Under-fire £20k-p/w Coventry City player backed to succeed at Sky Blues - Milan van Ewijk situation could prove key | OneFootball

Kaine Kesler-Hayden has been backed to come good at Coventry City following his summer move from Aston Villa

This article is part of Football League World's 'Terrace Talk' series, which provides personal opinions from our FLW Fan Pundits regarding the latest breaking news, teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…

Kaine Kesler-Hayden joined Coventry City in a permanent deal in the summer from Aston Villa, having enjoyed a productive loan spell with Preston North End in the EFL Championship the previous season.

Having spent the 2024/25 season at Deepdale, where he hoovered up numerous personal accolades with the Lilywhites, including Preston North End Fans Player of the Year, Player's Player of the Year, and Young Player of the Year, the wing-back was on the move again this summer.

Coventry paid Villa £3.5 million to bring the Englishman - who is estimated by Capology to earn £20,000 at his new club - to the CBS Arena, where it was expected that he would slot straight in to Frank Lampard's side at right-back following the departure of Milan van Ewijk.

The Dutchman had been heavily linked with a switch to Germany with VFL Wolfsburg, and it looked an almost foregone conclusion that the pacey full-back would depart this club.

But a deal was never completed, and Van Ewijk remained at the club, much to the detriment of Kesler-Hayden, who has struggled to have a consistent run in the Sky Blues side.

Kaine Kesler-Hayden backed to succeed Milan van Ewijk at Coventry City in the event of the Dutchman's departure

Football League World's Coventry fan pundit, Chris Deez, has provided their opinion on Kesler-Hayden's situation at the club and whether they believe that he is able to succeed Van Ewijk, should the Dutchman depart.

Chris told FLW: "I do feel quite bad for Kesler-Hayden. I've got a lot of sympathy for him because he obviously came in under the impression that he was going to be our starting right-back.

"It looked like Milan van Ewijk was off on his way to Wolfsburg, and there were other teams interested as well.

"We paid good money for Kesler-Hayden, £3.5 million in the Championship is pretty much what you would pay for a starting player.

"He hasn't looked great the couple of times that he has started, and he's made a few substitute cameos as well where he's looked fine, but I think it's too early to judge him, because he's not had a run of games, he's not had a chance to build up any consistency.

"Obviously, they train together, and they know how each other play, but it's different when you get on the pitch and play 90 minutes together against an actual competitive team.

"I think it's just going to take him time to settle into that position, because Milan has been incredible in that position for a couple of seasons now. He's got very big boots to fill whenever he has to fill them.

"He was amazing out on loan with Preston the season before; they absolutely loved him. They were upset that we signed him. I know they wanted to sign him permanently.

"I do think he will come good. I think he's been used as a winger and a wing-back a couple of times. I don't know if he is that comfortable there and wants to primarily play as a right-back.

"Let's not forget, we played against a very good Preston team that are also pushing for automatic promotion, so it's not like we were playing against minnows and he had a shocker against them.

"He had a tough game against tough opponents, so I'm not reading too much into it.

"I don't know how many more chances he is going to get to cement his place. It's highly unlikely that he is going to take Milan's place unless Milan leaves.

"We will see what happens in January; there might be some more bids coming in for Milan.

"I'm fairly confident from what I have seen so far that Kesler-Hayden can step up once he gets a good run of games behind him and gets used to his role in the team.

Kaine Kesler-Hayden has struggled to displace Milan van Ewijk in the Coventry City side

With head coach Lampard preferring to deploy a 4-2-3-1 shape, there has only been room for one at right-back this season, with Van Ewijk more often than not being chosen in that role.

The Dutchman has started 18 of Coventry's 20 league games this season, but missed the Sky Blues' trip to Preston on Tuesday night, with Kesler-Hayden coming in to replace him.

Interestingly, Lampard chose to set up in a 3-4-2-1 shape in this match, with Kesler-Hayden playing as a right wing-back, and despite Coventry leading the game and Preston down to ten men, Daniel Jebbison snatched a late goal to draw the game 1-1.

Kesler-Hayden has caused a stir online among Coventry supporters over his ineffectiveness in replacing Van Ewijk for this fixture, and as long as the Dutchman remains at the club, he will struggle to nail down that position as his own.

But given time and a run of games, which may only come when the flying Dutchman departs the club for pastures new, Kesler-Hayden may fare better - whether that happens in January or next summer though remains to be seen, if it happens at all.