Mark Robins felt Norwich City targeted Coventry’s Tatsuhiro Sakamoto yet again in the Canaries’ 1-0 Championship away win, and accused on-loan defender Callum Doyle of ‘leaving a bit’ on his Japanese international.
The one-time Norwich striker was convinced his old club deliberately targeted winger Sakamoto in the reverse league fixture at Carrow Road last season.
Robins was adamant there was more of the same served up in Saturday lunchtime’s defeat for his Sky Blues.
Former Coventry and now Norwich loanee Doyle produced a full-blooded first half sliding tackle on Sakamoto that saw the winger replaced at the interval, and later pictured leaving the CBS Arena with his left ankle in a protective boot.
“A 1-0 defeat always hurts me,” said Robins. “We lost the game at Carrow Road last year and I wasn’t happy about that, because of the nature of it. We were doing alright, had a man sent off, and then the way that we ended up getting Tatsu injured after the way it happened last season. They targeted him last season. Different manager, same outcome.
“I wasn’t particularly happy with us and how we responded because we have to do exactly the same to opponents because nothing happens to the opponent. Doyle has left one of Tatsu, hurt his ankle, and absolutely nothing happens. It is just par for the course. It is not right. We have to get nasty.
“Tatsu has done his ankle. It is in a boot so we have to wait and see how it settles down. That for me is the disappointment, that we didn’t take the game by the scruff of the neck.”
Robins sought to address the rising expectation levels around the promotion-chasers.
“We’re desperate to have a really good team in this division, because that is the only way you can make the step,” he said. “If it gets away from us then so be it. But that will be because people have lost all sense of reality. We have to keep calm.
“We looked a bit nervy, we certainly didn’t run hard enough. There were times we didn’t get it right with the press. We haven’t got that confidence to put it right on the pitch at the moment.
“We are talking about front-football but we have to be really careful here. We have put a group of players together who are really talented but we have to turn them into a team.
“The league season is a long one and you get ups and downs but if the support are in the mode where they have been told, ‘this is the season’ you have to be really careful, because otherwise the wheels can come off. That is not an excuse but a reason to keep grounded.”
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