The 2023/24 Premier League season may be just a few weeks in, but managers at the bottom of the table are already starting to feel the heat. This also puts Championship club owners on red alert, as they don’t want the Premier League cherry-picking their prize assets.
One such club who might face a raid on their manager is Coventry City. City boss, Mark Robins has done an outstanding job, taking the Sky Blues from League 2 to the brink of the Premier League. But despite that, he’s rarely linked with a job when one becomes available in the Premier League.
Managers already under pressure
At the moment, Sean Dyche of Everton and Paul Heckingbottam of Sheffield United are the two favourites in the latest betting to be the next English Premier League manager to leave. A bet on football for Dyche is 9/4, and Heckingbottom is 9/2. Both men have been favourites for most of the season, so if either goes soon, it won’t be a shock. A betting calculator can help you work out what the odds mean when it comes to money.
If either of those two managers were to lose their job anytime soon, the chances are that Everton would go for a big name. But Sheffield United are the sort of club who could come knocking for Robins. So Coventry should be prepared.
BREAKING: Coventry manager Mark Robins has agreed a new four-year contract with the club 🤝 pic.twitter.com/c5TxCuvDGB
— Sky Sports News (@SkySportsNews) May 17, 2023
Why does Robins continually go under the radar?
With Coventry City coming so close to returning to the Premier League last season, the stock of manager Mark Robins has never been so high. But Coventry City fans know how good Robins is. They don’t mind that he always seems to go under the radar. But it is a mystery why it continually happens.
Congratulations to Sky Blues boss Mark Robins, who has tonight been named LMA League One Manager of the Year for 2019/20! 🙌 #PUSB pic.twitter.com/9jBjWhMuVH
— Coventry City (@Coventry_City) July 27, 2020
If anything, the Sky Blues’ appearance at Wembley has raised the profile of Mark Robins. All of a sudden his achievements were in the public eye, and that will have caught the attention of plenty of prospective employers in the top flight.
Robins the diplomat
Mark Robins spent years trying to walk the tightrope between the club’s fans and the club’s previous owners, who it’s fair to say were loathed by the fans. Trying to keep the fans and the owners happy, whilst not looking like being on either side of the argument was an almost impossible job, yet Robins somehow managed it.
Managing with one arm tied behind his back
The situation at Coventry City over recent years was not only hard from a financial point of view but politics and brinkmanship also played a big part.
The Sky Blues spent a season away from their home ground playing in Birmingham at St Andrews. The club’s previous owners seemed to be in an endless dispute with the owners of Coventry’s home stadium, the CBS Arena and talk of building a new ground.
There was rarely certainty in the past, and at times, Robins must have felt like he was managing with one arm tied behind his back. Despite the lack of certainty, Robins still produced results on the pitch, and still somehow kept the club moving forwards.
No longer a big secret
The Wembley appearance last May shone a light on what Robins has achieved at Coventry City. And the chances are that the next time a Premier League job becomes available, Robins will no longer be under the radar.
