Source: FOOTYMAD
Strikers told to they need to improve
Boothroyd, "The front two were nowhere near as good as they can be." Coventry City manager Aidy Boothroyd has told two of his strikers to start playing as well as they know they can and to start knocking in the goals. Marlon King and Clive Platt, who have formed the front line in the last two games for Coventry City, have been warned by the City boss that they need to prove they can score if they want to remain as first choice strikers. Both players have a close relationship with Boothroyd. King because he has played under Boothroyd before and the manager knows how to handle the volatile player, while Platt, who also played under Boothroyd when the two were at Colchester, was thrust into the Championship because Boothroyd knew he had the ability to cope at a higher level. However, despite his belief in the two players, Boothroyd is beginning to lose patience with them and thinks it is time that they started to forge the strong partnership they are capable of. Coventry have won their last two games and in both of them, King and Platt led the attack, but Boothroyd was unimpressed with the pair saying, “Saturday was the worst they’ve been all season." "We were very good and professional in lots of areas. Our centre-halves were terrific, but I thought the front two were nowhere near as good as they can be. We did enough to win the game but you have to judge people on the ability they’ve got, how good they can be, and we didn’t get that from them." “They’ve set themselves high standards and they dipped from that at Scunthorpe so they certainly owe us one on Saturday, if selected and they need to make sure they perform to their best.” Boothroyd confirmed that the goal, credited as a Murphy own goal after a King shot rebounded off the post onto Murphy and into the net, boosted King's confidence. “It’s a weight off his mind,” said Boothroyd, “that goal has done him a world of good and another one would do even more for his confidence. Marlon would say it was never a problem but I know him better than that and I know that all strikers want to be scoring goals." “I’ve even known some who don’t mind if the team lose as long as they score, that’s how selfish they can be. He’s not one of them, I’m glad to say, and he will put in a shift for the team whether or not he scores.” Coventry go into Saturday's home game against struggling Middlesbrough looking to make it three wins on the trot, which would be for the first time in four year a Sky Blues side has managed that, but Boothroyd is in optimistic mood. “That would be good,” he said. “We look to win every game we play in, but keeping a clean sheet is obviously the first priority and that starts from the front.It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to work out that if you keep clean sheets and score goals you’ll win games. "I didn’t realise it was that long since we had three in succession but we’re starting to break little records like that as we go along.”
