Coventry City manager Tony Mowbray has said that his first priority is getting out of League One after the JPT format was changed.
Speaking about the new competition format which will see Premier League B teams allowed into the competition, the City boss, said to the Coventry Telegraph: “I think it’s just the first step in trying to integrate the Premier League teams somewhere down the line into the Football League.
“I haven’t got a problem with it. They are academy teams who will be very well coached and the football is not always about the result, rather the development of their players.
“It’s an interesting experiment, I’d have to say, to have Under-21 sides from the likes of Man United, Chelsea or Liverpool against Coventry City or Northampton Town, whoever.
“We’ll see what team we have got before we decide what we put out in it.
“I know the fans will want to win every game and yet the reality of it is if you keep going to the well with the same players they could be burned out by Christmas, so let’s wait and see what sort of squad we have.
“And yet the day we get knocked out because we have played too many young players is a frustrating and disappointing night, of course, so I understand that. You have to balance it with the night when you win at home to secure promotion. Everyone will have forgotten about going out of the JPT in August or September.
“We want to win every competition we go into,” said Mowbray, whose side went out on penalties to Yeovil in the second round last season, having been given a bye in the first.
“It’s great to get to Wembley and some people might think, forget about promotion, put your strongest team out and let’s have a day out at Wembley.
“I know what I want to do; I want to get out of the league. We’d all love to go to Wembley and play in a cup competition, of course we would, but I can’t sit here in the middle of June and say what sort of team we will field because it will depend on how many players we have got and how strong we are as a group.
“It will depend how robust the players are so if we sign players with a history of a few injuries we might have to be careful with them.
“If you have to trust the young players and put them in, as we did at Oldham at the end of the season when they did fine, then so be it.”
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