Frank Lampard stood in front of the Coventry fans in Singers’ Corner and, as is becoming quite the tradition, repeatedly punched the air with his fist to roars that grew louder and louder.
An eighth straight home league win, after a tight Boxing Day affair against Swansea, for the first time since the Sixties. Eight points clear at the top of the Championship. Another step closer to a return to the Promised Land nearly 25 years in the waiting.
For a manager so many were keen to write off after his stints at Everton and Chelsea, Lampard continues to prove he’s got the knack for this management lark after all. His side has blown teams away this season and now they they’re grinding out results too.
The visit of third-placed Ipswich on Monday night now provides a fitting benchmark at the halfway point of the season, not just for the chance to put further daylight between a promotion rival, and get some revenge for a 3-0 defeat at Portman Road three weeks ago, but also because the Tractor Boys are perhaps the side whose journey back from the depths is the one Coventry are so close to emulating.
Ipswich know what it’s like to spend more than 20 years outside the Premier League. They know what it’s like, too, to crash through the leagues and be plunged into administration along the way. But they also know what it’s like to come through it all again on the other side.
Coventry defender Luke Woolfenden was part of that Ipswich side that earned back-to-back promotions from League One to the Premier League before joining the Sky Blues on deadline day this summer. He sees the similarities.
‘We’re all together and that was the big, big thing I had at Ipswich, the strength of the group and how everyone bought into going in the same direction,’ Woolfenden tells Daily Mail Sport.
That togetherness has become one of the cornerstones of Lampard’s success. He’s spent hours doing one-to-one sessions with Jack Rudoni, an attacking midfielder in his own mould. It’s why he knew the best thing to do, after a tricky run of results, was to give the players Christmas Day off. ‘If we lose [against Swansea], people probably have a pop at him,’ says Woolfenden. ‘He’s got it down to a T what the group needs. He knows he can trust us as men to do the right thing.’
No one is mentioning the P word, though. ‘I can’t say I’ve spoken to anyone about getting promoted or we’re this many points clear,’ he adds. ‘It’s never really something you sit and talk about.’ The fans are still singing it, mind.
Unlike Ipswich, who romped straight from League One to the Premier League, heartbreak helps fuel Coventry’s promotion bid. Just two years after Coventry lost in the play-off final on penalties to Luton under former boss Mark Robins, Dan Ballard’s 123rd-minute header in the semi-finals last season sent Sunderland through at Coventry’s expense.
‘I’ve spoke to a few of the lads about it,’ says Woolfenden. ‘To be honest, they talk about it in kind of a fond way. It’s a negative for what they went through but it makes you stronger as a group because you’ve gone through that pain.’
Only once in Championship history has a side enjoyed a larger gap on the play-off pack at the halfway point than the 13-point buffer Coventry now enjoy. That was Reading in 2005-06 and they finished on 106 points. Coventry are only the second Championship side, after Wolves in 2008-09, to have reached a half-century of both points and goals at this stage. They went up as champions as well.
Lampard knows he must first traverse the January window. His squad is stretched. Top scorer Brandon Thomas-Asante has a hamstring injury, centre-back Jay Dasilva is serving a three-match ban and a flu bug has torn through the camp in recent weeks. Add to that the possibility of circling sharks.
Premier League strugglers West Ham have already expressed interest in strike duo Haji Wright and Ellis Simms while Coventry are said to have put an eye-watering price tag of £200million on the former as a way of making it clear he’s not for sale.
‘I can’t speak for everyone about what’s going to happen in the transfer window because everyone’s got different motives in life, but, as a group, I can say that so far nothing is affecting us,’ says Woolfenden. ‘We’ve taken every day as it comes and that’s standing us in good stead.’