The Dolman Pragmatist

7 minutes ago, Red Skin said:

A City classic was Orr's headbutt.  Obviously Bradley was troubled by his impending court case at the time, so his overreaction was understandable to some degree. (Love the lad for coming on camera and fronting up that he was out of order.  Massive respect for that).

To be fair, Gary Johnson made him do it (not the headbutt, the interview).

Murray Jones, promising striker signed from Palace in 1990.  Never made an appearance.

56 minutes ago, cidered abroad said:

What do you mean by "the old days"? If you mean LJ time here then yes.

Apart from that shambles, I don't remember any time from 1950 onwards that we spent lot's of money on transfer fees and didn't play them.

Some like Hugh McImoyle who were not very good here but we sold him on and got John Galley as his replacement. He did quite well here!

 

We didn’t spend a lot of money on him , but I was always bemused by the case of Jim Harvey, a very good midfield player who we signed in 1987 and who only played three times for us.  I remember him saying at the time that he couldn’t understand why Terry Cooper signed him if he didn’t think he was any good.

There was also the strange case of Laurie Pearson, a left back who we signed from Hull in the summer transfer window of 1987, and then swapped for Russell Bromage before the season even started.

41 minutes ago, RedorDead BCFC said:

So by your logic, teams in the championship draw Bournemouth or Luton at home but because they are PL they get home allocation? When most of the grounds in the champ are nearly all double capacity. 

In France if there is a two-division or more gap between the clubs the lower team is automatically at home.

12 minutes ago, REDOXO said:

Now I do sometimes think that myself. Although free speech works all ways
 

That was utter utter uttter utter garbage and to be frank so much of it has had to have effected season ticket sales, otherwise we would be hearing about it. 
 

Im pretty sure I will renew my two but have held off. But that didn’t help. However what was obvious to me was how much we miss Vyner pinging diagonals. 

Yes we were poor today, but not as bad as your post suggests.  Playing without any centre halves is always likely to be interesting and I’d have taken a point as soon as I saw the lineup.  It was clear that we were being protective of the back line, which was hardly surprising.  Yes, of course we missed Vyner, but we got a point which we probably just about deserved.

Don’t think it’s been mentioned, but John Galley’s debut for City in 1967 was a hat-trick at Huddersfield.  Best ever debut by a City player?

What makes you happiest when you are walking away from a match at Ashton Gate?  Having played poorly but scraped a victory; or having played well and lost.  I know which I prefer.

On 28/03/2024 at 19:17, bigboymog said:

Hi all a general warning to all as I have just received 2x bus gate penalty notices in one week ....the location is Cumberland Road ....I'm a visitor to the area and was aware of the air zone restrictions but thought as I was in the area I'd head for SS Great Britain well the road system is mighty odd and my sat nav( we all rely on them) guided me adequately to the location....however leaving the location as there is construction and diversions and in the melee I missed the tiny sign warning of the 'no left turn on to Cumberland Road' on Gas Ferry Road....this should be a lot bigger...and repeater signs placed alongside the roadside.... its not indicated on sat nav systems yet either.

Me too mate.  Two on the same day.  I don’t live in Bristol and I missed the sign completely.

The easiest games at this stage of the season are likely to be against teams with nothing to play for.  Three of our games are against teams needing points to avoid the drop who will be fighting for their lives.

1 hour ago, Ziderarmy said:

Do you seriously think Manning can do what Dicks did and take us to the top flight? 

Who knows?  If you’d asked me in Dicks’s first season if he could take us into the top flight, I’d have thought you were mad.

12 hours ago, fisherrich said:

God knows what Harry Dolman would make of this football club today. Shambolic.

If social media had existed in the sixties, a section of the fans would have been screaming for Harry Dolman to sell up as we fought off relegation from the second tier several times.

At least the Lansdowns (as far as we know) haven’t resorted to some of Harry Dolman’s more - ahem - unorthodox business practices…

9 minutes ago, 54-46 said:

Poor Alan Dicks. Imagine being lumped in with those two - not fit to button his overcoat

Alan Dicks has a lot in common with Liam Manning.  He was a young coach who no one had heard of when he was brought in as manager, and a very vocal section of the fans were screaming for him to be sacked in his first season at the club.  Luckily Harry Dolman resisted that temptation, held his nerve, and eventually it paid off, big time.

46 minutes ago, The Dolman Pragmatist said:

I’ve been a supporter for 60 years and there have been some difficult periods but I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.  I’ll go into next season with a season ticket and with optimism, as usual.

Absolutely fantastic that this post got a face palm from one poster.  Says it all about the current climate on OTIB.  So much easier to be negative about a situation than to look for positives.

7 minutes ago, Southport Red said:

I’m with you Major. Been a City hand for (approx) 58 years. In all that time there have been about 6 seasons when we weren’t awful. Cannot let them ruin any more of my Saturdays

I’ve been a supporter for 60 years and there have been some difficult periods but I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.  I’ll go into next season with a season ticket and with optimism, as usual.

10 minutes ago, Pippintogg said:

Pretty fed up too. First game in 1971, it's just a shambles of a club. I saw the game and we're just so predictable and easy to play against. 

If you’ve been supporting since 1971, you will have seen a lot worse than this season.

Just now, Monkeh said:

We beat them last time we played them before today

‘Rarely’, not ‘never’.

2 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

So. Listened back.

Not sure it's been covered but...why are we compromising the bench of the first team in order to focus on the FA Youth Cup? How on earth is that helpful unless we think an FA Youth Cup medal adds to the potential transfer fees we might one day get for these kids?

"There's a board of directors". Is there ****. There's two people who entirely depends on the benevolence of their employer/dad for their livelihood and success.

All the good signings he named were made under Alexander. I never warmed to Phil but credit to him because he did those deals, he sent the emails, he did the phone calls. He got those guys in. Who is doing that vital legwork now?

Finally. It is not a "young squad". There's few 34 year olds but there's also not many teenagers. Average age is 25 and most of the players are older than 23. It's a squad in its prime years.

Average of 25 is a young squad.  Only two squads in the Prem (Chelsea and Burnley) have an average age below 25.

1 minute ago, ExiledAjax said:

"young squad"

B*gger

26 minutes ago, The Original OTIB said:

For what it is worth, Pearson saw Cornick as playing centrally, something he's hardly ever done previously nor here. His most effective role is left of a front three. Either way, we have MUCH, MUCH bigger problems than Cornick, who I do not see as a problem. For the money spent (buttons today), a valuable squad player for me. 

Why didn’t Pearson play Cornick centrally then?  He appeared to also have had little use for Mehmeti once he signed him.

They got about a third of the way across the pitch and realised the match hadn’t finished and looked at each other in total confusion, then turned round and tried to run away.

57 minutes ago, OneTeamInBristol said:

Dickie no competition.

Pring in second.

Vyner has let a few mistakes come back into his game recently, there seems to be one a game.

One mistake a game’s not a bad record…

On 08/03/2024 at 20:10, Mike Hunt-Hertz said:

No Sheep Til Buxton...The Macc Lads

The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway… Genesis

23 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

Stewart’s legs had gone but at least he did want to be here.

Bridges completely took the piss, seen out clubbing after games when he was “injured”. Waster.

Tinnion’s signings were largely disastrous, Alex Russell was decent & a proper manager (GJ) turned Orr into an outstanding RB, Tinnion would never have done that.

How do you know he wouldn’t have done?

23 hours ago, GrahamC said:

It was a truly bonkers time.

Selling Pack & signing both Nagy & Massengo, too.

Absolute absolute shambles.

But at the time, if I remember correctly, we were hugely excited by the signings of Nagy and Massengo, and few seemed heartbroken that Pack was leaving.  Hindsight is a great thing…

I remember Sean O’Driscoll (who for all the stick he used to get was actually a very interesting and able coach) saying something very similar.  He said that however much he prepared players for matches, once the game starts it’s a question of the players making the right decision in the moment.  Of course a coach can make substitutions and tactical changes, and of course these can be hugely influential on a game as we saw on Tuesday night, but it is still down to the players to make the right decisions and then execute them effectively during the game.  

I always look closely at goal difference when thinking about who might be relegated.  It’s interesting that all but one of the teams below us has a goal difference of -11 or worse (Plymouth are -7), with Sheff Wed on -23 and Rotherham on -42.  By contrast our goal difference is -2, actually better than Preston who are only 4 points off the play-offs.  Of our 16 defeats this season, 13 have been by a single goal and the remaining three by two goals.  It shows just how close the margins are.  Before the Ipswich match people were talking about us being hammered, but the truth is that no one has hammered us all season, including two Premiership teams.  That, if nothing else, must give some cause for optimism.