Conor Coventry
I only just noticed that Conor Coventry was a (very) late call up to the Republic of Ireland’s squad for the game against England at Wembley yesterday. He was an unused sub.
Coventry qualifies for the Republic through his Mum and actually holds the record for their most capped player at U21 level making 28 appearances.
In fact up until recently he had more Ireland caps than had made league appearances!
Congratulations to Conor, and hopefully he gets his first senior cap at the next go-around. The Republic need to dig deep to find players if they are to ever reach the heights of the era I grew up in.
In a red shirt Coventry confuses me. He is the archetypical player who you just don’t notice, but not always in a bad way.
He appears to read the game well, can make interceptions and holds the ball, but he just seems very limited in terms of forward play.
He rarely ever plays a pass further than five yards or forwards. I don’t see him as a team driver or a leader and it does not surprise me that he only has one senior goal to his name.
The explanation to that could be that he is a dead ball expert, but let’s be honest the evidence does not point to that, in fact his delivery at a range of set-pieces has been woeful at best.
I don’t see him as one of our problems, and we look to have many, but to me Conor doesn’t provide any solutions to our current situation either.
Before the naysayers pipe up, Coventry is no George Dobson, although Dobbo does have about 250 more games under his belt.
Maybe surrounded by better players Coventry will excel, but I have to say I’ve been disappointed since he signed, and confused to what assets he brings.
A lot of fans have already decided to make him scapegoat player of the year.
I think we’re rather spoilt for choice from that perspective.
issue is he cannot create or score goals , like most of our midfield!
We’ve lacked midfield creativity all season, sure he shouldn’t be taking corners, free-kicks or trying to pick out a pass in the final third – that should be the job of a number 8/10 or just someone who can do that job. If we had that player then he could do what he does best – screen the centre-backs, disrupt our opponents in midfield, intercept through balls and lay off some simple passes to someone who could do something more creative. Too many people are judging him on the job he shouldn’t be doing.
We’ve got a good dead ball taker (for our level) in the shape of Terry Taylor. But the Messiah wouldn’t play him until we had so many injuries he was forced to.