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Opinion: Blues performance against Coventry is a big indicator of how much work there is to do

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I don’t think it was quite meant to be this difficult.

But at the end of the day, we managed to get through by hook or by crook, and that’s really all that matters, we’ll deal with the apparent horror of the next round when we come to it.

The Blues managed to scrape through against League One side Coventry City in the F.A Cup last night, ending up 4-1 winners in a penalty shootout after finishing 2-2 following extra time.

And even though they struggled against a side in a lower division to them, Pep Clotet seemed to be more pleased with the performance than he was with the result. Speaking to the club website after the game, he pointed out that their ability to bounce back was something he really enjoyed:

“The one thing we did have tonight, which has been common all season, is the ability to work hard and believe in ourselves until the end. Today we got rewarded, we came back twice to take the game to a penalty shoot-out. And that’s turned into our favour; we are very happy tonight.”

Which is all well and good, but when it comes against a League One side, that’s when alarm bells need to start ringing. And whilst he later talked about having to rotate the squad a bit with Bristol City coming up on Friday night, it wasn’t as if the squad was completely threadbare, there were a number of first-team players that started the game.

The fact is that the Blues got lucky last night, having to be bailed out not once, but twice by late goals, one of them we still don’t know if it was a cross or a shot.

Hopefully this game served as a bit of a warning to him, that after the high that was beating high-flying Nottingham Forest on Saturday, to then come crashing down to reality by scraping past a League One side shows that there is still plenty of work to do.

Did the Blues get lucky against Coventry?

Yes

No

Whether it be in terms of personnel, or his style of play, something has got to change as he makes plans for the future, and there’s no better time to start implanting it than right now whilst the Blues aren’t in a relegation battle yet.

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