ExiledAjax

Isn't the Trent navigable up to Stoke? I think there possibly was a port somewhere near there at some point in time. Like how there were once ports down on the levels on Somerset.

Likewise, I've seen a fair number of football club employment contracts over the past couple of years, EFL and PL. I've also done due diligence on a club for a buyer. The fact that the buyer didn't even want to check the contracts of anyone other than first team players and the head coach tells you everything. Then again I've also seen a few manager/assistant contracts that have seemed incredibly generous in hindsight given how those particular tenures went!

It does drop off pretty quickly, but the "name" assistants and those that move with a manager and come as a package are on good money.

The industry as a whole just doesn't properly pay "office" staff at any level. All wages go on coaches and players. The sport as a whole relies on the perceived glamour of the game...and once you see behind the curtain even that is an absolute sham as you say (the hours etc).

Yeh this was kind of what I was getting at. I've got no idea how friendlies are governed though, or how much flexibility/discretion groups like the Police or SAG have with stuff. Will there still be an official home/away end? I absolutely get that unofficially, outside the ground and all around everyone will be full of philia and happy, I love it. Wish more games were like it. It was one of the things that made trips to Griffin Park so great. Guess we have to assume it's been thought of by both clubs and both fans groups and some sort of announcement will follow.

Splendid.

Nice to see the club doing something like this for a group of fans. I have a genuine question for those that are involved in this relationship - will this be a rare example of an actual FRIENDLY? For example will there be an away/home end? Presumably Willem II fans will be welcome in the normal home City pubs? To be clear: I love it if this is the case. I'm all for actual friendlies and fraternal bonding between different clubs, wish there was more of it.

RTV/BCFC don't set the price for RTV. It's set by the EFL so we don't undercut iFollow. So yes the price should reduce, but it's not up to BCFC.

City one looks like a pretty generic piece that Sky have asked them to publish? RTV bit is short "Our audio-only commentary service will remain domestically through Robins TV, as well as audio and video streaming for overseas supporters." Doesn't really clarify what the future of RTV is though? If it stays as it is and Sky (and international broadcast games) aren't able to be shown on RTV then RTV is going to be showing fewer than 20 matches a season. They have to slash the price of, or completely scrap the RTV annual pass option surely.

Hopefully now Sky have done their launch there can be some Comms from the EFL or the Club.

Under the current deal/RTV set up they are not. I cannot see why Sky would allow that to change. But you could try the general supporter services email. Supporterservices@bristol-sport.co.uk

Which is £46 a month for 18 months by the looks of it? That's the "new to sky" thing on their website, seems to give Sky, Sky Sports and Netflix (which I already have). So near double the price of RTV + VPN, for 50% of the games (plus a load of guff). And I've still got to find some way to watch the other 20 odd games!?...not sure I'll bother tbh.

Included with what? It can't be free?

Anyone know how much Sky are charging us for this? Ie if you don't already have any form of Sky, and only want EFL football, how much flesh do they want? Seems to be a £20/month for 18 months "deal", but you also have to get Sky for 18 months? It's also only 20 or so matches, so not even half what you get now with just RTV? Seems utterly bullshit to me.

They're different conversations, why conflate them? In this thread I thought we were talking about an objective determination of whether or not this season's points total/position shows progression versus last season's. Yes it does, because it gets us closer to a points total that often gets you top 6. 72 is a theoretical example of such a points total in a theoretical season. That doesn't mean it's a "success" by the way. I don't think it's been a successful season, but progress and success are not mutually exclusive sisters. The discussion around it being "in our hands" or not was about the likelihood of real world outcomes. Not theory. Not benchmarks. Not measuring "progress". It was about what was likely to happen from that point onwards. You posited an entirely unlikely run of results in an effort to show that whether or not we got top 6 was entirely down to us. It wasn't, because what you asked for, with this real world squad, was very unlikely to happen, because other teams were going to continue accumulating points as we lost them. Which is what happened. I honestly can't believe we've had such a long chat about whether or not getting more points than last season is a good thing! If you feel like I've trolled or mocked you at any point then I apologise. I don't try to do that at all.

Just think, had we of lost the losable games - Leicester, Southampton, Coventry, Boro (away) and Hull then we'd be -15 and secured ourselves a relegation spot with 47 points and finishing 22nd. It was in our own hands after all. To have won all those points against those teams is a huge success. Expectations and targets can (should) be different things. Plus, as I said, my suspicion is that they have private targets and public spin.

Publicly. I have a suspicion that privately we have hard targets, but they aren't made public... except when Tinnion gets on the mic and gives us an inkling. Players have hard targets for fitness, for actions on pitch, for distance run etc. They are tracked during training, matches, and I believe have to log food and exercise at home as well. Not to mention the benchmarking they do at the start and end of each season. I can't quite bring myself to believe that an organisation - even one run like BCFC is - can have such measurement and metrics in one area, and not in another. Part of the reason I mention 72 points as a sensible target for a team like is is because it roughly marries with what Tinnion said on SOTC a while back. Asked "where do we need to be" he said "about 10 points better off". At the time, with the points we were on and games played, it meant he wanted us to be on about 1.54ppg, which over 46 games gives a 71 point total. This as well supports his statement of "progress", because we've finished closer to that low 70s target. Just a theory, could be wrong and it could all be vague behind the scenes as well as publicly, but I suspect not.

All hail the great Undefeated. I'd only add that this SMART target (as you ably name it) largely remains the same season to season (if it's an average of the last 10-15 seasons then it will change very, very slightly with each passing year). Therefore objective progress free of outside variables and uncontrollables can be measured against it. Getting closer to it indicates progression regardless of what "most" fans might arbitrarily expect.

I agree we're close to agreeing. Yes the target is to get promoted. Yes the only way you can do that is by finishing 6th or higher. My only point is that you've no idea, when setting "promotion" as a target in July, what it will specifically take to do that. But you do know that 72 points gives you a very good chance. We've got no control over what the actual threshold is, but we've got control over way we can aim for. Aim for 72, measure season to season progress by "are we closer or further from 72". Interesting question. On the face of it the flukey promotion scenario is more successful, but only because of it's ultimate outcome. If you present a 90 point season and a 72 point season and give them the same outcome, then the 90 point season is obviously more successful. It would also be a better indicator of future success, but that's a slightly different discussion. We finished 3 positions higher in the table, and with more points, but because we were 1 (one) point further from an arbitrary moving target, a target that we have no control over and don't even know what it will be when we start the season, we've regressed. And I'm the one spinning things? I don't need to twist your "most" of us spiel. It stands on its own two feet for what it is.

In one breath you say it's not a static target, then your very next sentence state an approximate minimum threshold of points. A threshold that I agree with, and that we should work towards. You identify that threshold because, in general, and on average, achieving such a points total gets a team into the playoffs. That's why aiming for a points total of, say, 72, is much better than aiming for something vague like "the top end" or "promotion". As you say, the specific total needed for that can change each season. But, crucially, no one knows for certain in August what you'll need in May. But, what we do know, is the average, normal, usual total needed. It therefore makes logical sense for that to be the target, and for progress to therefore be measured by our distance from that normal target figure at seasons end. We got closer to that target (my target, but also the target implied by Tinnion on his SOTC interview a couple of months ago). That is progress. As above, at kick off of the first match we cannot know precisely how many points we need to get to get 6th in a season. But we do know that in a normal season something in the low 70's gives you damn good chance of it. So if in each season we get a few points closer to that target, we are progressing, and are getting closer to where we need to be. I'm not trying to argue that this season is a runaway success, or that we have progressed to a great degree, but it's wrong, in my opinion, to paint this season's on the pitch results (note. I emphasise that this is on the pitch and results) as a complete failure or regression. You know that's not what I'm assuming, that was an example of what steady progress would look like if it happened. Nothing I said showed an assumed improvement like that every season. But, if we were to do that, then in a couple of seasons we'd be well in the play off hunt. Regardless of how other teams fare in that time.

But the points target isn't the same every season, so using a moving target to determine whether or not we have improved each season is flawed. You and @Capman are conflating single-season success with ongoing improvement of our squad and performance. Your defining our own improvement relative to ourselves by performance relative to outside parties who we cannot control. Potentially, using your method, we can say that we have never improved. It's deeply flawed. If we concentrate on ourselves then we will improve relative to our peers. If we improve by 4 points every season, then eventually we will hit a points total that inevitably gets us into the top 6. That is not standing still, that is season on season improvement and ultimately will deliver success. Apologies, I know you don't like me pointing this out but you keep saying that you speak for most/all of us, and you really don't.

Feels like a pretty low quality final to me. Last night's final frame was excellent , but the tension came about because of a poor mistake from Jones on the yellow. Lots of relatively simple misses from both players this session. Just feels like it's being decided by errors rather than quality break building.

Oh yes. Thanks for reminding us of that. The MTD is also a laugh:

And yet ironically Lansdown quotes Brentford and Brighton as clubs to copy. But he doesn't copy the systems they put in place to manage shifts like Potter -> De Zerbi, or Smith -> Frank. Wants to copy the results with copying the work.

So they're not actually made out of shipping containers like the old original one in Shoreditch? Are there still shops or us it just for boozing and watching sport?