timmins who he played alongside in the 1950s. Lol was close to Charlie in his playing days but the pair had lost touch until I put them in touch about four years ago and they had re-established a fine friendship. One of the most interesting comments that a sad Lol made was regarding Charlie’s playing ability. He pointed out that unusually for a defender of that era, he wasn’t a great tackler but did have exceptional passing ability and was renowned for his runs into the opponent’s half of the pitch. Lol described how Charlie would advance over the halfway line and be looking for centre-forward Ted Roberts. He could deliver an excellent cross and would invariably find Ted with his deep crosses.

Graham Williams sent me an email recently reminding me that former City player Martin Jol is enjoying a successful first season as manager at Ajax Amsterdam. The British papers have concentrated on Steve McClaren’s rehabilitation at FC Twente but Jol has rebuilt his own career after being treated shabbily at Tottenham. With one league game remaining Ajax are a point behind Twente and any slip by McClaren’s team next weekend will hand the title to Ajax. Jol’s team are also in the Dutch Cup Final and will face Feyenoord in the first ever two-legged final. The games, with the first leg in Amsterdam tomorrow and the second in Rotterdam on 6 May, will be attended by home fans only in an effort to avoid crowd trouble.

JIM'S COLUMN 17.4.10 Charlie Timmins R I P

2010-04-18T21:27:00.001+01:00

It is sad to report the death earlier this week of former Coventry City player Charlie Timmins (pictured above, right, with Gordon Nutt). Birmingham-born Charlie died on Tuesday 13 April, aged 87, after a fight with cancer.

After many years away from Coventry he had in recent years become a regular visitor at City home games with his son and grandson, Stephen, and brightened up the Legends Lounge with his impish sense of humour. He was a regular attendee at the Former Players’ Legends Day and loved mixing with his former City teammates.

A few years ago I had the pleasure of meeting Charlie and his family when I gave them a tour of the new stadium. Charlie could hardly believe his eyes at the facilities available at the Ricoh and spent more than hour with me reminiscing about his tn happy years at Highfield Road from 1948-58.

Charlie’s memory that day was remarkable. We talked about a famous game in the 1950-51 season when City beat Blackburn 6-1 to go top of Division Two – and he was able to rattle off the names of nine of the City team. He also remembered the day Preston North End, then a top First Division side, including the legendary Tom Finney, came to Highfield Road. It was in January 1956 and with both teams out of the FA Cup a hastily arranged friendly took place. Finney was at the time one of the top players in Britain, if not Europe, and he gave Charlie a real chasing in the mud. Charlie described the experience: ‘Finney played on the right wing that day but his left foot was stronger and whilst I could get close to most wingers, he was unorthodox and so fast. I was puffed out at half-time and the manager George Raynor had to switch Frank Austin and I to give me a breather. At the end I didn’t have enough energy to shake his hand”.

Charlie did service in the Royal Engineers in the war and was playing for a Birmingham non-league side, Jack Moulds Athletic, when City spotted him. ‘I was 27-years old and working at the Morris in Birmingham with no thought of playing football professionally. One night there was a knock on the front door and a chap called Harry Storer was there, saying he wanted to sign me for Coventry City. I played a game for the reserves on the first day of the season in August 1949. We won and I was picked for the first team game at Luton four days later. We lost 0-2 but Storer was pleased with me.’

Charlie played 23 times that season, at either right or left back and helped the Bantams to an eight-game unbeaten end to the season, lifting any relegation worries. The next season he was a regular as the team set the pace at the top of the Second Division. Promotion looked a strong possibility until the New Year when the team stuttered and finished seventh. Charlie showed me his press cuttings and his outstanding performances that season prompted the media to tip him for international honours with a big money move to Newcastle mooted at one time.

A loss of form cost him his place the following season and with City’s ageing team suddenly looking tired the team were relegated to Division Three. Charlie played a total of 165 games for the club between 1949 and 1958 and scored five goals for City, four of them penalties. He played under six managers Storer, Jack Fairbrother, Jesse Carver, Raynor, Harry Warren and Billy Frith. His only outfield goal came on Christmas Eve 1955 in a 5-3 win over Norwich. His final game was a 0-0 home draw with Brentford in February 1958. He was released at the age of 36 and joined Lockheed Leamington, managed by former City colleague Les Latham.

Charlie remembers travelling to Coventry from Birmingham every day for training on the Midland Red 159 bus with other Brum-based players like George Mason, Martin McDonnell, Gordon Nutt and Don Dorman. ‘Very few players could afford a car in those days and we had great fun on the bus every day. When I joined Lockheed I used to cycle to Olton station and catch the train to Leamington, taking my bike with me. At Leamington I would cycle up Tachbrook Road to the Windmill Ground in time for the kick-off.’

After hanging up his boots he went back into the motor industry and joined Rover at Solihull in the Car despatch division where he spent 28 happy years before retiring in 1986 continuing to live in the Sparkhill district. Charlie was a great supporter of the Former Players Association from its inception three years ago and the Association committee and members have asked me to express their condolences to Charlie’s family.

In turn the Timmins family would be very happy to see any Coventry City fans at the funeral which takes place next Wednesday (21 April) at 11.30 at Yardley Crematorium, Yardley, Birmingham and afterwards at the Westley Arms in Acocks Green.

The Former Players Association is running transport to the funeral and anybody who would like a lift can contact Bob Eales on 07795 283955.

Last week’s appeal on behalf of Bob Weeks and the picture of the Midland (Coventry) Telegraph Cup winners of 1908 prompted a couple of replies. Gordon Rouse is vice-chairman of the Telegraph Cup committee and revealed that Great Heath were the winners of the trophy in 1908. Fellow historian Mike Young was able to provide me with some more information:

Foleshill Great Heath (as they were known) beat Leamington Town 4-3 in the 1907-08 Final of the Midland Daily Telegraph Cup after beating Exhall Colliery 4-1 in Round 1; Budbrooke 6-0 in Round 2; Nuneaton Wanderers in Round 3; and Lord Street 3-2 after extra time in the Semi Finals.

It was so predictable that I wish I had put money on Richard Cresswell to score for Sheffield United last Saturday at Bramall Lane. His eighth goal in 12 appearances against City since 2001 makes him the highest scorer against Coventry since they left the Premiership. Cresswell has a pretty good record in the Championship but it is interesting to note that in his one recent season in the top division, with Stoke last year, he failed to find the net in 29 appearances.

Cresswell prediction spot-on

2010-04-11T20:43:00.000+01:00

Sheffield United's Richard Cresswell duly scored the winning goal at Bramall Lane as the Sky Blues made it eight games without a win. It was Cresswell's eighth goal against the Sky Blues since 2001, making him the leading scorer against City in that time.

JIM'S COLUMN 10.4.10

2010-04-11T20:41:00.000+01:00

Two weeks ago I reported the sad passing away of former City goalkeeper Charlie Ashcroft. Dave Walker of Allesley Park remembers Charlie for one of the most bizarre own goals of all time. In what was only Charlie’s third game for the City he was a member of the team getting a going over at Northampton Town’s County Ground – not an unusual occurrence back in the 1950s. City were 2-0 down after 35 minutes to the Cobblers when as the Coventry Telegraph match report describes it: ‘With all the field in which to place a harmless clearance Ashcroft weakly kicked the ball against the back of the unsuspecting (Roy) Kirk’s head and had the mortification of seeing his effort rebound 14 yards into an empty net’. The Cobblers scored another goal just after half-time and ran out 4-0 winners.

I also reported the death of another player from the 1950s, Charlie Dutton. Terry Hough sent me a lovely email. As a good friend of Charlie when he first came to Coventry, he was shocked to read that Dutton had passed away. They became good friends in the Fitting Shop at Binley Colliery where Terry was working, and as Charlie had previously worked in a colliery in his native Staffordshire the club fixed up a job at Binley for him.

Terry was best man at Charlie’s wedding but they lost touch after Charlie left City and moved away from Coventry. Terry played football for the Binley Welfare team in the Coventry & North Warwickshire league in the early 60s and remembers playing against Bobby Gould, Dudley Roberts and Mick Coop when they played for Modern Machine Tools who were the Coventry City junior side in that league.

George Hudson’s reappearance at Legends Day and his appearance on BBC CWR prompted Keith Ballantyne to ask if George ever scored against the Sky Blues for Tranmere Rovers. He did Keith, in an FA Cup Fourth Round replay at Prenton Park in 1968. City were held to a draw by Rovers at Highfield Road and in the replay Hudson and fellow striker George Yardley scored first half goals to send the Third Division side through to a plum tie with Everton in round five. George played for Tranmere for almost three years before hanging up his boots.

Gareth Robinson asked who played in goal for the Sky Blues during the 1994-95 and 1995-96 seasons. City's goalkeepers for those two seasons were:

1994-95
Ogrizovic 33 league games
Jonathan Gould 7
John Filan 2

1995-96
Ogrizovic 25
Filan 13

Oggy’s appearance total was lower than usual owing to the broken leg he suffered in a friendly at Northampton in 1995. Gould and the Australian Filan filled the position until Oggy was fit to resume in the autumn of 1995.

Bob Weeks has obtained a picture of the Midland (Coventry) Telegraph Cup winners of 1908 but there is no mention of the name of the team. He was wondering if any readers know the winners of the competition for that year. Amongst the players featured are R W Arnold, E O Shanks, Joseph Tedds, T Garratt and trainer W Wright. Perhaps the current trophy has a list of winners inscribed on it.

Finally City must be glad to see the back of Reading striker Grzegorz Rasiak for another season. The Pole notched his seventh goal against the Sky Blues in the last four seasons. Since arriving at Derby in 2004 he has scored in all six games he has started against City for Derby (1), Southampton (2), Watford (1) and Reading (3). The only time he failed to net was when he came on as a substitute for Southampton. His seventh goal on Monday means he pulls level with Pablo Counago and Richard Cresswell as the highest scorers against Coventry since they left the Premiership in 2001. Today City are likely to face Cresswell at Bramall Lane – who would bet against Cresswell scoring!

Coventry City Former Players' Database now live

2010-04-04T17:11:00.002+01:00

My Coventry City players' database is now live. Search for any player who has appeared for the first team since 1919 and discover the number of games played, goals scored, who they were signed from and sold to, where they were born and who they made their debut against and when.

It is hoped to add profiles and pictures over the coming months. Some are already there.

www.ccfpa.co.uk/?page_id=93

JIM'S COLUMN 3.4.10 Another successful Legends Day

2010-04-04T17:07:00.002+01:00

Last Saturday’s Legend’s Day was another massive success but I’m sorry to say I was unable to attend due to some family issues. Mike Young, a fellow committee member has however given me a full report on a great day for our former heroes, and Tony Thomas our resident photographer has again produced some memorable images of the day.

Numbers were slightly down on last year but quality was in big supply with Tommy Hutch, Willie Carr, Roy Barry, Ian Wallace and Ernie Hunt leading the charge of top players from the 1970s. These guys really know how to enjoy themselves and you can begin to understand the problems that managers like Noel Cantwell and Gordon Milne had in controlling themselves. Barry and Wallace made the long trek from their homes in Scotland with ‘Wally’ struggling on crutches but both had a great time and are great ambassadors for the Former Players Association.

Tommy Hutch vied with the legendary George Hudson for the biggest cheer in the Eon lounge at lunchtime but by all accounts Tom got the biggest cheer on the pitch at half-time. ‘The Hud’ as many fans called him in his heyday, presented Joe Elliott with a signed 1960s City number 9 shirt on behalf of the committee for all the fantastic work Joe has done in supporting the association since its inception.

The oldest guest was Trevor Lewis who is 90 next January and made his debut for City back in 1948 and is very sprightly for his age. The youngest was 33-year old Claus Jorgensen who was still playing league football last season. In between those two, all eras were represented. Two new members made their first appearance at an FPA event, Graham Newton and Ian Goodwin. Neither of them were at the club too long but both were remembered by their former team mates and thoroughly enjoyed the reunion. Their appearance reminds us that all former first team players are welcome at games and events, whether they played one game or five hundred. They are all part of the football club’s fine history.

Mike tells me everything went like clockwork with the players receiving a rapturous reception from the crowd at half-time. A number of people have asked why they didn’t do a lap of honour and the reason is that last year the lap took so long that there were still former players on the perimeter when the second half kicked off and the club risked a fine if there had been a repeat. The fans however had their opportunity to meet and mingle with the former heroes after the game when they were guests of the key men at G-Casino, Quinton Korsma and Paul Davis. Quinton and Paul have been enormously supportive of the FPA this season and a post-match trip to the Casino has become a regular event for all guests at home games. A video clip of the goings-on in the casino and pictures of the day can be found on the association’s website www.ccfpa.co.uk

On a personal note I would like to thank the hard-working committee who put in many hours of work to make sure it all worked well on the day. Apparently Bob Eales excelled himself with his speech and Billy Bell kept everyone on their toes with his humour, although a little bird tells me he failed to turn up for breakfast at Roy Barry’s hotel – he forgot to put his clock forward!

All in all it was another successful Legends Day and ensures that the club’s glorious past is remembered through their former players.

One former player missing last Saturday was Charlie Timmins. The 87-year old former captain and full-back is quite poorly at the minute and he was sorely missed by his contemporaries. Birmingham-based Charlie has become a regular at the Ricoh since the association was formed and all his friends wish him well and are thinking of him.

Charlie Ashcroft R.I.P

2010-03-28T16:39:00.001+01:00

Charlie Ashcroft who died recently

JIM'S COLUMN 27.3.10 Two stars of the 1950s pass away

2010-03-28T16:36:00.001+01:00

Charlie Dutton

Today is Legends Day at the Ricoh Arena, the fourth year running that the Former Players Association have organised a major reunion of ex-Coventry City players. Around 40 former players will be entertained to lunch in the Eon lounge and then will be presented on the pitch at half-time. Players representing seven decades will be present stretching from 89-year old Trevor Lewis who made his debut in 1948 through to Claus Jorgensen who scored the first ever goal at the Ricoh in 2005. If you’re going to the game today I encourage you to stay in your seat at half-time and give the Legends a great ovation to celebrate our heritage.

After the game, around 5.30 the ex-players will be guests of the G-Casino and mingling with fans in the casino. The casino have been immensely supportive to the FPA this season and every home game has seen a former player making an appearance there. Thanks go to the key men at G-Casino Quinton Korsma and Paul Davis.

This week I received the sad news that two former City players from the 1950s died recently. Former goalkeeper Charlie Ashcroft passed away, aged 83 earlier this month and another Charlie, Dutton, died aged 75, last October but news of his passing has only just reached me.

As a twelve-year old Chorley-born Charlie was already six feet tall and the natural choice to play in goal at school. Liverpool spotted him playing for Eccleston Juniors in the Preston & District League. His full debut for Liverpool was a 7-4 win over Chelsea in September 1946 and he went on to make 89 appearances over nine years for the Reds as well as winning an England B cap.

He joined Ipswich Town and played under Alf Ramsey but after two seasons at Portman Road manager Harry Warren signed the six-foot two-inch keeper for City in 1957. He had previously broken an arm, which had not healed properly and he could not straighten it properly. Poor Charlie was on a hiding to nothing at Highfield Road, having to replace the famous Reg Matthews especially during one of the club’s worst post-war seasons. He started the season as first-choice keeper but in the fourth game of the season, a home defeat to Newport County, he was badly at fault for one of Newport’s two goals. The Newport winger, Thomas, handled the ball which ran loose to Ashcroft. City players appealed for the free-kick but the referee waved play on as City had the advantage. Then Charlie, obviously thinking he had awarded the free-kick, inexplicably threw it straight to Thomas who gleefully lobbed it into the goal. After the game a fuming Ashcroft and several other City players were adamant they had heard a whistle.

In the following game Ashcroft was dropped and replaced by 17-year old Graham Spratt. Soon afterwards manager Warren was sacked and replaced by Billy Frith and after a horrendous 7-1 defeat at Southampton in February 1958 Charlie was recalled for the shell-shocked Spratt as the team slid towards Division Four. He played in most of the remaining games that season before being transfer-listed in the summer, joining Chorley where he played for four years. He worked at the Royal Ordnance factory at Euxton and lived in Eccleston,near Chorley, where he built his own house. A keen cricketer, he was playing cricket at the age of 56.

Charlie Dutton was a crowd-pleasing centre forward signed by manager Harry Storer from Derby County as an 18-year old in 1952. Storer loaned him out to Rugby Town almost immediately and he scored prolifically for the non-league side including five goals in one game against Sutton Town. He scored on his City debut in a 2-0 victory over Bournemouth in September 1953 and a week later scored the winner in a 2-1 victory at Millwall. Despite three goals in six games he was back in the reserves when regular centre-forward Eddie Brown was fit. That tended to be the story of Dutton’s career at Coventry. When he left to join Northampton in March 1956 he had made 28 appearances and scored nine goals.

His stay at Northampton was short and he was soon at Lockheed Leamington where he found his scoring boots and later enjoyed a successful career in non-league football with Bedworth, Rugby, Hinckley Town and Brereton Social. Charlie spent his later years back in his home town of Rugeley but died after a long fight against Motor Neurone Disease.

JIM'S COLUMN 20.3.10

2010-03-21T19:20:00.001Z

Tuesday night’s home defeat to Cardiff City put a large dent in Coventry City’s play-off hopes, especially after Saturday’s disappointing 1-1 draw with Plymouth Argyle. The gap between City and sixth-placed Cardiff is now five points and the Bluebirds have a game in hand.

In the face of some dreadful hype from supporters and the media I have urged a dose of realism for several weeks, pointing to the ambitious points total required for a play-off place and the fact that City faced home games with some of their bogey sides. Cardiff are one of those teams who have an impressive record in Coventry, having lost just once in the league since 1966, the final game of Dennis Wise’s short but impressive stay at the club. Cardiff boss Dave Jones is certainly getting his revenge on his former club who supposedly mistreated him after his 1979 transfer from Everton. Jones, like fellow signing Gary Collier, never recovered from a nightmare start in a defeat at Stoke on the opening day of the season, and started on nine games in almost three seasons. Since 2001 Jones has brought Wolves and Cardiff to Coventry on seven occasions and lost only once.

Five points have therefore been dropped against two teams supposedly out of form and ‘there for the taking’ and City followers are again guilty of counting their chickens before they hatch. Numerous reasons will be put forward for the two relatively poor performances and, yes, it was a dreadful penalty decision that cost City a vital penalty on Tuesday but my theory is that the players and the management had been taken in by the play-off hype.

Chris Coleman is normally a stubbornly measured interviewee who rarely gets carried away, but ahead of the Cardiff game he admitted in the press to looking at the league table ‘400-500 times a day’. Whilst this is probably a wild exaggeration, the fact that he even looked at the table is not good news. Judging from the team’s second half performance he would have spent his time better preparing them or watching videos of his impressive opponents.

Returning to the number of points required for the play-offs, Geoff Moore has provided me with some statistics on the number of teams achieving 69 points or above in all divisions since the play-offs came into being. No club has ever got into the play-offs with less than 70 points and until you get above 72 points the chances of getting there are less than 50:50. Many believe that this season 69 or even 68 points will be enough but the stats do not support that. By the way in 2000 Bristol Rovers reached 80 points in Division Two and missed out on the play-offs, finishing 7th.

Points In top six Out of top six % in top six
81 10 0 100
80 13 2 87
79 13 0 100
78 17 1 94
77 8 0 100
76 18 1 95
75 17 2 89
74 16 8 67
73 17 5 77
72 13 11 54
71 10 12 45
70 5 25 17
69 0 21 0

More stats were requested by several people including Steve Pittam and Dave Long. It’s the common belief that the Sky Blues’ results are better when Sammy Clingan is in the team and this table goes some way to supporting that view.

I looked at the record of each player this season and calculated the number of points won as a percentage of the points available when they were playing. I have only included the starting line-ups as it gets too complicated with substitutes. If a player had started every league game this season his record would be: Played 37, won 13, drawn 11, lost 13, points 50 which is 45% of the points available. The results make interesting reading and the top ten players are:

Pl W D L Points % points
McPake 13 7 4 2 25 64.1
Bell 13 6 5 2 23 58.9
Baker 9 4 3 2 15 55.5
Clingan 23 10 8 5 38 55.1
Barnett 13 6 2 5 20 51.2
Wright 30 11 11 8 44 48.9
Gunnarsson 28 11 8 9 41 48.8
Westwood 35 13 11 11 50 47.6
Cranie 30 11 8 10 41 45.5
McIndoe 37 13 10 12 49 44.1

James McPake and David Bell amazingly have only been on the losing side twice each and are well ahead of the field at the moment, and Baker, who has started only nine games is also ahead of Sammy. The Irishman however has an impressive record and it was not a coincidence that the team slipped from 11th to 17th during his absence from the side in the autumn. Bell’s position in the table may surprise many fans who feel we haven’t seen his best form this term but City’s strong form since early December coincided with his return from injury and has allowed Chris Coleman to play a true wide player on the right.

JIM'S COLUMN 13.3.10

2010-03-15T19:57:00.000Z

Another away victory last Saturday at London Road, Peterborough, strengthened City’s case for a play-off place and with some of their rivals stuttering the odds are falling on a miracle happening. City fans are quite rightly getting excited about the prospect of the team’s first foray into the play-offs but there is still a long way to go, with probably around 23 points from 11 games required. History tells us that as the race for a top six place reaches a climax the form of the leading protagonists will inevitably improve. City’s remaining home games look relatively easy but how often have we looked at fixtures and marked them down as a banker only to see our team blow an opportunity. As well, the recent home records against Cardiff, Preston and Watford are far from impressive. My advice to City fans is enjoy the ride – it’s so rare for us to be in contention for some glory and if the club’s recent history is anything to go by it might be some time before we get the chance again.

Today’s home game with struggling Plymouth Argyle gives the Sky Blues the chance to achieve their best run of league wins for eight years. Victory would mean a fourth success in a row and the best since December 2002 when under the managership of Gary McAllister the team beat Stoke (a), Wolves (a), Derby (h) and Reading (h). The mini-run took City to sixth place in the Championship and earned Gary the manager of the month award. Unfortunately the wheels fell off and the Sky Blues recorded just one victory in the remaining 21 games and missed relegation by a whisker. It is 12 years since a City team won five in a row – Gordon Strachan’s impressive side in 1997-98.

Mick Sanders enjoyed the short obituary to Birmingham goalkeeping legend Gil Merrick a couple of weeks ago. The article reminded him of one of his earliest City memories - George Mason's testimonial match in April 1953. He recalls it was between Coventry City and a Midlands All Star XI. City’s forward line was strengthened by two guests, Derby’s former England man Jack Stamps and Cardiff’s former City player Ken Chisholm. Merrick played in goal for a team that included the famous flying Wolves wingers Johnny Hancocks and Jimmy Mullen. The game, watched by a crowd of 11,143 was a thrilling exhibition match and ended in an 8-5 win for the All Stars for whom Arthur Rowley scored three goals, Hancocks 2, Peter Murphy, Ronnie Allen and a Martin McDonnell own goal. City’s scorers were Stamps (3), Barry Thomas and Eric Johnson. As Mick points out in his email, it was an opportunity to see some of the top players of the day including some of the mighty Wolves team and the great Gil Merrick in goal.

The acceptances are flying in for this year’s Legends Day and it is expected that around 50 former Coventry City players will be attending the event at the Sheffield Wednesday home game at the end of the month. The Former Players Association are organising the event and acceptances have been received this week from such luminaries as Neil Martin, Alan Green, John Williams and Wilf Smith.