COVENTRY CELEBRATED THEIR Championship title party with a 3-1 victory that leaves Wrexham\u2019s play-off ambitions in the balance.<\/p>\n
The Sky Blues were in party mood after Frank Lampard\u2019s side had wrapped up the title on Tuesday and ahead of the trophy presentation after the final whistle.<\/p>\n
Brandon Thomas-Asante volleyed the hosts ahead after 19 minutes at the CBS Arena, but Ollie Rathbone replied quickly for sixth-placed Wrexham.<\/p>\n
A point would have been welcome for the visitors but \u2013 10 minutes from time \u2013 substitute Victor Torp drove home a powerful free-kick which Danny Ward could only help into the roof of the net.<\/p>\n
Ephron Mason-Clark put the cherry on Coventry\u2019s cake with a classy finish in the fourth minute of stoppage-time.<\/p>\n
So Wrexham head into the last round of games on Saturday with the smallest of advantages in the race for the final play-off place.<\/p>\n
Level on 70 points with Hull, they now have a superior goal difference of just one over the Tigers, while Derby remain in the hunt just a point back.<\/p>\n
On what is sure to be a tense afternoon, all three finish at home, with Wrexham playing Middlesbrough, Hull hosting Norwich, while Derby entertain Sheffield United.<\/p>\n
Thousands of Coventry fans held up \u201cWe Are Back\u201d placards before kick-off to mark their return to the Premier League after a 25-year absence.<\/p>\n
Wrexham were back at a stadium holding fond memories for their supporters following an FA Cup giant-killing in 2023 during the Red Dragons\u2019 National League days.<\/p>\n
The Sky Blues were given a guard of honour by opponents seeking a league double after their 3-2 Racecourse victory in October.<\/p>\n
There were early shots blocked at either end with George Thomason and Frank Onyeka unable to find a way through congested defences.<\/p>\n
The party atmosphere went up several notches when Thomas-Asante made a darting run between Callum Doyle and Thomason to fire home Mason-Clark\u2019s cross from a few yards out.<\/p>\n
Coventry\u2019s lead remained intact for only six minutes as George Dobson delivered a delightful ball down the right for Issa Kabore.<\/p>\n
The wing-back had space to attack and Rathbone dispatched his low cross from 14 yards out in emphatic fashion.<\/p>\n
Although Coventry had two-thirds possession in the first half, Wrexham carried a threat on the counter-attack with Josh Windass rippling the side netting and Thomason striking an upright.<\/p>\n
Ward made his first meaningful save 10 minutes after the restart to keep out out a Haji Wright header at the base of a post after the Sky Blues\u2019 top scorer was found by Milan van Ewijk.<\/p>\n
Carl Rushworth was just as alert to prevent Sam Smith profiting from a Dobson\u2019s through ball that split the Coventry defence and the save was to prove crucial.<\/p>\n
Torp won the argument to take the free-kick and the Danish midfielder produced a beauty before Mason-Clark crowned a season to remember for the Sky Blues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"COVENTRY CELEBRATED THEIR Championship title party with a 3-1 victory that leaves Wrexham\u2019s play-off ambitions in the balance.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":455724,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[76],"tags":[14493,200672,18,19,17,200673,132,72108],"class_list":["post-455723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-championship","tag-coventry","tag-eire","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-playoff-scrap","tag-sports","tag-wrexham"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455723","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=455723"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455723\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/455724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=455723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=455723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=455723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}