Former Crystal Palace owner Simon Jordan has leapt to Frank Lampard’s defence and insists he wouldn’t get a second chance purely because of his name.
talkSPORT understands Lampard is nearing a return to management with Championship side Coventry City, who recently sacked long-serving boss Mark Robins.
Coventry owner Doug King confirmed Lampard was one of several ‘high-quality people’ to apply for the role, including Ruud van Nistelrooy.
It would be Lampard’s second stint as a Championship manager having led Derby County to the play-off final in the 2018/19 season.
He took over at Chelsea the following campaign and guided the Blues to a fourth-place finish and an FA Cup final.
However, he was sacked 18 months later amid a run of five defeats in eight games.
A move to Everton followed but Lampard won just 12 of his 44 matches in charge before he was sacked in January 2023.
Lampard then made a dreadful interim return to Chelsea in the wake of Graham Potter’s axing, where he won just once from 11 games in charge and departed at the end of the 22/23 campaign.
It was the second spell in charge of Chelsea that hit Lampard’s managerial credentials hard and has some wondering if he is close to landing the Coventry role based on his name.
Jordan felt those criticisms would be valid had Lampard been poised to take over a Premier League club, but given his successful one-season stint at Derby in the Championship, the Chelsea legend deserves another crack.
“With Frank, I think he was moderately successful in the Championship,” Jordan told talkSPORT.
“If Frank was being given a Premier League job now, I would be saying, ‘Well, that’s a second chance in a space that I don’t know he’s done that well in.’
“But in isolation, you could also look at the first season of Chelsea and say he did OK. It’s Everton and going back to Chelsea that damaged Frank’s credibility in the Premier League.
“But I don’t think his credibility is damaged in the Championship because he did OK at Derby.”
Jordan acknowledged any negotiations with Lampard will receive ‘additional scrutiny from the media’ given his standing in the game.
“But from me interviewing Frank Lampard, all that should be background noise,” Jordan said.
“Have you got the chops, do you know this division and do I believe in your vision? And if the narrative is he gets a second chance because he’s Frank Lampard, I’m not sure that’s right.”
Jordan added he hopes King isn’t making a managerial decision based on star power, ‘because when you make those kinds of decisions, you pay for them’.
Former Liverpool midfielder Danny Murphy, who was a keen observer of Derby during Lampard’s sole season in charge at Pride Park, shared a similar stance to Jordan.
“The owner of Coventry probably sees the fact that he’s done well in the Championship before, he’s got good contacts, he doesn’t mind working with young players,” Murphy said.
“Frank is hungry. Every time you listen to him, he’s desperate to be back involved. I think it will be on his merit if he gets it.
“Simon’s right, the spell at Everton and the one going back to Chelsea is the one people gave him a lot of criticism for.
“But it wouldn’t be as surprising as when (Wayne) Rooney got the Birmingham job. There’s logic in this.”
