Coventry's Premier League Journey: Frank Lampard's Impact

Coventry’s climb back to the Premier League has already felt improbable once. It might be about to do so again.

This is a club that had been marooned in the EFL wilderness, sinking as low as League Two while the top flight moved on without them. Mark Robins lit the fuse on their resurgence, dragging the Sky Blues off the canvas and setting them on a path that eventually led back to the elite.

Then came the shock. Robins was dismissed in November 2024, a decision that stunned plenty around the game and opened the door for Frank Lampard’s return to the dugout.

The former England midfielder had been out of work for over a year, his reputation dented by a bruising spell at Everton and a short, stop-gap stint as interim boss at Chelsea. He had lasted less than two years across his two permanent roles in west London, and the questions over his managerial ceiling were loud.

They are not so loud now.

Lampard has taken Coventry to the play-offs and then gone one better, delivering the Championship title and with it a return to the Premier League. His stock, once sliding, has surged again. The club have responded with a three-year contract extension running through to 2029, a clear statement that he is their man for the long haul.

The debate, of course, has already started: will they really stand by him if the 2026-27 season turns into the relegation fight many are predicting?

“Frank has a bit of experience in coaching and management as well in the Prem,” Hendry told GOAL, speaking in association with King Casino. “He's been a player in the Prem and he'll have seen how the football's changed.

“He's done a remarkable job with Coventry. He's really put them on the map and pulled them out of obscurity, really. And I think it would be very, very harsh if they didn't stick with Frank.”

That is the crux of it. Coventry have entrusted Lampard with a project, not a quick fix. Hendry’s view is that the manager has already earned the right to ride out any turbulence.

He also suspects Lampard would not be short of admirers if Coventry ever wavered.

“I don't think Frank would be short of offers from other teams in the Prem as well,” Hendry said. “Teams that are maybe, I'm not going to say the yo-yo teams because if it means him going down and bouncing back, I'm not saying Coventry's going to be a yo-yo team, but if they can become a Brighton or a Brentford or a Bournemouth that aren't yo-yo teams, that's as much as Coventry could ask for.”

That is the template: Brighton, Brentford, Bournemouth. Clubs that came up, stayed up and built something sustainable without pretending they could outmuscle the traditional giants. For Coventry, that kind of stability would represent a transformation.

Back among the big boys

For Hendry, Coventry’s return to the top table is about more than Lampard’s personal redemption arc. It is about what Premier League status does to a club’s entire ecosystem.

“For the benefit of the football club, with the amount of funds that are provided by just being a Premiership club and the fans that go and support Fulham, Brighton, Bournemouth and Brentford, they're seeing the Arsenal's and the Liverpool's and the Man City's and the Man United's and the Chelsea's attending their grounds and it's going to be great for them,” he said.

The money, the exposure, the weekly visits of the superclubs – it changes everything. It also underlines how fragile status can be.

“Listen, there's a lot of clubs, bigger clubs than the teams I've mentioned that aren't in the Premiership that think they should be in the Premiership and I get that, but that's life,” Hendry added. “Leicester. Leicester's sitting in League One! You would never have thought that.

“And you could go back to when Blackburn won the Prem in 94-95 and so many years later, they're in League One. It's a lot of years after, but it's not as soon as 2016 when Leicester won, but 10 years later, they're in League One. You couldn't have believed that.”

Leicester, Premier League champions in 2016, now in League One. Blackburn, title winners in 1994-95, also down in the third tier. The warning is stark: history offers no guarantees.

That is why Hendry sees no logic in Coventry even contemplating a change at the top now.

“But Coventry, I can't even think for a minute that they'd consider changing any of the top, well, Frank Lampard, I wouldn't think that for a moment, to be fair,” he said.

Coventry have fought their way back to the stage they lost. Lampard has helped script the latest act. The real question now is not whether he deserves their faith, but whether the club is brave enough to hold its nerve if the Premier League storm hits.