Nigel Pearson praises Tommy Conway for his two goals in victory over Coventry

Posted Thursday, August 11, 2022 by PA

Bristol City boss Nigel Pearson praised Tommy Conway’s hunger after the youngster scored his first career brace in the Robins’ 4-1 win over Coventry at the Pirelli Stadium.

The Robins seized the advantage in the first half through Kal Naismith’s first goal since his move from Luton before Conway’s brace.

Jamie Allen pulled a goal back for the hosts just past the hour mark before Andreas Weimann wrapped up the tie in the dying minutes.

The match was switched to Burton’s Pirelli Stadium following the CBS Arena pitch being deemed too dangerous to play after 65 Rugby 7s games in three days as part of the Commonwealth Games.

“He will probably be disappointed he didn’t get a hat-trick. But that’s what you want, you want ambitious players,” said Pearson.

“He is a youngster, very hungry for success and he works exceptionally hard at his game and on a physical and psychological level he has made great strides over the last 12 months.”

Pearson’s side had lost both of their opening league games, despite being in front in both encounters, but raced into a three-goal lead and never looked back.

Pearson admitted: “It’s just the result we were looking for. We’ve had three pretty good performances so far.

“We played pretty well even with five changes and it’s good for a number of the squad to get a bit of pitch time. For us, the result was going to be the most important thing.”

Coventry manager Mark Robins bemoaned the defensive mistakes his side made in handing Bristol City a three-goal headstart in the first half.

“We are young, we are very young and you can’t make mistakes against any teams that have got any quality,” explained Robins. “We’ve made three mistakes and they’ve ended up in the back of the net.

Robins also spoke about the current off-field situation at the club that left one game postponed before the squad were forced to play their first home game of the season in Burton.

The Coventry manager said: “Hopefully we can get that into a decent state to play so we can go back. It’s been disruptive, we’ve had to do a lot of things, there’s been a lot of upheaval.”