Coventry City match reaction from CoventryLive as Frank Lampard gives his take on the Sky Blues' performance at Tottenham

Frank Lampard felt his Coventry City players continued to show Premier League progression and plenty of personality after going toe-to-toe with Tottenham Hotspur.

Although Spurs finished 3-1 winners on the night at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, the Sky Blues were very much in the game and pushing for a second equaliser right to the death when the home side took the game away from them with a third deep in stoppage time.

Asked for his assessment of the battling away performance, the City boss said: “Yeah, it was a really good display out there. I know 3-1 changes the view at the end of the game but at 2-1 we were pushing and I thought from the first moment our work, our threat, the belief within the team, how we defended low...

“It took them two outstanding world-class strikes to score their goals but everybody in the stadium felt the game.”

Cov Kid James Maddison gave Spurs the lead against his home-town club before Jack Rudoni pulled City level early in the second half. There was a controversial second goal for the hosts when Omar Marmoush appeared to elbow Milan van Ewijk before putting his shot in the back of the net – a decision Lampard felt was harsh on his players – before sub Ben Davies added a third deep in stoppage time.

“We showed a real personality in the way we played in terms of we were fighting for second balls, we were running to be together,” said Lampard.

“We had big periods in the game where we started to get on the ball and played with confidence and took good decisions.

“And when I analyse it as two teams, this is a strong Tottenham team. Their league position is not real but it’s not probably, I think, related to this quality and the performance, and they’ll get better, they’ll improve, for sure. But when you think of eight of our starting players are in the Championship last year, they’ve had a tough start for different reasons but they’re playing now. If you didn’t know, just Tottenham and Coventry here like this, you wouldn’t know to say who was the team that had been in the Premier League for the last 50 years or who’s the team that’s been out there for 25 years. And that, for me, is a big deal for what the players produce.

“I’m disappointed to lose. I’m not over praising but if you know football, they’ll know they had a really tough game tonight.”