Frank Lampard blasts Norwich City’s underhand tactics as Coventry City drop points

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Coventry City drew 1-1 with Norwich City, leaving the Sky Blues boss unimpressed with their opposition.

Plentiful goals were expected to flow from Championship top scorers Coventry on Saturday afternoon, but Frank Lampard had to wait till the last moments of added time to see his side score.

Coventry dominated possession against Norwich, but the Canaries’ £6.9m summer signing Mathias Kvistgaarden opened the scoring for Liam Manning’s visitors after 17 minutes.

With the game heading for a Norwich win, Haji Wright scored in the sixth minute of nine added on for stoppages to secure a comeback draw for the Sky Blues.

After the game, Lampard lamented the underhand tactics employed by Manning, which infuriated the home supporters.

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Frank Lampard ‘frustrated’ by Norwich City underhand tactics

Lampard backed Wright to challenge Josh Sargent ahead of the affair, and the Sky Blues boss got his wish with the USMNT star enduring a quiet afternoon as his international teammate slotted home the equaliser.

Throughout the game, Norwich players went down claiming injuries and employed other ‘dark arts’ to try and see out the win at the CBS Arena.

Unfortunately for Manning, his side’s efforts came to no avail after Wright poked home from close range following calamitous defending from the Canaries’ backline.

After the game, Lampard lamented Manning’s underhand tactics. He told Coventry Live: “It is frustrating, but it is football.

“So it’s for the referee to deal with, not us, and I thought we kept our heads very well, to keep playing and to not get overly frustrated because some things were pretty clear today, what was going on.”

Lampard added: “I thought it was the least we deserved. We played fantastic, absolutely fantastic against a good team.

“Norwich are a very good team in this league; good players, recruited in the summer, a good coach and we dominated every part of the game.

“Of course they get their goal and some breakaway moments but they were very rare. But everything we wanted out of our team we did.

“We had 28 shots, most of the possession and expected goals, all that stuff, and it was absolutely the least we deserved.”

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Milan van Ewijk moment epitomised Coventry City spirit

With the game heading towards a win for Norwich, Lampard largely had full-back Milan van Ewijk to thank for the equaliser despite Wright’s name being on the scoresheet.

In the final minutes, the marauding van Ewijk made a gut-busting run up Coventry’s right flank, firing a low cross which was intercepted by Norwich centre-back Harry Darling.

However, the Dutchman did not give up and immediately won the ball back off Darling before he could clear it with a full-blooded but fair sliding tackle, which fell into the path of Ellis Simms.

Simms fired at Norwich keeper Vladan Kovacevic, who earned player of the match for his outstanding outing, with the ricochet falling perfectly to Wright.

“It was going to take something like that today”, Lampard said of Coventry’s equaliser.

“If they’re going to defend with a lot of numbers, and that’s fine. They would say they defended their box well and it’s hard to score sometimes when they’re blocking, and credit to them and all those things.

“But our build-up play to keep getting in there and sustaining higher attacks and winning it back and going again was brilliant.

“So we were all disappointed because of it but we have to understand it. Sometimes it doesn’t go your way, as I’ve been trying to explain, and we take out from the performance how we want to play.

“This is what we want us to be, and if we can continue with that, then we’ll win games like that much more often than not.”