Coventry City star told he has ‘incredible combination’ of unique skills ahead of Championship play-off second leg

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Coventry City will have to win away to Sunderland if they are to have any chance of making the play-off final this season under Frank Lampard.

Cov and Sunderland have a bitter rivalry but Frank Lampard knows the pressure is on after a disappointing first game. However, Lampard’s side still have hope in the reverse fixture.

The second leg gets underway tomorrow night and, somewhat unsurprisingly, the supercomputer believes Sunderland have a much greater chance than Coventry of securing their place at Wembley.

Lampard has experience of being underdogs for a second leg with Derby County in that famous play-off game against Leeds United, however, and that could be vital at the Stadium of Light on Tuesday night.

• READ MORE: Frank Lampard can match his own Championship play-off record, Coventry City must maintain Premier League dream

Jack Rudoni praise emerges from EFL expert Ali Maxwell

Haji Wright has scored four times against Sunderland this season, but the Coventry striker was non-existent on Friday. In part, that was due to the fact that the Sunderland backline defended like demons.

Of the six goals they have scored across their three meetings, the other player to bag at all is Jack Rudoni. He notched an equaliser on Friday and was one of Coventry’s most impressive players yet again.

Rudoni was earmarked as one to watch prior to the first game and he has already scored at the Stadium of Light this season. EFL expert Ali Maxwell of the Not The Top 20 podcast believes Rudoni is one of the most unique players in the division.

Matt Watts asked: “Rudoni stealing in with his seventh goal in his last 11 games — his sixth header of the season as well. He’s a really interesting profile of player, isn’t he?”

Maxwell responded: “He really is and when you watch what he does, which I would sum up quickly as pretty much everything. 

“In terms of wanting to get on the ball and receive the ball from his defensive midfielders through the lines, wanting to move the ball out wide and combine out wide — generally out on the right-hand side with [Milan] van Ewijk and [Tatsuhiro] Sakamoto.

“That triangle of players is unbelievably difficult to stop if they’re all combining. They all have different ways of getting crosses in. But then somehow, Rudoni, as well as doing all that, finds himself arriving late into the box and timing his run to get on the end of a lot of crosses.

“It’s an incredible combination and I can’t think of many Championship players — or even ones off the top of my head from the last few years — that combine both of those things. It is genuinely amazing.”

He added: “And it was such an exciting few minutes, wasn’t it? You’re still catching your breath from that Sunderland breakaway goal. Sunderland, having defended all of those crosses from the right, all of Sakamoto’s balls in, all of van Ewijk’s balls in — that is a bit of a numbers game, crossing.

“You can defend your box unbelievably well and you can pack it with defensive players as they did and that was what repelled most of them. But it is a numbers game. 

“And, sometimes, if it is a certain delivery, a certain flight of the ball, and a certain timing of a late run that’s hard to pick up, there’s not a lot you can do.”

• READ MORE: Coventry City’s Championship play-offs record is brief but bitter, now they can make up for 2022/23 heartbreak

Jack Rudoni’s first season at Coventry City could not have gone much better

Lampard has been ‘tremendously’ brilliant since joining Coventry, but Rudoni’s dream was to play under the Chelsea legend; it’s clear to see why as well when there are such similarities in their game when crashing the box or connecting play.

The 23-year-old has been in good form all season, with both Lampard and Mark Robins, as illustrated by the fact only five players had more than his 21 goal involvements in the Championship’s regular season.

He is a match-winner and a difference-maker in a multitude of ways, as outlined by Maxwell. Should Coventry find a way back into the tie, there is a very high chance that Rudoni will be heavily involved in some capacity.

Rudoni is dynamic and multi-faceted, with his set-piece ability another string to his bow. He is one of the best players in the Championship and should not be playing second tier football in 2025/26. Rudoni is learning from his boyhood hero and improving all the time, too.