As Coventry City prepare for their first season back in the top flight for a generation, few are under any illusions as to the task facing them over the next nine months.
Boss Frank Lampard delivered promotion in style last season, as the Sky Blues followed up their 2025 play-off semi-final defeat to Sunderland by easing to the Championship title, finishing 11 points clear of the chasing pack.
The former England and Chelsea midfielder now faces an altogether different task now though, as he works to ensure that Coventry do not go one-and-done in the Premier League.
Harry Redknapp on Frank Lampard’s task
Should Lampard need advice of how to approach the coming season, he won’t have to look far, as his uncle Harry Redknapp is one of the most experienced managers of recent times and knows a thing or two about Premier League survival.
But even Redknapp is baulking at the challenge his nephew faces, despite seeing the 48-year-old excel in the dugout last season.
“He’s surprised me,” Redknapp admits to FourFourTwo. "I didn’t see them going up at the start of the year.
“I didn’t see Coventry in it at all. I thought if they could finish sixth, maybe make the play-offs, it’d be a great season for him.”
And if Coventry are to beat the drop this year, Lampard will again have to exceed expectations.
“What he’s got to do is make sure he goes into the new Premier League season prepared,” Redknapp continues. “Are they going to be good enough to stay up? That’s the problem.”
Redknapp is also quick to point out that promising coaches that impress in the second tier can quickly find themselves under immense pressure.
“We’ve seen it so many times before,” he continues. “Good young managers that know the game and have done an excellent job, quickly watch all their hard work unravel.
“When results aren’t going your way, you have people calling up the radio. You get idiots who don’t know what they’re talking about coming on and going, ‘Well, yeah, we’re losing because he's a Championship manager’.
“What a load of rubbish.”
