Late miss the taming of O’Brien the Shrew

SHREWSBURY boss Micky Mellon reckons midfielder Jim O’Brien was reading the morning headlines in his mind before he missed a late sitter.

The Scot was a yard from goal deep into injury time but somehow failed to find the net to give the Shrews an unlikely win against his former club.

That miss came after Ivan Toney had cracked against the bar just moments earlier.

The visitors left for home feeling they could have taken all three points despite Coventry’s fine first-half performance.

Mellon said: “We’ve come to a tough place like Coventry and got a clean sheet.

“We came with an idea in the first half and it just wasn’t working but when you are Shrewsbury, you have to have another plan.

“In the second half, we were miles closer. We knocked the ball around and passed it a lot better.

“Nobody could argue that we had the best two chances in the game.

“With the one right at the end, we could count ourselves a wee bit unlucky not to win it.

“I think it came across that slow that Jim was already thinking ‘I’ve scored against my old club, here it is’ and then he never did it.

“He will live that all evening but that’s what happens in football. There’s no blame.”

Coventry were comfortably on top in the first half with Kyel Reid and Jodi Jones in particular causing problems for the Town defence.

Reid blazed wide from a low corner and was then involved in the best move of the game which ultimately saw Andy Rose head wide.

Rose went close in the second half too, but this time saw his effort deflected just the wrong side of the far post.

Coventry boss Tony Mowbray replaced all three of his attackers in the second period but he was left to rue that decision when Kwame Thomas went off with a groin injury.

They played the last ten minutes of normal time, plus seven additional minutes, with ten men and that almost opened the door for the Shrews.

Mowbray said: “Shrewsbury changed their shape and matched us up in the second half. They found themselves under pressure and not being able to cope.

“We have to find a Plan B for when teams try to stop us playing. I’ve told them that I can’t question their commitment or effort they really went after the game.

“I didn’t feel that they threatened our goal in the first half but a change of formation gave a young team a lot of problems.”