Blackburn Rovers 1-1 Coventry City

Whatever we do, don't go down to 10-men after 14 minutes and we should be able to compete with, and beat, Blackburn.

This mentality likely empowered such a bright opening for Coventry with a couple of chances and promising forward play. The wingback of McCallum was the main threat. Just 17 seconds in and McCallum is high and behind Elliot in the channel. The resulting cross flashes off of the bar. A second one minutes later hits the side net. The strength in formation versus a back four on full display.

As Coventry then nullified any Blackburn attack, the result was winning possession deeper and abandoning any attempt to play out. A lay off from James allows Kelly to send it long looking for the strikers. Note the other outlet, McCallum is so deep from defending that he can't get forward. Coventry turned the ball over 26 times total in this game.

Blackburn began to get into the game as they condensed the field. You can see Ostigard on the ball being forced inside and into the Blackburn midfield three. The resulting pass was picked off and a reminder of the fragile back-line being exposed in poor possession moments. This adjustment for Blackburn meant Coventry could only play predictably wide or long.

The final spur of Coventry's momentum in this first half came from the opportunistic hunting of Biamou. Braithwaite is under pressure and eventually fouls Biamou for a Coventry freekick in a promising position. Note the lack of support under the ball.

The same impression here, as Biamou sheilds the ball later in the game, but with no support. A trend for any of Coventry's strikers this season.

A trend for Coventry has been to defend in a 5-3. Mowbray mentioned a lot of teams have done this to them, and given the threat of players like Armstrong and Elliot, it would make sense. However, you can see the image on the left from the game today at 1-0, and also from the Swansea game. The same organization for Coventry.