Norwich continued their superb start under David Wagner with a 4-2 victory at Coventry. Having thrashed Preston 4-0 in Wagner’s first league game in charge, the Canaries raced into a 3-0 lead inside 18 minutes through a Michael Rose own goal and strikes by Onel Hernández and Josh Sargent. Coventry reduced the deficit to one with quickfire goals from Jamie Allen and Kasey Palmer – the first five goals came inside the opening 26 minutes – before Kieran Dowell added a fourth for Norwich in the 65th minute. João Ferreira rescued a point as Watford recorded a 1-1 draw at home to Rotherham but the result did little to help their chances of automatic promotion. In addition to Ferreira’s superb equaliser from 20 yards, which cancelled out Shane Ferguson’s first-half opener, Watford clipped the visitors’ woodwork on two occasions on what proved to be a frustrating afternoon for the Vicarage Road crowd. Slaven Bilic’s side sit third but are 13 points behind second-placed Sheffield United and an almost unbridgeable 18 behind the leader, Burnley. Wigan remain rooted to the bottom after suffering a second home defeat to Luton in the space of four days, with the Hatters easing to a 2-0 win. Having won at DW Stadium in midweek to advance to the fourth round of the FA Cup, Luton started the brighter and opened the scoring on 11 minutes through Harry Cornick. The visitors doubled their lead nine minutes after the restart when Elijah Adebayo collected a return pass from Cornick before slotting past Ben Amos with ease, leaving the Wigan manager Kolo Touré without a win from his last seven games. Dwight Gayle ended his 50-match goal drought as Stoke claimed their first points of 2023 with a 4-0 thrashing of Reading. Will Smallbone’s smart early finish paved the way for the Potters, with the influential Tyrese Campbell doubling his side’s advantage in the second half before Jacob Brown added a late third. An impressive performance was rounded off by Gayle, who scored his first goal since December 2020. Preston inflicted a fifth straight league defeat on Birmingham in a 2-1 win at St Andrew’s in which the referee Rebecca Welch made history. In the first Championship game to be refereed in full by a female official, first league goals of the season for Ryan Ledson and the captain, Alan Browne, in the opening 15 minutes won it for Ryan Lowe’s side. The substitute Lukas Jutkiewicz made it a nervy finish when he reduced the arrears late on, but North End held on. Jay Fulton’s late equaliser earned Swansea a point from a 1-1 draw at QPR. Jamal Lowe’s goal on his full debut – against his former club – put Rangers ahead after 27 minutes. The Welsh side hit back from their first shot on goal, however, scoring a well-worked goal with nine minutes remaining. Blackburn battled to a 1-1 draw with Bristol City at Ashton Gate despite having their captain, Daniel Ayala, sent off. The visitors went in front after 54 minutes through Bradley Dack, but City levelled 14 minutes later when the Rovers goalkeeper Thomas Kaminski could only a parry a Zak Vyner shot from outside the box and Antoine Semenyo slotted home the rebound. Blackburn were reduced to 10 men in the 74th minute when Ayala received a second yellow card for pulling back Nahki Wells as he threatened to break clear, but the visitors reorganised well and deserved their point against improving opponents on a decent run. Cardiff’s slide towards the relegation zone gathered pace with a 1-0 home defeat against Millwall. Following a pre-match protest against the club’s owner Vincent Tan, Tom Bradshaw’s first-half strike condemned the Bluebirds to another loss. Blackpool’s game against Huddersfield was postponed because of a frozen pitch.