Coventry City news from CoventryLive as Frank Lampard looks ahead to Monday’s CBS Arena clash with automatic promotion rivals Middlesbrough
Frank Lampard has been speaking about Coventry City’s top-of-the-table clash with Middlesbrough
In terms of the context of the season, Coventry City’s top-of-the-table clash with Middlesbrough feels like a huge game.
The in-form Teessiders travel to the CBS Arena on Monday on the back of six straight Championship wins, their last – a 2-1 win at Sheffield United – seeing them topple the Sky Blues off their perch – a position they’d held for just over four months, 127 days to be exact.
Asked how that feels like for the squad, going into the game in second place against new leaders Boro and whether there’s been a change or increase in intensity around the place, Frank Lampard said: “Yeah, they’re not stupid. The players understand it, it’s the top two teams in the league and we’re there for a reason. Everyone’s looking forward to the game and everyone has to have ultra focus. The intensity of the game is going to be big because Boro are an intense team in their physicals.
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“They’re a very good footballing team and they’re playing well. And sometimes you just have to applaud six wins on the bounce, and even before that they had four wins when the manager came in. So it’s an incredible run of form and that’s what changes the face of it, slightly.
“We’ve had our run, and we had a run last season of similar veins, and sometimes you say ‘well done,’ and understand they’re going to be a difficult opponent.”
As for whether dropping down to second adds another layer of pressure, the City boss said: “No, I don’t think so. It depends how you want to frame it. If you want to frame it that we were 17th when we came in a year ago and we got to fifth. This season we’ve been first a lot and now we’re second, and we’re fighting two points behind and all that. It’s a positive for this football club, where we are.
“People are comparing the pressures of being top and being second but, in football, it’s just what it is. So it’s important that the lads are just focused on us. We’ve shown ourselves to be a very good team this season in the league, and we need to bring that version of ourselves on Monday.”
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Asked whether being second and chasing rather than being top and being the chased could work in City’s favour, he said: “Who knows? I understand the point, we talk about different pressures, whether you’re first or second. Those pressures are great. If you’d have offered me first or second as a pressure at the start of the season I’d have bitten your hand off.
“Our form was really amazing in the first half of the season and now Boro have gone into the similar sort of form that we were in and we’ve come off it a bit. So I’m less worried about comparing pressures all the time and more worried about the week’s training, the group that we’ve got and how we approach this game.”
He added: “Is this a must win? No, because there’s 14 others afterwards. Do we want to win it? Absolutely, yes, and we have to give everything to try and do that.”
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