Frank Lampard Gives Lastest Coventry City Injury Blow And Makes Jack Rudoni Position Changes 

Frank Lampard believes Jack Rudoni can still be a major influence for Coventry City as he deputises for the injured Ephron Mason-Clark.

Lampard admits the £5m summer signing is currently “having to do a job” on the left for the team in the absence of Mason-Clark, who suffered a hamstring strain against Plymouth on Boxing Day and is facing a number of weeks on the sidelines.

Rudoni has played there in the last two matches and looks set to do so again when the Sky Blues face Norwich City in the Championship on Saturday (3pm). And Lampard is in no doubt he can continue to be a key figure in that role.

Speaking at his pre-match press conference on Friday, Lampard said: “For me he can play different positions because of his level. He is a fantastic player, and he has a high ceiling for me.

“Of course, when he plays on the left, he maybe doesn’t open up as many opportunities as we’ve seen him score this season.

“At the moment he is a player who is having to do a job for us, and it can affect the balance of the team and that was one of the issues in the first half against Cardiff, so we have to be creative and find ways around it.”

Coventry are in 14th place in the Championship after a 1-1 draw with Cardiff City last time out. Addressing their league position, Lampard, who has overseen three wins, three draws and two defeats in his first eight matches in charge, added: “It’s a squad that has changed in the last couple of seasons. We’ve seen that from the outside, reaching the play-off final and there are minimal players left who played in that game who are in the squad now.

“In that slightly transitional phase, it’s probably normal that you look and go ‘we want to be better than where we are’. The reality is that and we have to work and us as coaching staff we have to work, and the players themselves have to and they’re quite a young squad.

“We’re eight games in and it’s good for me to starting to see more from them as we’ve played, because training time has been very minimal because we’ve had a tight turnaround since we’ve been in.

“That’s been challenging in the sense that you see players in game, because a game like Cardiff is like a training session in the first half where you don’t like it so much and you want to correct it, but that’s the game, so those are the things happening at the minute.

“Our league position is a reality, and we want to improve it that’s for sure, but that will only come with work.”