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As do some of the anti-Johnson City brigade who took great delight earlier in this thread at drawing attention to those Sunderland fans.

And I can't begin to understand the dislike bordering hatred for a chap who gave me some of the most memorable moments in my time supporting City and who established us as a top half second tier club for the first time in 50 years. I watch his career with interest, as I do many other players and managers who've left City. But I'm not that fussed what Sunderland achieve. So at least we agree on one thing

If you’d checked, you’d have seen that this whole thread was begun by the Lee Johnson Deprecation Society, also still going strong. 8 months after he was sacked.

One could argue that here it was not so much that over time the players saw through him as maybe that here he took over a team that were largely devoted to the previous manager who had brought them success. That was a strong unit to win over, not just for LJ but for players coming into the club. Successful teams often need breaking up as they can be resistant to change not just towards the manager but also from incoming players. Has Klopp now become ‘streaky’ with players that have enjoyed success? Is it that the players have seen through him or that a clique of players are more self confident and and less inclined to take advice and instruction. At Sunderland I suspect players who have not enjoyed recent success at the club would be more likely to respond positively to a new manager as ours did to Cotts when he first came in.

I don't hate the chap. He's just not very likeable I'm afraid. Positively irritating - David Brent - obnoxiously full of himself. In his last 18 months or so he took the joy out of watching City for me. I find it amazing that others don't feel that... ...but we are all City fans. Nigel Pearson - who has managed only 100 or so games more than LJ but has achieved so much more - is a massive upgrade. Onwards and upwards!

Mods, can you arrange to have this moved over to the Sunderland fans forum? Or create a separate LJ forum, please, so those of us in 2021 can't see it listed?

LJ is doing well with Sunderland and I'm pleased for him. He tried his best for us and gave everything he had. It was right that he went when he did and I wouldn't swop him for Nigel, but he did deliver us 4 years of top-half championship football and an amazing cup run during his tenure, for which I thank him.

You'd be hard pressed to find the blue side of the river now.

To the tune of "19" by Paul Hardcastle........ "In 1965, Eastville seemed like just another football ground, but it wasn't, it was different in many ways and so were those who did the squatting"

Sssh. Don't say that. You'll offend some of the OTIB posters who make an early decision and stick with it. These are the same people that write players off after a poor 45 minutes, or believe young players like Massengo are the finished article at 19, and can't possibly improve.

The Sunderland fans slagging him off look like knobheads right now

I watched the Roman Kemp documentary, "Our Silent Emergency", on BBC One last night, focusing on the high number of young men who commit suicide. Heartbreaking to hear from those who had lost a dear friend or loved one. I thought that it was a brave choice of topic, as suicide is still very much a taboo subject in ordinary conversation. It's available on i-Player if anybody is interested.

The words that stand out for me here are "DELAY" "SENSIBLE" "STATEMENT" How very apt!! - They have been delaying sensible statements on building a stadium since 1965. When talking of a stadium everyone involved at that hopelessly needy club seems to prefer to spout crap - actually even in this report the directors couldn't help themselves from resorting to ridiculous hyperbole - "They have bold ideas for developing the stadium as the biggest sports centre in the south west", "I feel sure we could get the backing of some top business people in the area - this thing could mushroom straight away" The common thread in all of their stadium plans for the last 55 years seems to be that "someone else pays" - the reason that "someone else pays" is because they are broke, the reason they are broke is mainly because their fans cant be arsed to turn up. They are far from the most loyal, special fans in the country/world/universe unless you count the level of North Korean like fanta - sy. Still the fruit market is nearly ready right? Since its opening in late 2021 they must be doing final fit and finish stuff? Anyone got pictures or drone Footage like the Brentford fans had?

All of that is fine, people are allowed not to rate him, that's not the point really. The only thing I'd object to in your post is why you've felt the need to shoehorn in that you couldn't 'stand him' as a player - it's irrelevant to him as a manager. The aspect people are objecting to is the way people seemed gleeful that in early Feb it seemed he was irritating the fans, but haven't said anything since Sunderland have turned it round. That's the point where it feels a bit personal and weird. If you can dish it out, and it's not a personal thing, surely you can give a bit of credit where it's due.

New stadium noise...in 1965! This explains so much about them. No wonder their fans are all doo-lally. I think I would be following a club that had let me down so much. So glad I grew up on the red side of town. I think if I was on the blue side, I'd have crossed the damn river by now and said 'goodnight Irene' for the last time. Nineteen-sixty-bloody-five. England has actually won the World Cup since then!

'Rovers are on their way to League 2 The G*s are going to do it again, We can't stop them, Joey can't stop them, The scum from Filton Avenue....'

Good luck to him. LJ didn’t take us too much further forward in his time here but it wasn’t the disaster that some make out either. His CV prior to us was ok but some could understandably not see past his connection with SL. What I would say is he is at a bigger club, although in a lower league & if they do go up I’d expect them to avoid being in a relegation scrap next season, which is usually the fate of many promoted side (look at this season’s table, all 3 are in the bottom 5, 2 will probably go back down). Final point, our last head coach will never get offered a job like Sunderland, will he?

They currently only have one fit centre half too, and he went off injured on Sunday, so big injury problems but getting the results required. 9 wins and a draw from their last 10 games, and 5 clean sheets on the bounce with barely any fit defenders. Sunderland fans, understandably, very impressed.

We've spent years and years in that league and won it a grand total of once in 40+ years and often as a 'big' team in the league. To make out LJ should win it easily with Sunderland is foolish at best.

Really interesting angle....??????

Amazed to see the Lee Johnson Appreciation Society still going strong. BREAKING NEWS: he was sacked 8 months ago!

They lost to Shrewsbury and since won 9 games (including at Wembley) and drew 1. Surely that's more than just fine?

Arguably that's exactly what he's done. Sunderland were going through a couple of sticky results before this run relative to a club of their size in league 1 (hence the thread). His managerial honeymoon grace period period was over and a few fans were starting to get a bit frustrated after losing to Shrewsbury. Since then their form has been fantastic.

Ditto, I used to get the No 19 bus which went direct from Straits Parade, Fishponds to The Gate...cost about 6d each way.

And those posters who on page one were taking great delight in the negative comments seem to have gone very quiet on this thread! If you can give it out, as they did, it’s just good grace if they can return to the thread - admit they were probably a little hasty and acknowledge that he’s actually doing a good job so far.

Chas and Dave could write a song about it. It's lucky for the Gas when the year ends in one.......................

The quote "you can tell the players respect him" shows me that he's not been there long enough yet for his weakness to come to light. LJ is very forward thinking and has a lot going for him but we've all seen what happens when the confidence drops. I'll be interested to see how the players react to him when they begin to struggle and he starts messing with his tactics, making obvious mistakes etc as he did with us. They're still riding that positive air that inspires good run of form, let's see how they react to a run of poor results before we talk about how great LJ is.

Think Sundeland Will play in Championship next season. So far LJ have done a good job with them.

I suppose it's location was good for seeing if anyone was approaching.

Some interesting photos. I particularly liked this one from 1965. Basically Rovers had plans to develop Eastville into a super stadium. Amazingly nothing happened and now, after a series of false starts they’re going to build a super stadium at the fruit market

The loose horse caused a bit of an issue and anything could have happened which just shows why its crazy to back a horse going off at 1/4 over 20+ fences.

Yep, John Major was Prime Minister & I was still (just) in my 20s, I had my vaccine jab at the home of football last week on age (55+) grounds, so that’s how long ago it was. Makes me laugh when their fans comment on the standard at Championship level (saw one saying there was little difference between it & L1), as if they would ever know. They’re an irrelevance now, never see anyone wearing their shirts & bump along as a bottom six third division side in a tented village.

Into The Valley and ended up on The Skids.

And now Salford are a future quiz answer. They’re the shortest reigning champions of any English trophy, at less than 24 hours.

Congrats to LJ - first bit of silverware. I'm sure the Sunderland fans are loving that. Seems to have galvanised Sunderland - got them on the kind of roll that ends up with promotion. I for one would be happy to see him and Sunderland in the championship and on merit too.

Seems he's been bestowed the highest honour Sunderland has to offer. He's had a pizzeria named after him.

Define achievements? He saved us from relegation and turned us into a solid Championship side, challenging in and around the play offs. He got us our best cup run in 30 years, beating the biggest club in the country and going toe to toe with the best team in the world at the time over 2 legs. We played some of the best football I've ever seen from City, especially when you consider the level we were at (Cotts team was fantastic, but it was L1 football) The end was shit, and it was probably the right time for him to go, but it's nonsense to say he didn't achieve anything here.

Potentially, or potentially not. Strange how SL’s cheque book was found after he sacked SC wasn’t it. SC gave us fans the best season in decades, he deserved some loyalty from the owner imo.