Coventry City are finally back in the big time for the first time in a generation. After 25 years away, a period during which the club changed stadiums, hit financial rock bottom and plummeted to the depths of League Two as recently as 2017-18, manager Frank Lampard has led them to the promised land, with this 1-1 draw sealing a famous promotion.
The Sky Blues struggled to find a way past Blackburn for much of this tense evening and went behind to Ryoya Morishita’s strike, before Bobby Thomas blew the lid off the away end at Ewood Park with a header that will go down in Coventry folklore. The Premier League is calling once again.
For Lampard there is an element of personal vindication. Having been shunned from the top flight after poor spells in charge of Chelsea and Everton, the former England international has rebuilt himself in the Championship. Now he is a bona fide Coventry legend.
The fans had come in numbers, more than 7,000 packing out the Darwen End clutching sky blue balloons, primed to witness history. Many of them would not have been born the last time Coventry played in the Premier League. The goalscorer, Thomas, was born midway through that 2000-01 season and was four months old the last time Coventry featured in the top flight.
