The foundation of any successful promotion campaign is stability and the availability of key players.
Lampard, so far, has had it pretty good with his relatively lean squad.
Only Stoke (21) have used fewer players across their opening 18 Championship games than the Sky Blues (22).
The bedrock of Coventry’s success is how settled they are, particularly through the spine of the team.
Keeper Carl Rushworth, defender Liam Kitching and holding midfielder Matt Grimes have started every game, while centre-back Bobby Thomas and wing-backs Milan van Ewijk and Jay Dasilva have 17 starts apiece.
Eight players have been in the starting line-up for 15 out of 18 games and 11 have more than 1,050 league minutes on the pitch already this season.
While attacking midfielder Jack Rudoni missed nine matches with a calf injury, the Sky Blues have otherwise largely been able to call on their best players every game.
There are signs things have started to turn on the injury front, though, as top scorer Brandon Thomas-Asante is sidelined until January with a torn hamstring, Tatsuhiro Sakamoto has been out with concussion and Haji Wright has missed three games with a thigh strain.
It’s not just injuries which play a role in the hectic festive schedule – suspensions can have a big impact too.
Coventry are one of just eight Championship sides not to have a man sent off so far this season, but only seven clubs have picked up more than their 35 yellow cards.
Despite that, the Sky Blues have only had to deal with one suspension until now – Van Ewijk’s one-game ban after accumulating five yellow cards.
It proved a costly one as Van Ewijk, whose long throw is a key component of City’s attacking game, sat out at Wrexham on 31 October – their only defeat of the season so far.
Thomas, Wright, Dasilva, Kitching and Victor Torp are currently on four cautions as Coventry head to Ipswich on Saturday (15:00 GMT) – another yellow for any at Portman Road would rule them out of Tuesday’s trip to fifth-placed Preston.
The good news for Lampard is that should they avoid a caution, the disciplinary table resets after Saturday to the 37th match of the campaign, which comes in mid-March, with the threshold for a two-match suspension moving to 10 bookings.
