Mark Robins’ eye-catching Coventry deserve their headlines, Liverpool have a bargain in Andrew Robertson and Wolves are already good enough for top flightAmid all the hoopla over the departing Mark Hughes, it is right to take a moment to praise Coventry City. They were deserved winners of the third-round tie at the Ricoh Arena, despite giving up the greater number of chances to the visitors. The Sky Blues played with a determination and energy you might expect of a team assuming the David role in a Goliath encounter. But they were also calm on the ball and often quite cute on it, too. Their play was all the more striking, given the starting XI had an average age of 24...
The Premier League champions visit in the FA Cup on Saturday but Norwich’s main concern after upheaval on and off the pitch is to get back to the top flight before the parachute payments stopAre Norwich City having a bad season? It seems hard to argue they are having a good one; after 26 games they are 13th in the Championship, nine points off the play-offs, one place and two points behind Ipswich Town. Next up, the not altogether welcoming prospect of Chelsea in the FA Cup on Saturday.Lowlights include a run of eight matches without a win from October to December, a 4-0 mauling at Millwall, defeats at Carrow Road by Sunderland and Brentford and only 14 home goals,...
James Maddison struck the only goal as Norwich City won 1-0 at Ipswich Town to stretch their unbeaten sequence against their East Anglian rivals to nine matchesMick McCarthy walked into the Ipswich press room an hour after full-time, cup of tea in hand, and offered to avoid wasting anyone’s time. “If someone asks me, ‘Am I disappointed with that result?’ then I’m out of here, right?” he threatened. “I’ve just done interviews and been asked the most senseless questions.”He was generous enough to hang around but in any case Norwich City had already provided the afternoon’s most pertinent answers. Their hold over the East Anglian derby in the last decade might have come from nowhere but it is total: this...
Middlesbrough have spent heavily in the chase for an immediate return to the Premier League while Aston Villa lead the Midlands challenge with John TerryOver a long summer it has been difficult to get away from the usual faces at the same select few clubs – none more so than that of the Middlesbrough chief executive, Neil Bausor, who has been pictured with a beaming smile time and again alongside new arrivals at the Riverside. Related: Gary Rowett: ‘We’re trying to take away feeling we’ve a right to be up there because we’re Derby’ Related: League One 2017-18 season preview | Lawrence Ostlere Continue reading...
Plymouth’s defence was classy and defiant, Ndidi excelled on Leicester debut, Batshuayi proved little and Stourbridge showed romance is alive, even in defeatThe triumphant celebrations after Plymouth Argyle’s 0-0 draw at Anfield were further confirmation that giant-equalling is the new giantkilling. In the modern world of the FA Cup, it is enough for David to draw with Goliath – especially as it means a second payday for clubs often in need of such a financial boost. For Plymouth’s players, it was about more than that. It’s easy to be sniffy about their ultra-defensive approach against the youngest team in Liverpool’s history, but most League Two teams would not have been good enough to pull it off. Plymouth defended with such...