Coventry City 1 - 0 Port Vale

[dutchman]

[dutchman]

James Maddison wins it for Sky Blues

Local hero James Maddison gave the biggest Coventry City crowd of the season so far a Boxing Day boost with the goal that moves the Sky Blues within two points of the top of the table.

Tony Mowbray made one enforced defensive change for Coventry City – skipper Sam Ricketts back from his one-match suspension to replace the injured Ben Turner – and shuffled his attacking midfielders with Ruben Lameiras and Jacob Murphy getting the nod ahead of Jim O’Brien and Ryan Kent.

Vale showed some good attacking purpose in the early stages and were desperately close to snatching an seventh-minute lead as Lameiras played side into trouble with a volleyed back-pass and AJ Leitch-Smith’s angled shot slammed against the foot of the far post with Reice Charles-Cook in no-man’s land.

The visitors continued to give as good as they got in a game with plenty of effort but precious little finesse, City struggling to find any attacking flow despite some occasional flashes of ingenuity from Lameiras.

It was 41 minutes before City managed their first attempt at goal, Lameiras slipping the ball through to Murphy whose pulled his time-shot wide of the far post.

And seconds later the Sky Blues produced another good move, Joe Cole’s diagonal run opening up the Vale defence and Richard Duffy deflecting Murphy’s low cross past the near post.

City looked livelier at the start of the second half, Murphy almost finding a gap when he dribbled along the goal-line, and Lameiras had the fans on their feet when he cut in from the right and curled a left-footer past the far post.

Joe Cole was crowded out as he swivelled on to Bigirimana’s through ball, Armstrong’s shot was blocked and City were convinced they should have had a penalty when Ben Purkiss nudged Murphy as he sprinted through on the left.

Mowbray freshened up his attack for the final 20 minutes, sending on Jim O’Brien and James Msddison for Cole and Lameiras.

And it took just eight for the pair to produce the breakthrough out of next to nothing, O’Brien slipping the ball inside to Maddison who twisted to give himself a yard of space and curled a precision shot into the far bottom corner.

But the Sky Blues saw out five minutes of occasionally tense overtime and almost franked their victory in the dying seconds as Maddison pulled out a superb pass to find Ryan Kent but McGivern dashed back to clear as the sub rolled the ball past keeper Jak Alnwick.

Attendance: 17,779 (Away 1,283)