DOUG King admits an ‘adamant’ Frank Lampard persuaded him against selling any of Coventry City’s key players last summer.
A number of Coventry’s players had opportunities to leave the Sky Blues ahead of the start of the 2025/26 season.
This includes defender Bobby Thomas who was reportedly the subject of a bid from Championship rivals Sheffield United.
Thomas would go on to score the goal which sealed Coventry’s return to the Premier League away at Blackburn Rovers.
In a video posted on the club’s YouTube channel, Lampard and Coventry chairman King discussed various topics since the former’s arrival as Sky Blues head coach.
And King admits Lampard advised the club against selling any of their key players to divisional rivals if the Sky Blues wanted to achieve their targets this season.
King said: “I thought we would be around the top-six, maybe in the top three or four.
“Get into that position where we should get a home game in the second leg of the play-offs.
“It’s easier to have one at home when it really matters rather than one in the cauldron.
“I thought we were in a good place. I felt good about the situations, I didn’t think too much about it.
“The players wanted to stay, it was just they had opportunities which we exciting for them.
“Frank was rightly adamant that we weren’t going to go where we wanted to go if we traded our players to our competitors.”
Both King and Lampard felt Coventry could achieve a top-six finish at the beginning of the campaign as the Sky Blues exceeded initial expectations to life the Championship title.
However, despite the club’s success on the pitch, Lampard admits he felt the Sky Blues went into the season low on numbers.
Lampard added: “My job is to be a little bit glass half empty at times.
“You’re sizing up the parachute teams and the promoted teams.
“I thought if we could really maximise ourselves we could make the play-offs.
“What was good is that we kept the players we wanted to keep and that was crucial.
“I felt we went in [to the season] thin. My concern was if we get too many injuries in different areas it would really affect us.
“Fortunately, in the first half of the season, we rarely had two injuries in the same area. It looked after itself.”
Tough tests against Real Betis and St Pauli in pre-season alongside a training camp in Portugal gave Lampard confidence his side would hit the ground running this season.
And Lampard believes a settled pre-season with challenging friendly matches gave the Sky Blues the perfect preparation for what proved a title-winning campaign.
Lampard said: “We had a very good pre-season, we had challenging games and a great week in Portugal.
“The work we did in the summer was how can we concede less? And we specifically conceded against teams at the bottom of the table.
“That’s not coaching. But it was good to set the tone to make sure we’re better. I went into the season with more confidence and then we went on that run
“The other thing in possession was can we score more goals when we win it back in the middle of the pitch or when we’re in transition?
“Those early games, the lads really bought in. We called it play forward run forward. We’re not reinventing the wheel.
“I like watching control and push and cross but I also like to play differently.”
