Five things in EFL: The ups and downs of a manager

Funny thing, football management. One week you are the worst person at a club and the next, walking on water may not be beyond you.

Marti Cifuentes has experienced both ends of the spectrum over the past month as he prepares to take his Leicester side back to an old stomping ground.

For Middlesbrough, the love affair with Kim Hellberg is blooming while you won't hear any complaints from Southampton or Coventry fans.

In League One, the leaders Cardiff City take a five-match winning streak on the road while the top two face off in League Two.

Here are five things to keep an eye on over this pre-Christmas weekend of EFL action.

Three weeks is a long time in football; just ask Leicester City boss Marti Cifuentes.

Two calamitous defensive performances in defeats by Southampton and Sheffield United had the pundits sharpening tongues and pens ready to point out why a change may be needed.

Two wins and some spectacular goals later, the Foxes are back in the race (although they were always within touching distance) and the Spaniard heads to his former club QPR on Saturday (15:00 GMT) with the possibility of breaking into the top six.

Those victories over Derby and Ipswich came either side of a draw at Bristol City which would also have been a win but for surrendering a 2-0 lead - proof that there are still things to work on.

Abdul Fatawu's goal from his own half lit up the win against Ipswich but they cannot rely on moments of brilliance, according to the head coach.

"At the end we cannot forget the things we need to improve, but the way we responded (from the 2-2 draw at Bristol City) was important," he said.

Cifuentes will arrive at Loftus Road on Saturday to find his former club breathing down the Foxes' necks, with a win taking the Rs above Leicester.

A 7-1 battering at Coventry in the August sunshine had many looking at his replacement in the QPR dugout, Julien Stephan, and questioning his appointment.

But here we are in dreary December with the top six within range - who'd be a football manager?

These two have been through a fair bit in recent years.

Coventry have been to the brink of extinction, down to the fourth tier and back to within a penalty kick of a Premier League return.

Southampton dropped as low as League One, went into administration and the least said about last season's Premier League horror show the better.

Brighter times do appear to be here for both.

We are running out of things to say about Coventry this season but here goes - no-one has scored more goals or won more games in the top four tiers of English football than the Sky Blues; they are five points clear at the top and Frank Lampard has won back-to-back manager of the month awards.

But there was a wobble with defeat by Ipswich and a draw at Preston pausing the engraving on the Championship winners' trophy. A perhaps fortunate win over Bristol City last weekend may have got things back on track.

Saturday's trip to Southampton (12:30 GMT) will be another test of their credentials.

A loss at Norwich last time out slowed the Saints' climb towards the top six but only Coventry (19) have taken more points than Tonda Eckert's side's 18 across their past eight games.

"If you have big ambitions for the season you have to be disappointed with Saturday (but) it's important to clear your head," Eckert told BBC Radio Solent. "We'll be fully prepared to go big on Saturday."

At the end of last month some bloke (cough) wrote about Middlesbrough's appointment of Kim Hellberg and whether employing someone with zero experience of English football was a gamble.

Four games and four wins later we appear to have our answer, with Boro tears over the departure of Rob Edwards quickly dried. Rob who?

"I was well received here and everyone has been excellent to me, everyone in the club and around the club, including the supporters, so it's fun to get some wins and to give back," said Hellberg after a 3-1 victory over QPR made it 11 goals scored in his reign and a seven-point cushion now between Boro and third-placed Preston.

Bristol City also had a somewhat painful break-up of their own when Liam Manning, fresh from getting them into the play-offs, departed for a brief and tortuous spell in charge of Norwich.

Gerhard Struber has the inconsistent Robins four points shy of the top six and with both managers keen to attack, we could be in for an Ashton Gate treat (15:00 GMT).

There is a level of expectation which comes with managing Cardiff City; firstly to be the best side in Wales and secondly to be challenging at the top end of whichever league you are playing in.

At the moment the Bluebirds are failing on that first demand - relegation from the Championship last season saw them burn through two managers before appointing Brian Barry-Murphy in the summer to turn things around.

And the former Rochdale boss is succeeding with the second pre-requisite for any Cardiff manager.

Five successive league wins has taken Cardiff four points clear at the top of League One and they ran Chelsea close in a 3-1 midweek loss in the Carabao Cup.

"What a chance Cardiff City have now. I am excited… if they continue playing like that, it's going to be a big season," said former striker Robert Earnshaw after the tie.

In Yousef Salech (10), they boast the division's joint top-scorer and take the best away record to third-placed Lincoln (15:00 GMT) with the Imps eyeing up a chance to go second with a win of their own.

"Judge me after 10 games," said Notts County boss Martin Paterson after his appointment in June was met with a lukewarm reaction by supporters.

After 10 games they were 12th - not great, not a disaster - but given Paterson's only previous managerial experience was a 20-game spell in charge of Burton which produced 12 defeats and only five wins, the jury was definitely out.

He maybe did not help himself by admitting he knew little about how data was applied in football, given he had joined a club where data analytics is key.

"If you ask me about data, I wouldn't be able to give you an answer that makes sense because I don't deal with the data – I don't understand it," he told BBC Sport.

"I am a person who works quite simply on the football side of things. I don't pretend to have skillsets that I don't."

As it turns out, he knows quite a lot about that 'football side of things' with his side on an impressive three-match winning run which has taken them within two points of the leaders and Saturday's opponents, Walsall (12:30 GMT).

The Saddlers' own three-game winning burst was halted by a draw with Shrewsbury last weekend and such are the vagaries of League Two, defeat for either of these two could see them outside the automatic promotion places by five o'clock on Saturday.

BBC Sport will have extensive live text coverage of the EFL this weekend starting with Swansea v Wrexham (20:00 GMT) on Friday, and the evening's League One and League Two fixtures.