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Premier League Teams - Should we be embarassed?


tinman85

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I think it all comes down to the "footballing backwater" tag. We need to start attracting some star quality as well as producing it.

The stadium is ready, we used to have Tammy which got us a bit of coverage and our kids are building up their careers.

Perhaps SL should start paying Journos to cover us in the national papers. Also, and I hate to suggest it, but make inroads with Murdoch so we can get more influence on Sky.

I feel dirty.

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Should we be embarrassed? It's an interesting question. The answer for me though, is abundantly clear, when you see just one name on the list of clubs who have made it....

Swindon Town.

For them to have done it (twice if not for financial irregularities) is not only embarrassing, it's a crime.

 

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3 hours ago, tinman85 said:

Burnley, Palace, Brighton, Hudds or Reading, Bmuff, Swansea, Stoke....the list goes on! Take away the top 7 and perhaps Newcastle and West Ham it is a real lower league division.

Should we be embarrassed when we also look at clubs like Barnsley, Bradford, Cardiff and Hull making it to the premier league where as we as a club are arguably bigger or on a par with those listed, but continuously fail to achieve a promotion push to the top flight.

I wonder whether we need to look at our approach to signings, management teams, academies etc. Where has SL failed where these clubs have succeeded? Interesting debate. 

 

 

 

3 hours ago, The Gasbuster said:

Don't forget Watford, a club certainly no bigger than us.

They keep on sacking managers, yet hold on to their P.L  place.

How can you fail to mention Wigan & Blackpool..? Maybe even Swindon. Oldham, Luton(maybe before the prem..?) etc 

I'm sure Preston feel similarly frustrated. 

Unfortunately, every new club (I like to see new clubs get there) that makes it, makes it harder for those that remain, due to finance.

Anyway, if we feel aggrieved, just imagine how the gas feel, being a bigger club than us, you know..!

 

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57 minutes ago, Septic Peg said:

I think it all comes down to the "footballing backwater" tag. We need to start attracting some star quality as well as producing it.

The stadium is ready, we used to have Tammy which got us a bit of coverage and our kids are building up their careers.

Perhaps SL should start paying Journos to cover us in the national papers. Also, and I hate to suggest it, but make inroads with Murdoch so we can get more influence on Sky.

I feel dirty.

Being media darlings hasn't won Leeds promotion back to the PL though has it?

I don't think we are seen as a footballing backwater. To be honest I think we are seen as a soft club for mercenaries. Clubs we buy from know we can be messed about and bent over a barrell, agents know for their players and players know coming in here they can lift the foot off the gas. Now, having said that, I think this is and will become a thing of the past. It certainly was true but I think we have as a club become a lot more shrewd. Nonetheless it still needs shaking off.

I think what holds us back is at board room level. It was too wet behind the ears for too long and heart ruled head. This set in place our relegation to League One which was in hindsight absolutely necessary. I think those lessons have been held on to and rather than learned from have been burned from. We are now reluctant to buy in worthy experience, we are now too focussed on buying cheap or buying for the long term and totally forgetting about the short term. I think I can give a great example.

Last summer we buy a defender who quite clearly has really significant potential (Magnusson). However the feeling is he will not play that much this season. We also buy Taylor Moore too. Our only other CB acquisition then was a Swede on a free transfer who had history of injuries and as it happens turned out to be a turnip. Now I am not moaning about signing either HM or TM, great and just what we want to see. However, the season previous we nearly went down and our defence was absolutely powderpuff. So the thinking in the summer was let's spend good money on players for the future, but for the season ahead lets take a gamble on someone with dodgy availability. Is it just me who finds this absolutely insane?!

Frankly I think the board are all or nothing. It's either paying stupidly over the odds and long term contracts for the short term or they completely neglect the short term and season ahead until January. There's far too many extremes in approach, too quick to abandon ideas and far too silo'd once an idea has been taken.

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@29AR no, you are not alone! The crocked Swede was an interesting one. Another "punt" that did not work out. But this was Johnson's judgement, surely, not the board's doing?

Someone on the board might though have asked him: "so, Lee. What happens if Flint breaks a bone in September, and Leeds were right about (the Swede's injury)?"

 

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There seem to me to be two types of team that make it up. One is the side with money or with a couple of star quality players who already have the know how to play their way out of the Championship. The other is the workmanlike side where the manager gets them all playing together and they punch above their weight. Either way once they reach the promised land its very difficult to hang on to their elevated status. Palace and Swansea and, this season, Newcastle are examples of the first. Burnley were a good example of the second, and Huddersfield will be if they make it.  My point is we're definitively not in the first category and top players won't come here because of it....Dwight Gayle as a good example. Neither do we appear to have a manager to galvanise a run of the mill bunch of players into a unit full of self belief. Which is more likely to happen? I can't see SL funding a multi million team build, it looks as though the plan is to build from youth. So whatever the fans want, they will have to be patient and hope over the next 4 or 5 seasons we can build a side which can mount a serious challenge.  And pray for  a Tammy 2 to make the journey a bit more fun along the way. 

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1 hour ago, Septic Peg said:

I think it all comes down to the "footballing backwater" tag. We need to start attracting some star quality as well as producing it.

The stadium is ready, we used to have Tammy which got us a bit of coverage and our kids are building up their careers.

Perhaps SL should start paying Journos to cover us in the national papers. Also, and I hate to suggest it, but make inroads with Murdoch so we can get more influence on Sky.

I feel dirty.

Every reason (or excuse) put forward by club loyalists (or SL loyalists), those who dislike criticising, too strongly, if at all, the club and our generous but unsuccessful majority owner, every reason - like "football backwater" - can be countered with an example of a club exposing said reason/excuse for the nonsense that it is.

Football backwater (players won't come here) - Swansea, Bournemouth (Blackpool, Swindon)

Old ground - Blackpool, Swindon, Barnsley, Bournemouth

Up against parachute payments - Blackpool, Middlesbrough, Brighton, Hull (first time), Cardiff, Swansea (this list goes on)

Up against great clubs like Forest, Wednesday, Leeds etc - not a hindrance to all those mentioned above, and other "lesser" clubs too.

It's a tough league - blah blah blah. Yes, it is, let's go back to L1.

 

Think of a reason, an obstacle, and there is a club that has overcome the very same. With the ground as it is now, and all the "mod cons" we now have in place, we really are running out of reasons/excuses. It does require a bit of luck, too, and had we had a big slice of it in 2008, SL might well have had at least one PL season to his name.

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Another list you could make @Jack Dawe would be clubs that have made it to the Prem from the basement, overtaking us along the way:

Hull City, Swansea City, Cardiff City, Fulham and Bournemouth.

None of them fashionable clubs and all did it a different way, but why aren't we aspiring to be like them and instead saying things like "well, we're 17th in the Championship which is about where we should be"?

Well, our average crowd is up in the top 10 of the Championship now. As you say, the excuses are running out...

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49 minutes ago, 1953 said:

There seem to me to be two types of team that make it up. One is the side with money or with a couple of star quality players who already have the know how to play their way out of the Championship. The other is the workmanlike side where the manager gets them all playing together and they punch above their weight. Either way once they reach the promised land its very difficult to hang on to their elevated status. Palace and Swansea and, this season, Newcastle are examples of the first. Burnley were a good example of the second, and Huddersfield will be if they make it.  My point is we're definitively not in the first category and top players won't come here because of it....Dwight Gayle as a good example. Neither do we appear to have a manager to galvanise a run of the mill bunch of players into a unit full of self belief. Which is more likely to happen? I can't see SL funding a multi million team build, it looks as though the plan is to build from youth. So whatever the fans want, they will have to be patient and hope over the next 4 or 5 seasons we can build a side which can mount a serious challenge.  And pray for  a Tammy 2 to make the journey a bit more fun along the way. b

Tammy 2?

Just keep Ron Swanson under watch.

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1 hour ago, Jack Dawe said:

@29AR no, you are not alone! The crocked Swede was an interesting one. Another "punt" that did not work out. But this was Johnson's judgement, surely, not the board's doing?

Someone on the board might though have asked him: "so, Lee. What happens if Flint breaks a bone in September, and Leeds were right about (the Swede's injury)?"

 

I just don't know who's judgment to be honest Jack.

Personally, I have a strong gut feeling of 'upstairs' being far more hands on than we are led to believe. Clearly SC broke the mould, but too many outgoing managers have alluded to boardroom influence, SL taking half-time team talks and addressing the players, we had David James being bought by one man and then we had not so long ago managers will not select transfers because managers come and go, Director of Football will do that role.

The jobs for the boys, too many going out without fanfare or acknowledgement (most recently Des Taylor for instance).

It is all conjecture of course, but there's a lot of smoke for there to be no fire.

IMO, which is in no-way ITK, I think the reason we go through so many managers without any really excelling (SC aside) could well be because the manager has less influence than we are led to believe.

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36 minutes ago, 29AR said:

IMO, which is in no-way ITK, I think the reason we go through so many managers without any really excelling (SC aside) could well be because the manager has less influence than we are led to believe.

Sounds very logical when you say it like that! And of course the one who we're led to believe had more influence than most over the years at AG (SC) had the most success, bar GJ, who as I understand it had SL wrapped around his little finger.

It will be interested to see if, or rather when, this current project fails where SL will turn next.

The "outsiders" he has appointed over the years, namely Coppell, McInnes and O'Driscoll have simply not worked out.

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2 hours ago, 29AR said:

I just don't know who's judgment to be honest Jack.

Personally, I have a strong gut feeling of 'upstairs' being far more hands on than we are led to believe. Clearly SC broke the mould, but too many outgoing managers have alluded to boardroom influence, SL taking half-time team talks and addressing the players, we had David James being bought by one man and then we had not so long ago managers will not select transfers because managers come and go, Director of Football will do that role.

The jobs for the boys, too many going out without fanfare or acknowledgement (most recently Des Taylor for instance).

It is all conjecture of course, but there's a lot of smoke for there to be no fire.

IMO, which is in no-way ITK, I think the reason we go through so many managers without any really excelling (SC aside) could well be because the manager has less influence than we are led to believe.

The picture you paint there (SL "taking half-time team talks"??) is frightening, depressing. I hope you're wrong!

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Nothing to be embarrassed about at our club. Football isn't an excact science . Lots of great memories in my time watching football at Ashton Gate , many mistakes as well . The merry go round of football, it ain't no different at any other league club.  At least we don't play in blue and white quarters . 

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Not embarrassed but definitely bewildered and angered (hence the user name).

It's obviously a complex matter.  Let's not get caught up too much in a 'moment in time' frame shot.  Outside of the top seven all will fall back down at some point.  

So, what have the top seven got in common?  If you look at a population heat map you will see the mass of population spreads from the south east, up through the east and west Midlands and up to the north west.  All the top seven are based in that spread.  

What else? All the top seven have had periods of historic success; they all have a winning legacy.

Let's then look at Bristol City.  A club from a transient, middle class city; thorough bred second, third and fourth generation Bristolians are in a minority in Bristol.  The legacy passed down is minimal.  Football, especially local football, is not a priority for your average Bristol dweller - or the council.  We excel generally, we are a highly  desirable place where people want to come to live.  We are a cool city, football aside.

This is not an apologist post; Bristol City from the eighth (?) largest populated city underachieved long before Steve Lansdown.  It is rediculous that we do not have a club regularly in the top flight.

Other reasons include location and reputation but I believe it is largely down to culture.  Being a two club city is also something we could've done without. 

 

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6 hours ago, Jack Dawe said:

The picture you paint there (SL "taking half-time team talks"??) is frightening, depressing. I hope you're wrong!

Now you've quoted me in hindsight that may have been hyperbole. 

It's certainly been reported, and widely, that SL has on occasions addressed the players half time and after games - I think there may even be a LJ quote confirming. Whether he took half time team talk or had a few minutes, I don't know and so for that perhaps I gave it a slant which I can't substantiate. 

So yeah, perhaps the picture was with a very broad brush-stroke.

I'm probably coming across as a very anti-SL person. Don't get me wrong, if someone were minded to go through my posting history there's probably quite a bit venom for him at times. However there's also significant admiration and I totally believe his intentions could not be better. The man deserves that stand and, in time if he'll accept it I would agree the ground too.

But ultimately I'm not convinced by his abilities to lead a football club nor his ability to surround himself with the best persons (in the football world). I don't think that's an unfair criticism: he hasn't had anything like value for money on his outgoings; we've not really progressed as a football team*, he's been here a damn long time and overseen a lot and the lists that you were able to produce show chairman able to achieve far more with far less and in less time. 

 

* I say football team. Before people quote the infrastructure of course we have progressed immeasurably... but that's not down to any sense of ability, it's down to a chequebook and any single one of us with his bankroll could have achieved that. So I think it's distortive to judge his tenure on that. 

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15 hours ago, The Gasbuster said:

Don't forget Watford, a club certainly no bigger than us.

They keep on sacking managers, yet hold on to their P.L  place.

no bigger than us? you are right, you can add another ten names to that list, other posters have named them I only wish I could answer the question, why not us. in truth if I could I would be a wealthy man and not living in a small terraced house, we do seemed to be cursed, reading are the club that most annoy me smaller city, smaller ground, less support etc etc yet here they are again with a chance to yet again gain promotion to the premier league, it's got to be bad choices at every level what else can it be to be this unlucky for so many years and to have under achieved for so long we have to accept that with the best will in the world the people who make the decisions are making the wrong calls time and again. 

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23 minutes ago, exAtyeoMax said:

I heard that he did, when we played Burton…

I doubt he went into the changing room and starting telling the players about tactics. If  SL did address the players at half time, more likely he was trying to motivate them by pointing out how well looked after they are at Ashton Gate, and warning them not to take the ****. (I hope so anyway.)

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I think everyone has to want it, really want it and believe the Premiership is achievable. This belief should be easier, more realistic, now the team's previously mentioned have done it. I'm hoping our players witnessing the scenes at Brighton will want the same for us. Infact I'm hoping the SL, Board members, the Manager and the fans will want that. I didn't begrudge Brighton, but I wanted to be where they were. If it was someone like Cardiff for example I could not have gone to the game and watch them celebrate.

I agree our Council and the fact we are a two club city doesn't help. At Brighton they had bunting up at their train station and flags everywhere, imagine doing that at TM and risk upsetting the Gasholes!

I've commented yesterday how we need to be tougher, physically tougher but just as important we have to be mentally strong and have desire too. How many players know they are unlikely to play in the Premiership, they didn't seem to have the belief they were Championship worthy for many matches this season. Hopefully now we have got a lot of young players they have that ambition, and another years experience, not just settling for one last pay cheque. 

At the rugby SL came onto the pitch at HT and I can't remember his exact words but something like 'this season has been a disappointment, I'm not going to hide the fact, but Bristol will bounce back bigger and better soon'. I want strong words with meaning to be said from him about football too, realistic ambition and aknowledgement about past mistakes. Basically I want some hope not more despair.

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21 hours ago, Septic Peg said:

I think it all comes down to the "footballing backwater" tag. We need to start attracting some star quality as well as producing it.

The stadium is ready, we used to have Tammy which got us a bit of coverage and our kids are building up their careers.

Perhaps SL should start paying Journos to cover us in the national papers. Also, and I hate to suggest it, but make inroads with Murdoch so we can get more influence on Sky.

I feel dirty.

We can't be more of a backwater than Cardiff, surely?

I just think we are perceived as slow witted yokels by them fancy dan London types (could have a point).

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11 hours ago, WTFiGO!?! said:

Not embarrassed but definitely bewildered and angered (hence the user name).

It's obviously a complex matter.  Let's not get caught up too much in a 'moment in time' frame shot.  Outside of the top seven all will fall back down at some point.  

So, what have the top seven got in common?  If you look at a population heat map you will see the mass of population spreads from the south east, up through the east and west Midlands and up to the north west.  All the top seven are based in that spread.  

What else? All the top seven have had periods of historic success; they all have a winning legacy.

Let's then look at Bristol City.  A club from a transient, middle class city; thorough bred second, third and fourth generation Bristolians are in a minority in Bristol.  The legacy passed down is minimal.  Football, especially local football, is not a priority for your average Bristol dweller - or the council.  We excel generally, we are a highly  desirable place where people want to come to live.  We are a cool city, football aside.

This is not an apologist post; Bristol City from the eighth (?) largest populated city underachieved long before Steve Lansdown.  It is rediculous that we do not have a club regularly in the top flight.

Other reasons include location and reputation but I believe it is largely down to culture.  Being a two club city is also something we could've done without. 

 

Being à two club city didn't hurt Manchester or Liverpool.

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