LondonBristolian

I utterly agree with this. These debates seem to inevitably collapse into SOD vs Cotterill and that muddies the water so I don't want to go down the road but Cotterill has not impressed me at all and has shown absolutely nothing that suggests to me he can find a way to lift the club and improve our fortunes. I completely agree with how bad the transfer activity and coaching seems to be. We've had the slight improvement of fortunes that clubs tend to get for a few games when they get a new manager but, now that has passed, there is not very much left.

There comes a point though, where the manager has to start doing something about that and I just don't think he is. Obviously it's not SC's fault we're in the position we are but I'm increasingly convinced he's not the man who's going to save us from it. When he was appointed, I genuinely wanted to give him a chance but bizarre team selections, players being dropped for no particular reason, perseverance with formations that don't work and a general lack of ideas are extremely concerning. I'm not normally the first in the 'sack the manager' queue - I was all in favour of giving Johnson, Millen, McInnes and O'Driscoll time to prove themselves (in some cases perhaps wrongly) butI honestly think that the sooner this arrogant, clueless no-mark gets out of our club, the better it'll be all round.

To get someone who can rebuild us over the summer. I know full well that was the plan with SOD last season and it didn't work but it was the wrong manager rather than the wrong plan.

Initially McInnes, Millen and SOD all seemed to be improving things too.

He confirmed he would have been if an opportunity had come up at the right time in the past. He's said several times that he does not want to manage now. Our fans just choose to ignore that repeatedly.

Fair point. I didn't mean to suggest SOD was in any way a golden age. The results were awful for the most part and, as I said, he didn't seem to motivate the squad. What I do think is he brought in a group of players in order to play a certain way and, if we'd got a manger in to build on that, we'd be be in a better position than bringing in a manager who seems to be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. There were, of course, several things that needed to be improved from the SOD era but I'm just not convinced Cotterill is improving them.

Thing is we do need a long-term plan. But there's no point in talking of transition or patience when the manager seems to have no clue of what he's trying to achieve. I really, really don't want him to have more time to make poor signings over the summer.

I'm not sure there even is a short-term answer. We keep trying them and they always end in disaster. One thing I would say is that - having always in the past been in favour of giving managers a chance - I really think it's time to pull the plug on Cotterill. I actually think SOD assembled a promising squad - albeit one that probably wasn't ready and that he struggled to motivate - but I genuinely do not understand what Cotterill is trying to do. The signings have made no sense, Moloney seems to be being forced out of the club at random, our best centre-back is suddenly a right-back and the long-term plan seems to have been scrapped for journeymen singings and random team selections. We need to identify a promising young manager with the ambition and confidence to rebuild the club and give him time to do it. Cotterill is not the answer and is just undoing the few good things that SOD put into place.

Absolutely. A great result last night but we've got to be aiming 8 or 9 points from the next 4 matches. I'm not saying it's easy but it's doable. And I reckon getting those points on the board will put us a long way towards safety. But if standards slip again, we're right back we started.

I don't know why our best centre-back is suddenly playing as a right-back and our best right-back is being used in emergencies only.

I remember a couple of years ago when McInnes picked an utterly baffling line-up away at Southampton and it proved to be a tactical masterstroke as we came away with a 1-0 win. I really hope something similar happens tonight - on paper that line-up concerns me a lot...

I think that is a key point, though and one that a lot of Baldock's detractors are missing. Yes, he misses a lot of chances but much of the reason he scores a lot is because he makes himself available for chances in a way many strikers struggle with. Maynard was a great player of us when on form and a more clinical finisher than Baldock but I don't think he was great at getting himself inside the box and available for the ball and I don't think we'd be creating anywhere near as many chances if we still had Maynard in the side as we do with Baldock. I suspect the number of goals Maynard would get would still be similar as he'd put more of the chances he did get away but I don't reckon Maynard would be out of sight by now on number of goals scored simply because I don't think Maynard would have had anywhere near as many opportunities.

That's a bit much too read into one team selection. Isn't Williams coming back from injury anyway? I'd probably take Williams over Flint but, to be honest, I think we've relied on Williams a lot more heavily than anyone (even him) expected at the start of the season. There's plenty of time for him to force his way back into the picture and hopefully we'll finally have four decent centre-backs...

I think that's harsh - I'd say he succeeded for the most part at Rovers and QPR too, even if ultimately ended on a bit of a sour note with both clubs. He also did a very, very good job at Plymouth before - admittedly - leaving in contentious circumstances. But crucially his last season in Blackpool ended very badly, Palace struggled to promotion based mostly on Freedman's work and then he seems to lose enthusiasm quickly when things went wrong. Holloway's had a good career and up to a couple of years ago, I'd have said - Rovers connection aside - he'd have been an excellent choice. But the Holloway of the last couple of years isn't the Holloway who got Blackpool promoted or did well at Rovers or QPR or Plymouth. I think he'd struggle - and that's nothing to do with his previous allegiances.

"Passion" is a buzzword people who know nothing about football use to describe an imaginary quality. In answer to your question, I'd say the ability to motivate players and tactical awareness to get the best out of a limited group on limited resources.

Has nobody followed Holloway's career over the past couple of years? Stuff the Rovers connection - the guy admitted to losing enthusiasm for the game at Blackpool and threw the towel in at Palace when he realised he no longer had the appetite for it. The guy badly, badly, badly needs a rest. I'd be shocked if he was back in management this season and reckon it'd be a disaster wherever he went. Much like the old problem with signing journeymen players, we simply cannot afford to appoint a manager based on their success three or four years ago and completely disregard their recent record.

That's a risk of course. But I could just as easily give you a list of managers with proven track records who've failed at clubs - O'Neill at Sunderland, Warnock at Leeds, Hughes at QPR and Scolari at Chelsea will do as a starting point. And it's not about a sticking a load of new managers' names out the hat and picking one at random (I'd suggest Merson and Tony Adams got jobs from their reputation as a player whilst Millen and Tinnion got them through their association with the club) but meeting and interviewing new managers and finding one with the vision, ideas and work ethic to get the top. But the likes of Steve Cotterill will never be better than half-decent and the likes of Warnock and Holloway have their best days behind them (or need a break at the very least). Other managers are appealing but too expensive. So we have to find not just any new candidate but a good new candidate - there's nobody suggested so far who brings up even a flicker of enthusiasm.

I think it absolutely has to be a new first-time manager. The names being bandied either aren't suitable or have their best days past before them or were never much cop in the first place. We envy clubs who had the foresight to give Adkins, Poyet, Rosler, Robinson, Rodgers, Martinez, Moyes and - hell - even Di Canio their first breaks but the only way we'll ever get a manager of that calibre is to identify them before someone else does. Yes - inexperience is a risk but there are no experienced candidates who'd not be a risk. It absolutely has to be a new appointment. If it were down to me, I'd invite David James to an interview and see what he had to say for himself. Throw in four or five more intelligent, articulate young coaches and former players who've got their badges and we might just unearth a diamond...

His recent record isn't great. He did a great job to get QPR up but then his tactical naivety was exposed in the Premier League (he literally had QPR players screaming at him from the pitch that his tactics weren't working shortly before Norwich scored against them, for example). But, far worse, at Leeds it seeemd his passion and spark has gone. And frankly we've tried appointing managers with good past records but worry question marks over their recent enthusiasm before. It'd be Coppell mark II.

I really, really, really wouldn't and cannot imagine someone less suited to what's actually needed.

Steady on - Pack's mentality isn't that bad. Personally I think it has improved the last couple of games...

Of course we're a selling club. Every club in the football league is and half the Premier League too. Whether or not you think it's good for SOD to publicly say that, it's beyond naive to think that we won't sell any player if a good offer comes in.

It's really important we beat Boro but, if we do, 5 points from those 3 matches would be a decent return. I'm not too worried about the teams around us doing well - I'd rather they didn't obviously but we really look like we've improved and, as long as we can keep playing well (which obviously isn't guaranteed), I think we'll ultimately get enough points to be out of the bottom 3.

Obviously it'll be better if we win but, even if we don't, we're on 2 points a game this last week and 1.5 points a game since SOD took over so we'll still be up on that average whatever happens today. The last thing we need is the players and fans all to lose all hope again and put us back to square one. Yes, we're deep in the s*** and today is looking worse for us. But the reality is we're not going to win every game (and nor do we need to in order to stay up). The 7 point gap looks worrying but all the teams around us are there for a reason - that they're going to lose more than they win. We just need to keep going, no matter what happens today - I still reckon we can get 7 points from 15 this month and that should see us narrow the gap at least a little...