Coventry City told to follow Sunderland transfer trick after worrying Doug King comments

Coventry City have been urged to follow Sunderland’s lead in the transfer market should they win promotion to the Premier League, despite concerns raised by owner Doug King earlier this season.

Former Sky Blues boss Gordon Strachan believes clubs stepping up to the top flight must strike the right balance between loyalty and survival, pointing to Sunderland’s recruitment of experienced figures such as Granit Xhaka as a model to follow.

“You've got a decision to make when you get promoted,” Strachan said on talkSPORT’s White and Jordan. “You can either stay... I think Frank (Lampard), if he's using his heart, would like to keep these players, every one of these players, who have worked so hard over the last couple of years, you want to give them a chance. The other side of it is you want to stay in the Premiership.

“If you look back at Howard Wilkinson when we (Leeds United) got promoted from the Championship, he then went, 'Right, that was the Championship', (Gary) McAllister, (Tony) Dorigo, (Rod) Wallace, all these players, Stevie Hodge, they came in.”

The former Manchester United man added: “I don't think they can afford that kind of money, and they shouldn't, because Coventry fans should never be put in a situation again where the club's on the brink. If you're the custodian of the club, you make sure that the community is looked after. What they might want to do is, and there's other clubs who come up and go for younger players, want to sell them on. It's been proven that doesn't work.

“What can happen is, if you look at Sunderland, Granit Xhaka. I think having him in the tunnel beside all these players who worked so hard to get there, that type of person in the tunnel where you look and go, 'I'm glad you're here'. It's like Henderson at Brentford. When they walk out, he's there, wonderful. If (James) Milner was still 35, Milner. If Harry Maguire wants to move on, Harry Maguire.

“You maybe have two or three of those players in there, and the rest of the players know that they're going to be on a bit more wages than them, but they're going to make them better players and be successful, you can accept that. I think that might be the road that they go down.”

Strachan’s comments come after Coventry owner Doug King questioned Sunderland’s money-spending approach to recruitment following their promotion, suggesting a more cautious strategy may be adopted at the CBS Arena. Speaking earlier this season, King said: “I think everybody probably approaches that in their own, independent way. Burnley have been up and down a couple of times, [it] hasn't quite worked how they did it.

“Obviously, Sunderland, I guess, changed the whole first XI, which for me is a little bit radical. Obviously, they're staying up, but their identity of who got them there has been somewhat lost. Is that the right thing to do? I don't know. I guess we'll do it the Cov way. We'll do it the way we think is the right way to try and achieve what we want to achieve within what we are able to do at that time, I think.

“I mean, once you get to the Premier League, you definitely would like to try and stay there, certainly for one year, then it allows you to bed in a little bit, but it's not so straightforward, and we're aware of that. But listen, we've got really good people. Dean Austin, our recruitment director, has got a really good extended team. We're looking at lots of different things. We've done a great job. I have to shout it out, a great job in that department from when we sold Vik [Gyokeres] and Gus [Hamer] in those early days, how well we have recruited has really established us.

“I look at squad value. How have we developed players? What are we paying for? We have to make money, and we have to develop them, right? We can't just sit here and pay expensive players and let them fall off the cliff afterwards, then we're losing more money.

“So if you look at that and you can check it out, we've really established a high-quality squad at this level, and when I came in three years ago, we had a couple of players. We've reinvested it really well, and I'm proud that we've done that because we needed to do that. We couldn't muck that up. So I take a lot of confidence from that with that team, we're already expanding and bringing more people in, more crunching, more data, more creative work of trying to do our own thing versus just following everybody else.

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“That's what I do anyway. I like to go my own way and zag when others are zigging and all that sort of thing. I don't like following people particularly, so we'll do it the Cov way, and hopefully if we get there, we'll see where we go, but it'll be our way.”

Sunderland and Coventry City will renew their rivalry next season in the Premier League after the Sky Blues confirmed promotion with a 1-1 draw against Blackburn Rovers under Frank Lampard, having suffered a dramatic defeat to the Black Cats over two legs in last season’s Championship play-offs - setting up a compelling top-flight reunion between the sides.

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