Coventry and Luton meet with Wembley a distant memory

Mark Robins and Rob Edwards meet this weekend in very different circumstances from 18 months ago

Oh, the EFL. How we love you for being the gift that just keeps giving.

The Championship lead changed hands three times last weekend and one of Sunderland, Burnley or Leeds United will end this week top of the pile.

At the bottom, Cardiff City have gone from losers to movers with three wins and a draw while in League One Wycombe Wanderers, after losing their first two games to Wrexham and Birmingham City are now sitting in third place behind, well, Birmingham City and Wrexham.

Meanwhile, in League Two no-one in the top six levels of English football has a better record across their last half a dozen games than Port Vale.

Skies darkening for Coventry and Luton

Luton were promoted to the Premier League just 18 months ago

Football, like life, has a nasty habit of bringing you back down to earth and it is very rare the landing is a soft one.

Eighteen months ago Coventry City and Luton Town came face-to-face at Wembley with a place in the Premier League at stake.

The Hatters took the honours and then plenty of plaudits for the way they came so close to staying in the top flight.

Meanwhile, Coventry recovered from that Wembley defeat to finish a creditable ninth in the Championship last season and come within the width of a toenail of beating Manchester United in an FA Cup semi-final.

But time and football don't stand still and this weekend the two meet with the Sky Blues in the relegation zone and Luton just two points above the dotted line.

Mark Robins' side have lost four of their past six league matches with the manager - the longest-serving in the EFL - asking fans to stay positive despite a poor start to the campaign.

Ellis Simms managed 19 goals in all competitions last season but has found the net just twice so far - they need him to start firing.

Luton, like all teams fresh from the Premier League and awash with parachute payments, were expected to make a much better fist of things than they are at present.

While fellow relegated sides Burnley and Sheffield United are among the front runners, Rob Edwards has watched his team win just three of their opening 11 games.

Just like Coventry they have goalscoring issues, especially on the road, as only Stoke City and Plymouth Argyle have found the target fewer times than the Hatters' two on their travels.

You wonder what the consequences might be for the defeated on Saturday.

Friday night chimes at Fratton Park

Callum Lang scored the winner for Portsmouth in their first victory of the season at QPR last weekend

It took Portsmouth 10 games to record a first win on their return to the Championship, one game later and they're bottom of the table.

Failure to follow-up their victory at QPR and going down to a resurgent Cardiff merely highlights the challenge facing manager John Mousinho.

It's 12 and a half years since Pompey last won a home game in the Championship and 24 since they beat Sheffield Wednesday at Fratton Park.

For their part, Wednesday's great escape of last season might need a repeat visit the way things are going for Danny Rohl with just one win from five on the road and only three goals scored in that time.

These are two big clubs full of tradition but their glories are but distant memories.

Cardiff are lighting the way for the strugglers though, with stand-in boss Omer Riza leading them to three wins and a draw ahead of a trip to West Brom.

Could a gap be appearing at the top?

Sunderland, Burnley and Leeds have all topped the table in the last week

It wouldn't be an EFL feature if we didn't show the top of the Championship, such has been the tight nature of it in the opening weeks, but there might just be signs the top three are pulling away.

Leeds can return to the summit with a lunchtime win at Bristol City on Saturday while Burnley and Sunderland could also finish the day top of the pile with victories over QPR and Oxford respectively.

Sheffield United's unbeaten start to the season was ended by Leeds last Friday and was followed by a midweek defeat at Middlesbrough - they'll look to get back on the horse at home to Stoke.

Wycombe blooming under Matt

Matt Bloomfield replaced Gareth Ainsworth as Wycombe manager in February 2023

Replacing Gareth Ainsworth as Wycombe manager was never going to be an easy task but it probably helps if you're a bit of a club legend - enter Matt Bloomfield.

With more than 550 appearances as a player for Wycombe, Bloomfield had managed Colchester for just 27 games before returning to his first love to takeover at Adams Park.

A strong finish to the end of last season had many looking optimistically to the start of this campaign and successive 3-2 defeats by Birmingham and Wrexham to kick-off with showed signs they might be competitive.

Since that loss to Birmingham, Wycombe have won seven and drawn two of their subsequent nine games.

"I don't really look at the table - I just want us to be the best we can be. We just need to keep being focused and keep being relentless," Bloomfield told BBC Three Counties Radio.

"What I do know about football is that pride comes before a fall and we need to retain our focus and humility. We've done nothing yet.

"My desire is to stay here for a long time evolving the club into the best it can be."

Wycombe meet Leyton Orient on Saturday with leaders Birmingham visiting fourth-placed Mansfield Town at lunchtime and Wrexham heading to Charlton Athletic.

Trouble at Burton

Burton failed to win any of their 11 League One games under Mark Robinson

Seven days ago many EFL pundits were highlighting Saturday's League One match between Cambridge United and Burton Albion as being potentially the breaking point for either Garry Monk or Mark Robinson.

One week later Monk has guided Cambridge to successive victories and Robinson has been sacked.

Seven defeats in a row in all competitions and just four points from a possible 33 in the league proved too much for Burton's relatively new Nordic owners.

The Brewers are now the only EFL side without a league victory and are looking for a fifth permanent manager in barely two years.

"I'm on a course with Mark at the moment and have sent him the odd text this season to try to keep his spirits up," former Wycombe manager Gareth Ainsworth told the BBC's 72+: The EFL Podcast.

"New owners come in and want to play a certain way but how long are we going to keep going with a perception of how someone plays rather than a win rate of results and success?" added Ainsworth.

Moore creates a Vale of fears for opponents

Port Vale have won their last four League Two matches

Alongside Wycombe, Port Vale are the form side in the top six levels of English football.

Sixteen points from their last six games, including four wins on the bounce has taken Darren Moore's side to the top of the League Two table.

Vale host AFC Wimbledon this weekend but their success has been built on the best away record in the division with five victories from their seven games.

Moore signed 16 players in the summer with many of those catching the eye already, none more so than Irish striker Ruari Paton whose arrival from Queen's Park looks like a smart piece of business.

Walsall are the EFL's top scorers with 26 goals and seven scored in their last two games as they head to Accrington Stanley.

Four defeats from six has Carlisle second from bottom going into a game at home to Cheltenham Town, while back-to-back defeats have kept Morecambe bottom of the league ahead of a Saturday lunchtime meeting with Chesterfield.

So, not much going on this weekend really...

You can follow live text coverage of all the EFL action across this weekend on the BBC Sport website, starting with Portsmouth v Sheffield Wednesday from 19:30 BST on Friday.