MATCHWATCH : Coventry City (a)

[bloody Volvo driver]

Thought Cov looked half decent against Forest, especially after the break, looked a little “rabbit in headlights” to start with with their return to the Ricoh, but afterwards took the game to Forest, and totally dominated them, particularly down the Forest left!

Let’s face it, the scout’s report from our game on Tuesday will be cross and score.

Would snatch the proverbial arm off for a point, but heading up the M40 more in hope than expectation. Robins has got them organised, can see a top half finish for Cov.

[Hound]

Weirdly considering the size of the squad, it’s actually quite hard to pick the midfield. Would like to bring Hoilett straight in but guessing not quite 100% fit. TDB deserves a start. Azeez as well

Bit frustrated we’ve not got a lb over the line yet. Esp if it is ribeiro in our sights

Would prob go for

Rafael
Holmes McIntyre Moore Yiadom
Rino Laurent
Azeez Swift TDB
Puscas

Not too sure where Ejaria and Hoilett quite fit yet. Still good options

[Snowflake Royal]

I'd take a boring 0-0 from this.

Would prefer a more entertaining 3-3 tbf.

I'm not sure how many more times I can take watching our defence at 6s and 7s.

Which, if they continue like this, are some of the scores we'll see against the better teams.

[Snowflake Royal]

Weirdly considering the size of the squad, it’s actually quite hard to pick the midfield. Would like to bring Hoilett straight in but guessing not quite 100% fit. TDB deserves a start. Azeez as well

Bit frustrated we’ve not got a lb over the line yet. Esp if it is ribeiro in our sights

Would prob go for

Rafael
Holmes McIntyre Moore Yiadom
Rino Laurent
Azeez Swift TDB
Puscas

Not too sure where Ejaria and Hoilett quite fit yet. Still good options

Not sure it's wise playing McIntyre RCB.

You're not wrong about the midfield. And once Ejaria is back we'll have 5 players I'd be happy seeing start in the middle 3. And no senior left back.

[Hound]

Weirdly considering the size of the squad, it’s actually quite hard to pick the midfield. Would like to bring Hoilett straight in but guessing not quite 100% fit. TDB deserves a start. Azeez as well

Bit frustrated we’ve not got a lb over the line yet. Esp if it is ribeiro in our sights

Would prob go for

Rafael
Holmes McIntyre Moore Yiadom
Rino Laurent
Azeez Swift TDB
Puscas

Not too sure where Ejaria and Hoilett quite fit yet. Still good options

Not sure it's wise playing McIntyre RCB.

You're not wrong about the midfield. And once Ejaria is back we'll have 5 players I'd be happy seeing start in the middle 3. And no senior left back.

yep fair point on RCB. Prob keeps Morrison in by default. I'd like to drop Moore for McIntyre purely on footballing form - not too sure how it would go down yet. And McIntyre didn't really help his own cause against Bristol. Holmes has to come in though. Tough one.

Disappointed on the LB thing as I mentioned. Would have been higher priority than Hoilett for me. Hopefully one will come in for the next game

[Westwood52]

Weirdly considering the size of the squad, it’s actually quite hard to pick the midfield. Would like to bring Hoilett straight in but guessing not quite 100% fit. TDB deserves a start. Azeez as well

Bit frustrated we’ve not got a lb over the line yet. Esp if it is ribeiro in our sights

Would prob go for

Rafael
Holmes McIntyre Moore Yiadom
Rino Laurent
Azeez Swift TDB
Puscas

Not too sure where Ejaria and Hoilett quite fit yet. Still good options

Not sure it's wise playing McIntyre RCB.

You're not wrong about the midfield. And once Ejaria is back we'll have 5 players I'd be happy seeing start in the middle 3. And no senior left back.

yep fair point on RCB. Prob keeps Morrison in by default. I'd like to drop Moore for McIntyre purely on footballing form - not too sure how it would go down yet. And McIntyre didn't really help his own cause against Bristol. Holmes has to come in though. Tough one.

Disappointed on the LB thing as I mentioned. Would have been higher priority than Hoilett for me. Hopefully one will come in for the next game

Strange isn’t it.We have known Richards has been gone for some 6 months ,and almost four games in we still haven’t come up with anything.I accept the FFP restrictions;but surely a bit of forward planning was required here.While it is a specialist position;I would have thought a LB would be easier to find than say Hoilett.

[morganb]

Not sure it's wise playing McIntyre RCB.

You're not wrong about the midfield. And once Ejaria is back we'll have 5 players I'd be happy seeing start in the middle 3. And no senior left back.

yep fair point on RCB. Prob keeps Morrison in by default. I'd like to drop Moore for McIntyre purely on footballing form - not too sure how it would go down yet. And McIntyre didn't really help his own cause against Bristol. Holmes has to come in though. Tough one.

Disappointed on the LB thing as I mentioned. Would have been higher priority than Hoilett for me. Hopefully one will come in for the next game

Strange isn’t it.We have known Richards has been gone for some 6 months ,and almost four games in we still haven’t come up with anything.I accept the FFP restrictions;but surely a bit of forward planning was required here.While it is a specialist position;I would have thought a LB would be easier to find than say Hoilett.

Perhaps it goes something like:

Reading: Hi. We've been doing some scouting around and we see you are a left-back and available on a free. Would you like to join us?

Player: Ok. Mmm, Reading. Not the most sexy of clubs and weren't you 7 points clear at one stage last season but eventually managed to finish outside the play-offs. I'll need a pretty good offer to entice me to come to you, what can you offer me?

Reading: £8.5k a week, a one year contract and guaranteed game time. What do you think?

Reading: Hello? Hello?

[Hound]

8.5k per week is hardly minimum wage though tbf. Be surprised if all the players at clubs like PNE or Peterborough are on that. Reckon could have got in a free agent or loanee on that fairly easily

[morganb]

Wonder if we're being too choosy, may be we have a specific target in mind who we're happy to wait for, perhaps we're looking at a loan player but if we don't get one by the time the window slams shut we could pick up a free agent in early September (perhaps trialling them during the international break).

[Royal_jimmy]

I was feeling quite optimistic about this one but I'd take a point now.

This will be a tough game

[Coppells Lost Coat]

Wonder if we're being too choosy, may be we have a specific target in mind who we're happy to wait for, perhaps we're looking at a loan player but if we don't get one by the time the window slams shut we could pick up a free agent in early September (perhaps trialling them during the international break).

Wouldn't surprise me that we have a guy lined up on loan - just the parent club are waiting to finalise their deals to push it through.
There is no way the club are that naive to be at this stage with zero options lined up. We have had months of preparation. Just FFP has taken away maybe 2 options that required a fee.
I am still hopeful that we can pull a few rabbits out of the hat, we always seem to, but maybe thats why we are in this mess.

[Snowflake Royal]

Weirdly considering the size of the squad, it’s actually quite hard to pick the midfield. Would like to bring Hoilett straight in but guessing not quite 100% fit. TDB deserves a start. Azeez as well

Bit frustrated we’ve not got a lb over the line yet. Esp if it is ribeiro in our sights

Would prob go for

Rafael
Holmes McIntyre Moore Yiadom
Rino Laurent
Azeez Swift TDB
Puscas

Not too sure where Ejaria and Hoilett quite fit yet. Still good options

Not sure it's wise playing McIntyre RCB.

You're not wrong about the midfield. And once Ejaria is back we'll have 5 players I'd be happy seeing start in the middle 3. And no senior left back.

yep fair point on RCB. Prob keeps Morrison in by default. I'd like to drop Moore for McIntyre purely on footballing form - not too sure how it would go down yet. And McIntyre didn't really help his own cause against Bristol. Holmes has to come in though. Tough one.

Disappointed on the LB thing as I mentioned. Would have been higher priority than Hoilett for me. Hopefully one will come in for the next game

TBD looks a good singing and you can take what you get when you can get it. But madness if our two top priorities weren't LB followed by LW

[Snowflake Royal]

It's weird with us and full backs.

Remember when we had Kelly, Cummings and Gunter but no left back.

Then we've got Obita, Blackett, Richards plus Gunter, Yiadom, Araruna, Holmes and Watson.

Now we've got Yiadom, Holmes and Bristow.

Er chaps, have you considered trying to maintain 4 fullbacks, 2 each side, rather than this feast and famine bullshit.

[Simmops]

Lose this and we're deep in the mire

[SouthDownsRoyal]

8.5k per week is hardly minimum wage though tbf. Be surprised if all the players at clubs like PNE or Peterborough are on that. Reckon could have got in a free agent or loanee on that fairly easily

Agree, it isn’t £9 an hour

[SouthDownsRoyal]

Lose this and we're deep in the mire

Cov aren’t too bad and our squad is thread bare, I really hope we get something out of it as I’d hate for a rot to set in, especially early on and in a relatively kind run if fixtures but if we lose it’s still early days

[Westwood52]

Interesting selection today.End of a back five ?That said TDB looks comfortable as a wing back,and from first viewing looks Prem quality.The Coaching Manual suggest Hoillet won’t start.If only Puscas could find some form;otherwise Pauno will be pressing the panic button to get a CF in next week.

[Simmops]

Let's cut to the chase shall we? Reading are scoring plenty of goals; in fact they have netted twice as many as Coventry but they're simply shipping too many at the other end. The seven they've conceded is the joint worst in the league and needs to be addressed sharpish; it's something they should be able to organise with an experienced centre back pairing. For Coventry, they have no such trouble; they've only conceded two goals so far this season so will be confident of managing the threat Reading bring.

[skipper]

........................Cabral
Holmes, Morrison, McIntyre, Yiadom
...............Rinomhota, Laurent
Azeez, ...............Swift, ..................TBD
.........................Puscas

Actually,.yeah Yiadom left.

Solid lineup that

[Mr Optimist]

8.5k per week is hardly minimum wage though tbf. Be surprised if all the players at clubs like PNE or Peterborough are on that. Reckon could have got in a free agent or loanee on that fairly easily

Exactly. Do we have any scouts that watch League 1 and 2 teams? Surely there must be someone from there that is 21/22 with 50 or so first team games behind them that would be worth a relatively low financial gamble on to see if they could make the step up…