Huge claim made as Mark Robins told he took Coventry City as far as he could..
Mark Robins has been hailed as Coventry City’s best manager since club legend Jimmy Hill – but told he had probably taken the Sky Blues as far as he could.
Robins was sacked back in November after a nearly eight-year tenure in which the Sky Blues rose from League Two to the Championship – and were one game away from the Premier League in 2023 but for defeat in the second-tier play-off final.
He also guided Coventry to a controversial FA Cup semi-final defeat by Manchester United last season, but all that counted for little when he was dismissed after a poor start to the current season and was replaced by Frank Lampard.
Robins’ work in reviving an ailing Coventry has been acknowledged by one of his predecessors in the Sky Blues’ hot seat, Gordon Strachan, but the Scot also claims his time at the club was probably up anyway.
First a player and then for five years manager of the club, Strachan says of Robins: “Mark did such a brilliant job and people would say, ‘Why did he go or why did they make him go or whatever?’
“But even with Mark, when Adi Viveash, his right-hand man left, it was huge because that was one of the best partnerships in football. It might be one of those things where the dynamic shifted a wee bit.
“I think after getting to the FA Cup semi-final, nearly getting promotion, you can’t do any more than that. That was phenomenal, the performances. I have had that feeling before as a manager. You think, that’s as much as I can do. It all just felt inevitable when Viveash left.”
Viveash, Robins’ former assistant, made a shock departure from the club last summer, something referenced by club owner Doug King in explaining his reasons for sacking Robins.
Strachan added in an interview with Genting Casino: “They got beat in the play-offs the year before, they got beat in the semi-finals (of the FA Cup). That is magnificent for Coventry.
“I’ve got to say, I think he’s probably the best manager, apart from maybe Jimmy Hill, that Coventry have ever had. To keep doing it, going from playing at Northampton and Birmingham and nobody being there, the training ground might get sold, the players will get sold… to take them where he did, what an achievement.”
As for Lampard Strachan believes Robins’ record with Coventry means all the Chelsea legend can do at the CBS Arena to make his mark is take the club back to the Premier League.
