If you can't be bothered to stay up late to watch Ray on Late Kick Off tonight (BBC1 11.35pm), you can watch it here..

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=314597566265&ref=nf

To summarise - he's careful with money, Westwood is probably going to go in the summer and he now believes we're beginning to see the fruits of our labour.

Nothing particularly new to Coventry fans thanks to Ian Winter's linear questioning (the finances), but still worth a peek.

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21 days into the month, I felt compelled to comment on February so far. It's been alright hasn't it?

Since the Blackpool game (when we were all questioning Coleman's motives and ambition) there's been a noticeable shift in attitude around the club. While Coleman spent January talking down our prospects, the talk this month has changed and there's far more determination and belief about our performances too. 

The interviews going into the Forest game were particularly refreshing, as they were all I'd been hoping to hear the entire season. Oggy obviously realised that cowering and pandering to teams in pre-match interviews was only giving them the advantage, so came out with some fighting talk. Nothing crazy, but just enough to make everyone realise that we weren't going into it playing for a draw for once. And the players appeared to respond, because we ended up putting in our best performance of the season. In the words of Richie Bernau, "marvellous stuff there".

And with 10 points out of a possible 15, it seems we've now told losses and draws to bugger off (in the main) and realised that wins are far better. 

Crystal Palace 0-1 Coventry 
Newcastle 4-1 Coventry
Coventry 1-0 QPR
Coventry 1-0 Nottm Forest
Bristol City 1-1 Coventry

The most telling thing recently is that while we've continued to take the lead in every single game, we're now managing to show some steel and get the points from the games too. Here's a stat; we've taken the lead 19 times in the league this season.. Newcastle have taken the lead in 20. To me, that can't be just a fluke. I'm just glad that we're now starting to believe in ourselves and realising that with some organisation and positive tactics, we can actually beat these teams.

Just to reiterate the relative unimportance of draws. You see how we lost to Newcastle (as everyone is), then beat Palace a few days later, having gone for the win in both games? How many people would have taken 2 draws before those? We all would have wouldn't we, mainly cos it sounds good - 2 games unbeaten blah blah.

Fact it though, it's all about 3 points in the Championship. Ipswich will tell you that. They've lost far less than anyone else in the bottom half, but they're still fighting a relegation battle, simply because they've drawn too many.

A loss followed by a win will always leave you better off. 3 points plays 2.

I'm just mighty glad to see the attitude has changed recently, and unsurprisingly this has coincided with decent a climb up the table.

We just need to guard against complacency though, that's our biggest enemy. We had that great run last February, and we all started talking about play-offs. But that soon fell apart, so we need to make sure we maintain the same levels of positivity, concentration, determination and effort so we can finish the season on a high.

We're playing the bottom 3 in the next 3 games - we couldn't ask for a better opportunity to really thrust ourselves up the league even more. 

I know we're often scared to talk about winning runs because we've been burnt before, but I think it's time the players and manager forgot about guarding against failure and go for it. Like we always say, if they at least give it a go, we'll be happy with that. What we don't want is negative interviews, tactics and targets of mediocre league finishes. They simply don't work for us.

We're not the finished article but you don't take the lead in 19 games (21 if you count the cups) if you're a bad team, do you?

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Has been confirmed on the official website.

Best completes Magpies move

I doubt we'll get to hear the details of what we've received for him. You have to remember we paid a decent sum to bring him to club, and he's become a full Republic of Ireland international in that time.

A tribunal would have seen us get far more than the £500k that it's rumoured we received for him. I'm sure of that.

We've lost him on deadline day, with no sign of a replacement coming in and seemingly minimal compensation.

And on a separate note, his farewell to the club turned out to be a crescendo of undeserved boos, even given how vital he's been for us this year.

I reckon we're going to miss him.

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Very difficult to believe our manager actually set out at home to achieve a draw against the mighty Barcepool. He bloody well did though.

Following on from praising Swansea to the rafters and dismissing ourselves as a bunch of talentless prats (not in so many words), Coleman's build up to this game again focused on how the team that he's spent 2 years creating is actually no bleeding good at playing football, so we're just going to try well hard at kicking things and hope we get a clean sheet from the match. (Again, reading between the lines).

That's really going to install confidence in the team isn't it? He seems to forget that we'd won 3 league games in a row at the Ricoh, and were playing a Blackpool side who'd only won once in their last 5 so were hardly setting the league on fire.

Quite obviously, this never came into his thinking. This was best demonstrated by him deciding to persist with a formation from the Playing-away-at-Old-Trafford Handbook.

Leon Best got the nod to play up front. On occasions, you hope that a 4-5-1 formation will turn itself more into a 4-3-3. Listening to our manager prior to the match, the focus was very much on our one and only striker doing "a lot of unselfish running with no reward".

What this means in real terms is that our lone striker, in a home fixture (i.e. the one person who you'd really want to be selfish and being on the end of all the chances we would create) was being told that his job was not to bang them in the net - but to perform Coleman's favourite move; run around like a lunatic leaving no-one in the box.

Annoyingly, Best chose Saturday to have one of his most ineffective games of the season, so we didn't even get the lunatic side of things.

The first half was bad. None of the attacking players (and I use the term loosely) seemed to have a clue about where they were supposed to be playing. All except Bell that is, who impersonated a life-size table football man for the first 20 minutes of the match. This was essentially him patrolling an area no bigger than a pair of Jay Tabb's pants.

A slight ray of light was Carl Baker, who was at least trying to link up the midfield and attack in a hoof-less way. Chances fell to McIndoe and Best early on, but neither could finish. Even Baker was far too tentative though. Throwing him into the middle of the park and asking him to dictate the play of a Championship match seemed to be a bit too much.

For a team that has supposedly been working on making it hard for the opposition to create, we didn't do a very good job of hassling Blackpool. They looked confident, and stroked the ball around us with ease. While they were doing what all footballers are taught at the first day of football school (passing), our boys were playing as if they'd had that side of the game trained out of them. Every pass seems to be an effort to us this season. There's no eagerness to get onto the ball, and when we do get it, we soon run out options and end up giving it a way. I'd suggest this is a by-product of spending all our time focusing on how the opposition might hurt us, rather than looking at how we might attack them.

The second half should have been a different story. Again, Blackpool were the more attacking, with young Villa prat Barry Bannan looking like an absolute world beater for them. Then again, you could put Paul Trollope against Stephen Wright and I think he'd come out of it looking good. Unfortunately, while I'm making a joke of it, Bannan really was brilliant.

But things should have all changed when Ormerod got his marching orders for supposedly belting Gunny. Now, I didn't see it, but if our own player has to go off because of it, and our own fans around that bit say that he's been whacked - I for one believe them. I hear Blackpool have concocted about 4 different versions of what happened, but a bit of solidarity wouldn't go amiss from certain quarters (Clive).

Anyway, here's the "equation".

Coventry (11) v Blackpool (10) @ Ricoh Arena + more attacking formation + motivation = 4th home win in a row.

Simple maths.

Here's what happened instead

Coventry (11) v Blackpool (10... but still playing like 11) @ bewildered Ricoh Arena - home ambition - positive tactics + negative manager = EXACTLY THE SAME TEAM, TACTICS AND PERFORMANCE UNTIL WE CONCEDE AND HE'S FORCED TO ALTER HIS STANCE.

Seems to be a recurring theme of games just lately. No really drive to go and win.

Freddy, Morrison and Deegan all came on to try and salvage the game for us. I'm still trying to work out what Leon Best has done in the last 2 weeks that suddenly warrants him now being booed off the pitch though. He may have had a less than effective game, but booing him? Very odd behaviour. Maybe I misread it and it was actually a booing of Coleman's tactics - I'd guess it's a bit of a mix.

Having moved Baker over the wing, we immediately looked threatening, and the goal came from him getting to the byline and pulling the ball back. Something that all good wingers should do. Neither of our current first choice wingers possess any sort of pace to be able to do this, so in normal circumstances, you'd be entitled to expect a change. Under the current regime, I can't see them looking beyond McIndoe and his new yellow boots with go faster stripes (which don't work).

All in all - unbelievable that we didn't look to take the game to them until we went a goal down. I feel like I'm repeating myself, but I'm gobsmacked by our management and ambition at the moment.

We've gone from having decent momentum over Christmas, gearing us towards a push up the table - to the immediate brakes and reins from our manager.

Needless to say he thought that the result against 10 men Blackpool team at home was "a point gained".

It beggars belief.

Disclaimer:
It's getting embarrassing writing much the same after every game. So for this, I apologise (sort of). I'm well aware that some fans enjoy optimism and the "keep the faith" attitude towards the club and its current progress, and I respect that. While I like to think I'm quite a rational person, I can't bring myself to congratulate consistently below-par performance and hold blind faith, as I genuinely think it does more harm than good. This is my angle when I write things in this blog - some will agree, some won't.

I suppose what I'm trying to say is, even though it might seem it, I'm not the negative git.

Coleman is.

Haha, etc.

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A team who have only scored 11 goals at home all season, against a team set out by their manager to defend, defend, defend.

Only going to be one result wasn't there.

Quite where the logic is in going all-out-defence against a team that find it notoriously difficult to score goals, only Christopher Coleman will know. Everyone seems well pleased with it though.

We're now 17th by the way, but that seems to have gone unnoticed. It's become the norm.

I also find it strange that our manager seems to think that one successful element of play has to be to the detriment of another. If we want to keep a clean sheet, we have to completely abandon any attacking tactics. After 60 mins he decided that our window for winning the game had gone, and shut up shop. I always thought it was the job of a manager to develop a team that is capable of both. It seems that ours has one aim, to hold on.

The more I write, the more I realise what I say will be unpopular. I can't really do much about that. If I thought what I'm thinking was unfair, I'd keep it zipped. But I'm very clear in what I think it should be fair to expect from our football club and manager. Consistently negative tactics and a refusal to aim higher than 16th isn't really anywhere close. I seem to say it in every post, but we're still not progressing, so it seems to me that our approach is way off.

Looking at the bigger picture, we're talking almost 23 years now without even a sniff of success, and we're still being told that "we're not ready", "we have to be patient", "we're building".

Stupid clichés all the time, guarding against defeat. Too easy.

I'm sure there must be a few people out there who find it worrying that our manager has such a low opinion of the team he's created. Basically, you can tell that he thought the best we could achieve last night was a 0-0 draw.

What chance have you got!

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Right, probably about time I let my thoughts be known about this match. I'll just write a list of my musings as they come to me.

1) Yes, Clinton scored a nice goal...but he shouldn't be our first choice striker. I read him say in the paper today "If Forest can rotate, why can't Coventry?"

I'll tell you why Clintonio - it's because the Forest team has developed a style of play and winning mentality over many months that the best teams do. We won 3 in a row (which would normally be classed as the beginning of a winning run) and thought that we were suddenly brilliant, all over again.

Maybe if we'd stuck with a winning team as far as possible, we'd have a mentality and fluency about us by now. Instead, Coleman's still fiddling with the formula, and even when he comes across something that works (Best and Eastwood up front), he tries to be clever and bring you (Clint) back in.

All because he fancies you.

It's been the Clinton Morrison show all season.

2) Following on from this thought, Martin Cranie was playing out of his skin at right-back when we won those 3 games in a row, so shoving him over to left-back is rubbish. Wright did okay in the previous league match, but if you're talking longevity, Cranie is the best right back at the club. You've got to play him there.

3) There is something wrong with our tactics and ability to adjust during the game. We've played 29 games this season (league and cup), and gone ahead in 16 of those. That's a whole load of opportunities to win and progress.

We've won 8 games all season. To me, that's a very poor ratio from winning positions.

We went ahead against Ipswich, and almost immediately went into our shell and seemed scared to go for the win. People who "know" football say that's sensible. I don't think so, I'd say that's unrealistic and a negative mentality. You've got to understand the ebb and flow of a game - when to attack, when to defend. We can't do either it seems. One thing that is for certain; you can't rely on holding teams out for the entire game if you score in the first 10 minutes.

That's ludicrous.

It seems simple logic that if we play well up until we score, it might actually be because we have got something about us when we play our natural game. So why we're constantly trying to curb that and just encourage teams onto us once we do go ahead, I don't know.

4) Substitutions. Christopher, bloody identify when players aren't doing it, and change them.

And this doesn't mean identify them in the 80th minute. It's pot luck if they're going to even get the ball in that time. Give people the chance to make an impact.

Basically, take McIndoe off if he's rubbish again and bring on Carl Baker. He earned a decent crack by showing McIndoe up in the previous game.

5) We can't concentrate for an entire game. It happened against Portsmouth, and the same keeps happening again and again. Right before half-time, right after half-time, right before full-time. There's no professionalism to get the job done and they just switch off too often.

You could see it so clearly on the TV. We scored, and were so pleased with ourselves (lots of high-fiving and inane grinning) we thought it was perfectly okay to forget about shape and concentration. Gunnarsson may not be a right back, but he was an absolute country mile out of position. McPake then decided to commit himself when there was no cover, and the rest was just shocking.

It's all about decisions, and we make some crazy ones sometimes.

6) Coleman embarrassing me with his rant.

Oi, Chris. Why not focus all that rage and anger at the players who can't defend for 10 seconds?

Fact is, we scored after 6 minutes injury time, so your argument is void anyway. I appreciate the passion, but if you can't defend for 10 seconds, you don't deserve any points.

All you've done is deflect from the real issues of the game - bad tactics and our team's lack of professionalism. I bloody hope this is all a front and behind the scenes you're working like you've never worked before to address these problems.

I doubt it though.

All in all - the result was gutting. All the momentum and confidence the players built up in December has probably gone now because of this fiddling and piddling with the formula.

Bloody hell fire.

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Buggeration - right loads.

Let's get one thing clear; Portsmouth were absolutely there for the taking. So I reckon we should be a bit cross about not winning it. Unfortunate that a combination of tiredness, crucial injuries, poor tactics, negativity, naive refereeing, thuggish opponents, no communication, loss of concentration and woeful pissing marking have conspired against us. Even though they were useless, we just couldn't take advantage.

You can't say it was down to lack of effort, because there were some very committed performances out there. McPake was strong once again, Gunnarsson put himself about more and more as the game wore on, and Best gave them real problems until he came off.

My main concern was just how poor we were for much of the game though, footballing-wise. I'm having an argument about this as I write.

Don't get me wrong, there were some good spells when we played well and showed class (Best's goal was unbelievable). But I think all you have to do is compare our performance to that of Reading's last night to get a little perspective. Liverpool were equally as poor as Portsmouth, but Reading absolutely deserved their win. And it wasn't just down to old-fashioned grit and determination (although they had that too), it was because they simply outplayed Liverpool.

Contrary to what you might hear from some corners, we didn't really outplay Portsmouth. I think we could have, but for some reason, it didn't click for us. Sloppiness and an increasingly defensive attitude were probably the 2 most contributing factors.

I think it should be pretty clear, given how many times we've lost leads this season, that we can't try and defend a 1 nil lead for the length of time we did. It wasn't like we were up against Man Utd, Portsmouth were struggling to create their own chances - they needed our help to win.

But if you are going to try and defend a lead, you've got to at least concentrate until the bitter end. 2 lapses of concentration cost us, and in the end we just gave Portsmouth their goals. They didn't have to work to create them. That's the biggest frustration.

So rather than feeling sorry for ourselves again and thinking up excuses for why we'll probably lose the next game (Coleman), let's get a bit angry and work out what we can do next time to stop it from happening again.

Here's a starter for 10.

1) If the ball is coming straight for your head and no opposition players are around, don't let lunatic right-backs fly in front of you. Communicate.
2) If there are 10 seconds left in a game and you concede a corner, you mark a man. You mark a man as if your life depends on it.
3) When you're the manager of a team that finds the winning habit hard to come by, don't mess with the formula so you can get your favourite back in. It probably ain't gonna do the in-form striker you drop much good.
4) Don't play Jermaine Grandison up front. (Not knocking him at all, but have you ever seen anyone look so bewildered!?)

All this has got me thinking. Take a look at the video below. Yes, it's that man Roy Keane again. It's a very extreme example of him caring about footballing mistakes instead of feeling sorry for yourself, so take it with a pinch of salt, but I honestly reckon we could do with taking a leaf out of his book.

It'd be nice to see just a little bit more of it sometimes.

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And freeze we did. If I was one of those people who think it's wicked to turn everything into a website address rather than an actual description, I'd say that it was Brrrr.com.

Gladly, I'm not.

It was disgracefully cold.

Anyway, it's a bit of a shame that while we were all freezing anatomically in the stands, the players did the same for lots of the match -  only metaphorically. There were many poor touches and a lack of urgency, in the first half especially.

To be honest, that's the main criticism I have - now for the cliché: We did what all good teams should do and won when we didn't play very well.

It's true though, there were some pretty dodgy performances out there. But the good thing was that this was balanced with some solid ones too. McIndoe, Barnett and Bell were all off the pace for most of the game. But Clingan was influential, Freddy is oozing confidence, and Stephen Wright had his best game of the season.

One thing I'm not very pleased about is the over-the-top criticism Leon Barnett though. Let's put this into perspective for a minute; during our 3 match winning streak, Barnett was an ever present. So, there shouldn't have been such surprise why he was brought back into the team. He couldn't play against Portsmouth, but before that game him and McPake had been playing very well and forged a good understanding.

Yes, everyone can see that he had a very nervy game. I'm not denying that. But it's too easy to jump on the bandwagon after one bad performance. I didn't hear anyone saying that he was "the worst defender they've ever seen" during the winning streak.

Basically, just get a bloody grip. He had a mare, but he's had plenty of good games too.

I suppose what makes this reaction seem even more strange is that on the pitch at the same time you have a player like Michael McIndoe who has consistently put in below-par performances this season.

He's missing the edge he once had, and he's just not a threat for us. Can't blame anyone for this, because it happens - he was worth a punt given how he has performed against us in the past, and having a left-sided player on the left does give us good shape. But if you're analysing his individual performance this season, it's been a dramatic fall from grace for him. I read about how the opposition pick him out as a threat, but what does this actually mean? If he was playing against us this season, we'd do the same. I'm sure he loves the compliment, but it's all based on reputation, rather than form.

What spoke volumes was that Carl Baker came on and managed to have more of an impact on the match in his 10 minutes, than McIndoe has in the last 10 games. Nice to have options on that side now.

Generally, it's quite clear that we weren't brilliant. But there were positives which we must take to the next game.

- How clinical we were in the first half to punish their lack of cutting edge. That's such a vital quality.
- We looked far more likely to create opportunities than we did month or so ago.
- Clingan, Gunnarsson, Best, and Eastwood showed how good they are technically, and matched this with determination. So important.
- With everyone now fit, it's great to see some options and real competition for places.

And I was very pleased to hear Coleman keeping their feet on the ground afterwards. Yes, we won and that is great which he acknowledged. But I think he's realised over the last few weeks that we can't accept a return to nightmare performances of November. What we have to do is make sure we don't make the same mistakes again. We can't play the same way against Ipswich - one thing Roy Keane demands is that they always win the physical battle and show more desire than the other team.

If we do that, and continue to show the footballing qualities of the last few weeks, we should be beat Ipswich. And we have to be looking to beat them if we've got any ambitions of pushing our way up the league.

Rather coincidently I read Roy Keane's autobiography the other day. Whether you love him or hate him, the man is a winner. I'd recommend reading this if you want to get inside the head of someone who understands how you achieve in football. Also if you want to know why I waffle on about the importance of ambition and attitude, Roy Keane('s ghost writer) explains it in way that a mere spectator like me never could.

I'm considering sending a copy to our boys before the Ipswich game.

But first, the small hurdle of Portsmouth in the FA Cup to negotiate ...

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After a well-earned point at Pompey, I'm confident that if we're able to put a strong team out, we're more than capable of doing them.

I'm envisaging a night like the Blackburn match last year (minus the crowd and the queues) where we really take the game to them.

Typically, I shan't get carried away by a win - I best say that now, I'm not overly concerned about a cup run this year. Yes, it's great for exposure and money-wise, but all I'm bothered about is achieving some sort of consistency in the league. Last year it turned out to be our downfall because we put too much focus on the big cup game.

That said, it was also the catalyst and really got us playing (for a month, at least) so if we win it best bloody have the same effect again. I'd be delighted.

Best and Westwood playing..

was good by the way.

They're our players. All realism aside, It'd be nice to think that was a statement of intent from Coleman. For once, I'd like to see signs of him telling any prospective buyers to sod off if they think we're going to do them any favours. They'll probably get them dirt cheap anyway.

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Well, of course, we couldn't manage that.

Going away to a team who haven't lost in 15 was always going to be tricky. Saying that, it just means their next loss can't be far away. That was my attitude going into this game.

Everything is possible in this league, just ask Peterborough and Cardiff. And given how well we played the other day against Doncaster (another team in great form), I would have expected everyone to go into this game with a bit more belief than what you read all over the forums.

"I'm expecting a loss today ".

This was the consensus. Sure, I can understand guarding against complacency, and playing as the underdogs can often work - but it's Nottingham Forest, not Barcelona.

You don't see many teams winning 3 in a row then going into the next game expecting to lose! I don't think it makes you particularly radical if you go into a match thinking your team can get something out of it, and being disappointed if they're not able to. Personally, I'd rather do that than be content to amble along in the wilderness for the next 20 years. But each to their own, I guess. Any anyway, the fans don't prepare the team.

I assume the reason Freddy didn't start was because he was a little ill last week. Even though he managed 80 mins on Saturday and was able to come on and play 30 against Forest. It's always the way really - find the winning formula and then have to change it. Bloody hell fire.

Being my usual cynical self, all I can see is that we have a 5 day rest until an FA Cup game on Saturday, where we could afford to change the team then. (We sacrificed our league form and rested players to be ready for a cup game last year - never again . We're not the sort of team who winning comes easy to, so I don't think squad rotation is really something we should employ by choice.

Really, unless Freddy was totally incapable of playing, he shouldn't have spent the first hour sat on the bench. He's been a cut above everyone else in this winning period. He's was vital to that run of form.

Suffice to say, one penalty and Clinton is back in the team for the duration now.

It's just annoying not being able to keep the run going, really. Yeah it's only one loss - but I still can't quite work out which way we're heading which is the frustrating thing. It'd be nice to have an idea.

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