Frank Lampard is super again! How Chelsea legend has rebuilt battered reputation to put irresistible Coventry on course for Premier League promotion
Given Lampard is the highest-scoring midfielder in the history of the Premier League with a ridiculous 177 top-flight strikes to his name, it will come as very little surprise that an intensive attacking philosophy has been the backbone of his success so far this season.
A purposeful, possession-based approach has seen Coventry create more chances, have more shots and land more efforts on target than anyone else in the hyper-competitive 24-team second tier, and perhaps unsurprisingly that has resulted in them scoring a heap of goals – 27, to be precise, which is at least 12 more than anyone else in the division. That has seen them build up a ridiculous +20 goal difference after just nine games, thanks in no small part to a 7-1 dismantling of QPR and consecutive big wins over Birmingham, Millwall and Sheffield Wednesday.
It helps that the Sky Blues have three of the Championship’s current five top goal-scorers in their ranks: the USMNT’s Haji Wright, who leads the way overall with eight goals in nine games, and Brandon Thomas-Asante and Viktor Torp, who have both bagged five times so far. Meanwhile, right-back Milan van Ewijk has the joint-most assists in the league with five.
Lampard’s 4-2-3-1 shape seems to complement the personnel perfectly, with Asante-Thomas slotting in behind Wright and Torp contributing from a deeper, box-to-box role. All three are examples of how the manager has improved players, too, with Wright’s finishing and work-rate coming on leaps and bounds, Asante-Thomas successfully stepping in to cover for the injured Ephron Mason-Clark and Torp being far more effective going forward than last season.
