Roy Keane believes Coventry City are now a “proper run” club who he’d like to see back in the Premier League.
The Manchester United legend also sees Frank Lampard as a “good fit” for the Sky Blues who are currently leading the charge for automatic promotion, sitting top of the Championship with a 10-point lead over second-placed Middlesbrough and with a 12-point cushion in the automatic promotion spots.
Discussing the club and Lampard on the Stick to Football podcast with Gary Neville, Jamie Carragher, Jill Scott and Ian Wright, Keane said: “They’re a proper run club now. You hear the things coming out of Coventry over the last few years. Not just because they’re flying now.
“Over the last few years they have been getting close and you look at the stadium, and going back to the time when they were a really decent team (in the top flight). I think they’re a proper club now, in terms of the business behind the scenes and Frank’s a good fit.
“They should have gone up last season, they were the best team in that play-off game – obviously credit to Sunderland for hanging in there – and you were thinking it might take them a few months to get over it but they have regrouped and gone again. It would be nice to see Coventry back.”
Asked if it’s nice to hear his peers and playing contemporaries talking so positively about Coventry and the job he’s doing, Lampard said: “Yeah, and it’s better than the other side of it because in my job you have to get used to that as well. So I think that the rule is, don’t get too excited when people speak well about you and don’t get too down when they speak badly of you because their job is to have an opinion and some people will have a reason for their opinions, and some people will speak generally.
“I was on that podcast and we were talking about management and I thought Roy spoke really well because he’s lived it in different experiences and also lived being a player of a level where people will question whether he should be a manager; is he good enough to be a manager; what right has he got to be a manager; it’s too easy to become a manager. All that nonsense.
“Him and Wrighty are smart and they do that job really well, and I’ve got full appreciation of what they do. But my job is not to get too sold on opinion because you might be the greatest one week and then you’re the worst two weeks later.
“But I’ve got respect for those lads because I know they live and breathe the game. They’re football people, so, I generally will accept anything they say.”
As for what Keane – a formidable opponent in anyone’s book – was like to play against, Lampard said: “It was amazing. I played against Roy at a really young age at West Ham and he was one of my sort of heroes, even at the time.
“And he absolutely overran me at Old Trafford once. I remember I was a young boy and then I really realised what the level was, what the demands were, what top players really looked like and what they feel like to go against you. He sort of swatted me aside, almost, in my early days.
“I matured to be able to have good battles with him as it went on but I also think that now, my personal opinion with Roy, I think when he speaks on TV generally, I have a lot of respect for it because I think he gets straight to the point and he cuts through some of the crap of opinion that maybe can be elsewhere.
“He’s very to the point whether you agree with it or not, and I think that’s a really positive thing.”
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