"I would love to know" - Mark Robins questioned for Coventry City player decision | OneFootball

FLW's Coventry City fan pundit cannot understand why Liam Kitching's minutes were limited earlier this season.

This article is part of Football League World's 'Terrace Talk' series, which provides personal opinions from our FLW Fan Pundits regarding the latest breaking news, teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…

Coventry City defender Liam Kitching has been key for the Sky Blues during their excellent run of form under Frank Lampard.

The 25-year-old joined Coventry from Barnsley in the summer of 2023, and was a regular feature in Mark Robins' side that finished ninth in the Championship and reached the semi-final of the FA Cup last season.

However, he made just five league appearances this term before Robins was sacked in November, which in hindsight may have been a contributing factor in Coventry's early-season struggles.

Lampard was appointed to replace Robins at the end of November, and while he didn't bring Kitching into the side immediately, the centre-back has now started every game in the Championship since the draw away at Cardiff City on New Year's Day.

Kitching even wore the captain's armband during the Sky Blues' victory over Queens Park Rangers last month, highlighting just how much his new manager now trusts him.

Robins questioned for Kitching decision

We asked our Coventry fan pundit, Chris Deez, which player has surprised him the most this season, whether that be positively or negatively, and he pointed to Robins' decision to drop Kitching during the early months of the campaign.

"I think the player that has surprised me the most this season is probably Liam Kitching," said Chris.

"It is not fully his fault that he has surprised me. It was the fact that he basically did not play this season until Frank Lampard came in, even though Robins loved him the season before.

"He started every game, he was a really good defender for us, he was a really good signing, and then, for whatever reason, he fell out of favour completely with Robins.

"Robins made a lot of strange decisions early on this season, like bringing in Oliver Dovin for £1.2 million and then swapping goalkeepers every two weeks, and he was nearly the player that I chose for this as my most surprising player of the season, but no, Kitching has been a really weird one.

"Under Lampard he has been brilliant, he has played every game and Lampard quite clearly loves him.

"It has been a really strange one. He has not surprised me with his quality at all, because we saw plenty of that last season. I would love to know what exactly it was that happened that made him just be unceremoniously dropped from out of nowhere."

Kitching will hope he can repay Lampard's faith with promotion

Kitching has started each of the last 10 games in the Championship for Coventry, during which they have picked up 24 points from a possible 30 and propelled themselves into the play-off places.

Their win away at Oxford United on Saturday made it eight wins in nine league games for the first time in over 55 years, so Kitching's return to the side on a consistent basis has clearly had a positive impact.

Lampard has experience of guiding a team into the Championship play-offs, having reached the final with Derby County at the end of the 2018/19 campaign, and Kitching will no doubt hope that he can repay his manager's faith by helping him go one better with Coventry this time around.