Coventry City 3 - West Bromwich Albion 2

Date:	Saturday 22nd November 2025
Competition:	Sky Bet Championship
Coventry: 6.5	(4-4-2) Rushworth, van Ewijk, Thomas, Kitching, Dasilva, Sakamoto (Kesler-Hayden, 90), Grimes, Torp (Allen, 80), Mason-Clark, Simms (Thomas-Asante, 73), Eccles (Rudoni, 81) Unused subs: Wilson, Bidwell, Latibeaudiere, Ángel Brau, Andrews
WBA: 5.0	(4-2-3-1) Griffiths 6.5, Campbell 4.9, Phillips 4.9, Mepham 4.6, Taylor 4.5 (Styles, 81 4.9), Molumby 1.8, Mowatt 4.8 (Diakité, 62 5.0), Johnston 7.5 (Iling-Junior, 46 4.5), Price 4.2, Grant 5.9 (Maja, 81 4.3), Heggebø 7.7 (Collyer, 62 5.1) Unused subs: Wildsmith, Bielik, Dike, Gilchrist Sent off: Molumby (49, Foul/2nd yellow) Manager: Ryan Mason 3.7
Scorers:	Eccles (41), Simms (56), Torp (61); Heggebø (32, 9)
Referee:	Andrew Kitchen 5.4
Attendance:	29,216 Home Fans 5.6 Away Fans 6.7

Submit your ratings for this game by clicking here:

Ratings submitted so far: 20

oshawabaggie:

I stayed up late to watch England's self-inflicted defeat by Australia and then got up early to watch Albion lose in similar fashion. Still, even with a two goal lead (and it probably should have been three), there was always a sense of inevitability about the result. Albion are a brittle team - flashes of brilliance, but always just one sloppy pass away from conceding.

We could blame Molumby, but I don't think the result would have been different even with eleven. I can't blame Mason either. We were positive in the first half and gave Coventry a scare. But the truth is, this is just an average squad, at best. Albion's decline since the heady days of Lukaku and Odemwingie has been steady, if not linear. We've had our moments, but bad prior management has taken its toll: we are a mid-table Championship club. That is not to say it will be that way forever, but I don't see us making the playoffs any time soon.

Nevertheless, Baggie till I die.

Ancient Baggie:

Taken in isolation losing by the odd goal away to league leaders isn't the worst result this season but the manner of the defeat from being 2nil up is a tough one to take.

We scored two really good goals and looked competitive in the first half and it looked like Masons game plan was working OK but from there a real lack of professionalism cost us dearly.

For me it's been a recurring theme all season we don't seem able to recognise and manage key moments in games, weather it's putting games to bed when we have the chances or seeing out important periods when we're in front. We switched off for their goal just before half time and then Molumby did what Molumby does and gets himself sent off. I'm guessing the knives will be out for Mason now and I think that's a shame because he's a half decent coach but the one thing he probably need's to do is get the Ferguson hairdryer out for a few of them. My fear is we don't win the next couple of games he'll be shown the door and we'll be back on the merry go round again. COYB

Brendan Clegg:

I can’t be the only one who is livid with that farcical result from such a strong position? It shouldn’t really be acceptable to chuck away a two goal lead at any level… this was really bad and so so frustrating because it was there for us to win. And the league table and points tally shows… even an average team capable of nicking draws and winning home games would be right up there. I maintain - our squad is so much better than our position even acknowledging how in transition we are.

The starting lineup was a bit - whatever. You could argue individuals across a load of positions but I thought the balance was enough. And I think it’s fair to say the opening 30 was great for an away performance. Horrible, gritty, pressing at the right time.

My negative from about the first 5 minutes was the cheapness in which we gave the ball away - calling out Price and Grant who were stupidly casual, and Taylor, Campbell and Phillips who really had to do better. You cannot control games if you cough up the ball as often as we do when there is a bit of pressure. It comes back to haunt you.

But we scored two brilliant goals that were all about MJ being lively and crossing smartly and calmly into dangerous zones, and Heggebø doing what we probably haven’t seen from him this season - almost ignoring the game around him and just hitting the six yard line with expectation that the ball would arrive, like an instinctive striker. They were two brilliant finishes that were a bit prime Maja-esque and deserved I thought.

By that point we were good for the lead although we’d allowed Cov too much of the ball by gifting in to them and got lucky that they’d hit the bar and scuffed a chance. As they ran out of ideas and were hitting speculative shots it felt like the route to victory via a halftime clean sheet and regroup was there.

However we conceded a criminal cheap goal awfully in timing and defensively … Grant and Taylor allowing a cross way way too easily when they were 2 v 1 and then a free header. One to make the blood boil, compounded by a stupid booking for Molumby which was ultimately caused by Mikey Johnston’s silly theatrics and rolling about when really, honestly, he was okay wasn’t he. I hate this in the modern game and I don’t blame Cov or the ref for getting on with it.

I thought after their first we were lucky to get to the break ahead but we did.

Much as Molumby is a moron, I can understand Mason not hooking him at half time provided he had the “don’t do anything stupid” chat, for continuity. I hope that chat happened but suspect it didn’t.

Instead SIJ came on for MJ which everyone thought was injury related but in the aftermath press conference Mason said was tactical which is either a bluff for the Blues game or probably a sackable offence in its own right.

We started the half okay before Molumby’s stupidity gave the referee an easy decision. Whilst his tug back was idiotic and gave us a big challenge I would point out that we were still 2-1 up and this is a crap league.

Mason did not react - he froze - and within about 15 minutes we were behind to a couple of avoidable goals from set plays that were nothing to do with being a man down but which came from situations because we had no plan or leadership. We wilted under little pressure and the players looked lost.

It was maddening that the subs we eventually made - to shut up shop - were probably the right ones to make at 2-1 up immediately after the sending off but by the time we made them we were 3-2 down and therefore were negatively inexplicable given we needed a goal.

Really clever coaching I’m sure probably had a textbook where you manage the 15 minute blocks and the spells but it was nonsense… we needed a goal and when a striker did come on it was Maja when, again arguably, Dike would have offered the percentages threat you need to level up when you’re outnumbered.

I don’t think we had a shot all half which at this level is truly abysmal even with 10 men,

For me, whilst Molumby should get a maximum fine, the buck stops with the head coach. He’s a rookie who had no idea what to do at 2-0 up, at half time or when we had a sending off. You can blame individuals for moments in games costing us but overall the results and table don’t lie - the guy is totally out of his depth and has to go this weekend.

I think he set the team up well and our raids in behind their advanced fullbacks showed an element of thought/analysis/gameplan that came off - but his in game management again fell woefully short. He needs to learn that and take the blows in a lower league in order to make a career out of it - but not at our level.

We will go nowhere under this guy - it’s obvious.

Griffiths - 7 I thought he made some good stops and collected crosses.
Campbell - 6 Defensively did a good job but his inclusions negatively impacts our ability to keep the ball.
Phillips - 5 was always in there challenging but we conceded 3 goals
Mepham - 5 is he really fit? Again, we conceded 3 goals.
Taylor - 4 Mattock-like! Had to block the cross for the first given Grant was covering his inside, didn’t even challenge the header for the 2nd, absolutely terrible on the ball.
Mowatt - 6 was doing okay, pressing and passing
Molumby - 4 was also doing okay but he’s just can’t be trusted and honestly is not so brilliant that we just need to accept this side of him
MJ - 7 Brave, 2 assists, a huge threat, would be an 8 were it not for the silly play-acting
Price - 5 Running and touch/quality there but the carelessness with the ball too often absolutely kills us
Grant - 7 I am his biggest critic. He ran his nuts off here and fought for everything. He showed great touches in spells. He engineered 2 break aways that were very similar situations to our goals but unfortunately lacked the same quality pass/cross on his left foot when Coventry were wide open.
Heggebø - 7 Was battling away but the encouraging thing was his movement for both goals… there have been 7 or 8 times this season where similar crosses from the right have been put in and he’s been nowhere near. Something maybe clicking?

SIJ - 5 Strange one and then in fairness to him within 5 mins what he’ll have been told to do went out of the window.
Collyer & Diakite - 6 I thought they steadied us a bit and helped us keep the ball better but wee brought on too late.
Styles - 6 energy, commitment, aggression
Maja - 5 Again surely this was one for Dike… or once we were a goal down with 10 to go, both of them?

The longer this goes on… the more time we are wasting. We might be in transition but we are shamefully under-achieving.

Probably the only thing more humiliating than getting walloped at Cov was to be 2-0 up and to then throw it away. An utter embarrassment.

The season is still just about salvageable if we act now.

Kev Buckley:

Molumby's red mist replaces the smoke from the fireworks.

Once the smoke from the pre-match entertainment fireworks had cleared, it was just about possible to discern a 442, with Campbell and Taylor coming back in, whilst Grant over on the left (where else?) forced Johnston over onto the right. Price was clearly up alongside Heggebø and Molumby partnered Mowatt in centre-mid. Ex-Albion man BTA, the division's top-scorer, no less, was rested, and on the bench for the Sky Blues.

Albion started brightly, with Johnston almost benefitting from a break down the left after Taylor, overlapping Grant, delivered a nice cross, but Mikey couldn't get a shot off.

A couple of minutes later and, as Coventry tried to dribble out past him, Johnston won the ball high up the field, then got a return pass from Price that allowed him to drive forwards before delivering a slide rule cross behind the defender but across the edge of the six-yard-box where Heggebø arrived to steer it in at the near post.

Heggebø would have butchered another chance, after Price had robbed the home side, by the time Coventry hit the corner of the post and bar and started to look more like table-toppers who didn't really need a give-away from Mepham, as Albion's passing out from the back started to look a bit suspect.

Mepham went down injured around this point - twenty-or-so - but, despite Bielik looking, for all the world, as though he was going to come on as a replacement, the former stayed on.

Five minutes later and Grant would gallop away but could only produce a cross that found none of the four who'd got up to support him.

Molumby got booked for a challenge that shouted out "extracting revenge", after Coventry failed to put the ball out to allow Johnston to get treatment after going down upfield, but within a minute, not only was the winger back on his feet, but he was once again setting up Heggebø with an almost identical cross to the opening goal, although this time, Heggebø let it run across his body and steered into the far side.

Sadly, Albion couldn't get to half-time with their two goal lead intact, Taylor and Grant allowing the Coventry right winger to deliver a cross that had Phillips spitting feathers in the direction of his left sided players, although the freedom that our central defenders gave to the beneficiary of that cross might suggest that it was the whole of our defence that had switched off, and not just the wide left players.

I've read a few comments that suggested that Molumby, on a yellow, should have been subbed at half-time, but would Mason have expected his enforcer to think that, because he was on a yellow, the referee wouldn't show him another yellow card for something as simple as tugging a player who'd gone past him, back - after all it's all part of the game, no?

As it was, Molumby ran out for the second-half, although Johnston, having provided both of our goals, was strangely replaced by Iling-Junior, although sadly, the referee would show Molumby a second yellow card for some "professionalism" after less than five minutes of the second half, and Albion were down to ten men against a home side who'd gone into the break on a high anyway.

Not all that sure how having eleven on the pitch might have affected the way that a Coventry player got in between our defenders for the glancing header equaliser, nor how it might have affected our defence's ability to properly clear a corner that ended up seeing the ball rifled home to give the home side the lead - and all this with still thirty to play, although Mason's response to the goal, bringing on Diakite and Collyer for Mowatt and Heggebø, whilst pushing Grant up top seemed a bit odd, given the latter's line leading showings in the past.

If anything, the double like-for-like switch, Styles for Taylor, and Maja for Grant, with ten to go, might suggest that the manager could have gone with Maja as the line leader all along, especially as Albion's ten-men, after the first double swap, didn't really trouble Coventry, who did, though, trouble Griffiths on a couple of occasions.

Having gone 2-0 up, this was a bad one to lose. Coventry look like they'll take points of most sides, so taking three off then would have been a big gain for us. As it is we're now in seventeenth, bottom of a ten-club grouping separated by just the three points that we gave up.

Cardiff Baggie:

Just a brief report on the Coventry game which I watched on Now TV.

I always look at this forum after Albion games. I'm a home STH holder only. I also usually find that I'm pretty much in 'sync' with Brendan's very detailed reports so in that context:

I thought the head coach's tactics in the first half were spot on for counter attacking football against one of the best sides in the Championship. As a result we were 2-0 up. Then, fairly typically we switched off/ball watched and allowed Coventry to score.

So at half-time we were 2-1 up but Molumby had already been booked for a reckless and needless foul in the corner. I say that as it seemed that the reason for him doing it was that an Albion player (MJ) was injured and the ref' had played on. As this wasn't a head injury I didn't have much issue with that and so not clear why Molumby did.

After half-time Molumby quite soon was given a second yellow (he has form for this) and we're down to 10 men. Coventry then seized the initiative and scored 2 goals to win 3-2.

I don't want to blame Ryan Mason for all of this. Every professional footballer on a yellow card has to bear in mind the result of a second poor challenge. They can't always be substituted to prevent the red mist.

I think we may still have lost the game with 11 players. I would have been happy with a draw. I don't think our present squad is much more than mid table in quality overall even though I do believe that we could beat any of the Championship teams on a good day. Take Isaac Price as an example and I'm a fan by the way. He seemed quite anonymous in the Coventry Game, why?

I do agree that our (and by definition the head coach's) game management needs to improve but it is too soon by far to be calling for his replacement. We have to ask ourselves why our last 4-5 coach's have struggled to extract consistent top six performances from Albion. Carlos Corberan came closest but why did Tony Mowbray have the problems that he did? The performance this time was far better than when we lost 2-0 to Coventry in April so I don't think our present coach is doing that badly. I appreciate that there are many that may disagree but just my opinion.