Eight wins from Coventry’s previous nine matches restored the Sky Blues as runaway leaders, their promotion back to the Premier League increasingly viewed as a formality with less than four weeks of the season remaining.
Hull are among the automatic promotion hopefuls who have stuttered below them and, while they dropped points to relegation-battling Oxford United three days earlier, the Tigers highlighted just how hard Lampard’s side will have to work to get over the line.
The hosts were quick to showcase their own promotion credentials with a brand of relentless attacking football that had Coventry under huge early pressure.
After Cody Drameh found himself on the end of two chances inside the first five minutes, Joe Gelhardt sent a shot just wide for the Tigers.
Hull’s biggest chance of the first half, however, came from a goalkeeping mistake after Carl Rushworth clattered into team-mate Liam Kitching as he tried to pluck a teasing cross from the air.
And while the ball fell invitingly for John Egan in the box, Kitching was able to recover and reposition himself for a goal-saving block while Rushworth was still lying on the ground.
Coventry improved after that scare but failed to trouble Hull keeper Ivor Pandur at any stage.
Containment remained the aim for Coventry after the break when Matt Grimes was booked for cynically pulling Amir Hadziahmetovic back as the Bosnia-Herzegovina international threatened to spring free.
With video assistant referee [VAR] technology not in use in the Championship, the most decisive moment of the second half, when the ball struck Coyle’s arm in the box, was missed and barely disputed.
Beyond that, Coventry failed to generate a second-half shot on target while Hull were limited to tame efforts from Mohamed Belloumi and Gelhardt.
