BrizzleRed

2 hours ago, Selred said:

Absolutely. And if it inspires more women to get into officiating then fantastic!! 

Yeah great …… until a female official gets some abuse from the terraces and instead of it just being a ref getting some stick, all the handwringers will be calling out fans as being sexist!  

4 minutes ago, Simon79 said:

You don’t think Covid has anything to do with scratching around for free transfers? He wasn’t perfect, but that’s quite some statement. It also baffles me that Holdens reign has somehow been deleted from history! COYR 

Course covid has had an effect, but covid didn’t blow £millions on pointless dire tranfers that we were glad to see walk away for free at the end of last season.

Holden was awful too and definitely shouldn’t have been appointed, but look at the crap squad he was left with though.  Also, he wasn’t given four and a half years to drag this club down like LJ was allowed.

1 hour ago, Negan said:

Am I the only one who wants lee Johnson to do well? Weird how fans enjoy his team getting beat. Ex player and manager who has given great service to this club and was honoured to be here. Hope he wins the league with Sunderland myself. 

 

Ashton however... 

You’re probably not the only one Negan, but I suspect there are far more of us who hold LJ and MA jointly responsible for leaving us right in the shit last season.  They are both also responsible for pissing so much money away in the awful transfer policy and bringing in dross, that we’re now having to scratch around for free transfers, as they completely emptied the transfer kitty.

As an ex-City player I don’t wish him ill, but I personally got sick of his waffle and bullshit, so I can’t honestly say I him any great success after the mess he left us in.  

5 minutes ago, Garland-sweden said:

I vått och torrt we say in Sweden. Thick and thin you say in English? Whatever happens, support your team.

Top man

18 minutes ago, firstdivision said:

Yes. We’ve discussed the clunkiness of Xg before on here. Possession stats are the same as the ‘weather was fine’ or ‘it was raining’. Just facts - don’t tell you too much.

I know one stat for sure ….. my arse was off my seat way longer during a match than it has been in a few years and that tells me a lot!!!

5 hours ago, Garland-sweden said:

Yes as you said BrizzleRed: resignation when we went behind. You could feel it all the way to Sweden that we want to come back and score. They had the game but this team got something. Happy and proud. COYR!!!

No feeling of resignation.

Amen to that brother! .
 

Can already feel the gloom lifting after some really bleak years and total respect to you for still sticking with it over in Sweden after the crap we’ve had to endure

How can you not warm to a team when they give everything, like they did today.  

I’ve got to be honest and say I’ve been turning up out of duty for a long time now, but this season has felt different and today really felt like something could be happening.

Rather than a feeling of resignation when we went behind, both the players and the fans responded and there seemed to be a real buzz around the Gate again.

I left the game today feeling much happier than after a fair few wins in the past and isn’t it great to see a team who look like they genuinely care and aren’t stealing a living off us.

I’m really not bothered about getting that first home win …… play like they did today and we won’t have to wait too long!

49 minutes ago, Shaun Taylor said:

Bleak times just like the past!

God, I’d started to forget just what a shithole that place was …… cheers for the reminder ST!!!

1 minute ago, Marco the red said:

Have very little time for teams who try and buy a league, add in mark ashton would would very amusing to see them not go up.

Mark ashton is interested in mark ashton 

Absolutely mate.  

I’ve got nothing against Ipswich and actually think of them as a proper football club.  

That said, now they’ve got that parasitic slimeball there, I won’t be wishing them any good fortune whatsoever.

I put him on a par with agents as the most destructive, self centred scum of the football world.

This is already starting to look like us all over again while Ashton was here.  I know Ipswich didn’t exactly set the division slight last season, but surely they didn’t need this many new signings.  

MA is increasingly looking like that shopaholic who gets a buzz out of buying new things, but after a short time, they don’t feel new any more and he just wants to go out and buy more.

I’m sure their fans are lapping it up, as under Mad Mick, the old owners kept the purse strings very tight.  Once the reality sinks in that they are lumbered with a team of misfits, they won’t be so happy.

Ok, he could surprise us and actually make more of a go of it with a strong manager in place, but after witnessing the total train wreck he turned our club into, I certainly wouldn’t put any money on it and can only see a few years of pain coming up for ITFC fans.

22 minutes ago, WessexPest said:

On A$$h@t some were suggesting the poor attendance (and to be fair to the dregs a lot did admit that scraping 7k for the first game where fans were allowed in for 17 months was rubbish) was due to a JB boycott. A handful might’ve stayed away on principal but given he’s not been convicted I find it a bit far fetched that would significantly impact their numbers.

Others cited concerns about COVID keeping fans away, but if anything that’s even more dubious - didn’t stop Newcastle and Tottenham having packed houses today.

You do get a few sensible posts on they’ve certainly got more than their fair share of belters, doing their best to prove Gaslogic still knows no bounds!

The Covid excuse is a bit of a laugh, as even the Government are happy with outdoor events going ahead now and you don’t get much more outdoor than the Minimal ‘stadium’

On the subject of piss, how long do you think it’ll be before the sags start explaining away their piss poor opening day attendance by inventing a mass boycott because of jailbird Joey?  

Before you know it, there’ll be a w***fest with them proclaiming what amazing fans they are to organise this mass protest so effectively!

1 hour ago, Moments of Pleasure said:

We're a "medium" in the Championship. Big in L1. And massive! in L2. 

They're a minnow in the Championship (I know. It's a stretch, but bare with me), medium in L1, big in L2.

We'd be fodder in the Prem. Miniscule. But minted.

Ok MoP, I’ll concede the Sags to be a big shit in L2 then

1 minute ago, bcfc01 said:

Our average league position over the last 108 years is 36.

Pikeys at 53.

This is where the subjectivity comes in, as do you look at the average over a club’s whole history, the last few decades, or where they actually are today to decide on a club’s stature?

I’ll bet there will be a fair few League 2 clubs rolling up at that hell hole of a ground next season and happily believing they’re bigger than the Sags.

Maybe I’m just biased though! 

6 minutes ago, Moments of Pleasure said:

I think they are a big club, at the bottom level. I think we can give them that. With their 5-7k crowds (should they win often enough; and perhaps with a generous voucher scheme to boost attendance numbers like they ran following their humiliating relegation from the bottom in 2014), I can see them throwing their weight around a bit and enjoying being "big" for once, as they mix with yer diddy Crawleys, Stevenages, Forest Greens and Barrows.

I think they will enjoy it, for a year at least.

I reckon you’re being a little generous there tbh MoP

The big club, little club debate crops up every so often and is pretty subjective and all depends on the criteria used.  

To put it into context, with our pretty poor record of success over our history, but balanced by our decent crowds and excellent stadium, I’d say we we’re still pretty medium to small at Championship level.  We could probably say we would be biggish at League 1 level.

Given how far those deluded f*****s are behind us in all crieria you could possibly compare in that horrible excuse for a club, to say they are only one division behind us is giving them far more credit than they deserve imho.

1 minute ago, italian dave said:

Generous to credit them with an IQ of more than 5…

I was actually allowing them 6!!!

10 minutes ago, sticks 1969 said:

Would people on here say a lot of things face to face that they post on here ?

Probably not, but in fairness, with a few exceptions, most of the discussions on here seem to be well reasoned, with the exception of the heat of the moment stuff on match day threads of course!!!

8 minutes ago, Bristol Rob said:

It's run by idiots, for idiots.

Should anyone offer a reasonable opinion that maybe suggests that the manager or owner isn't 100% correct, they get immediately suspicious and then deploy the ban-hammer.

Them relishing the tinpot status, their constant posts about resigning former players and their deluded view as to the number of supporters they have hold them back just as much as the decades of under investment.

It certainly makes you appreciate the team who run our site. While there may be very isolated complaints about bans on here, I reckon they do an amazing job and all credit to our mods in the standards they keep.

12 minutes ago, IdliketoRogerMoore said:

They ban or suspend anyone who doesn’t toe the party line over there! 
so if you don’t share the exact brain dead views as the mods you’re a goner! 
 
 Seeing as they weren’t swimming in the biggest pond in the first place and you kick out all smart fish you end up with a load of goldfish who swim in endless circles forget their own name every 7 seconds!

Really point there and not really considered that.  Looking at it that way, their mods have got a hell of a lot to answer for.

I know a reasonable number of sags and they’re all sound as a pound.  We have a bit of good natured banter and some really enjoyable and friendly discussions about football.  

That’s why I can’t understand how their Sagchat Forum seems so infested with totally brain dead, deluded morons.  

I can’t work out whether Sagchat is just a magnet for for the most deluded, simpleton belters of their fanbase, or all sags are two faced and although seeming like normal human beings in mixed company, they just revert to gormless retards when amongst their own kind.  

There do seem to be a few sensible posters on there, but there appears to be a large percentage of them who would only need the fingers of one hand to count their IQ levels.

The gap between the quality of discussion on their site and OTIB is probably even wider than the gap in our respective league positions.  They really do come across as the village idiots of Bristol.

10 hours ago, Garland-sweden said:

We have been in leauge one next season without Bentleys all great saves. He is the player that kept us up in this division. Ashton went to Ipswich and Most of the fans are happy. Who is Gonna replace Ashton?  Contacts and not contracts. NP have a very difficault situation, feel really worried. Afraid we are fighting for avoid relegation next season, hope Im wrong.

Fair points there G-S.  I’m massively glad MA is gone, as I think he’s a con merchant, but my concern is, he doesn’t get replaced quickly enough.

I wasn’t impressed with the majority of players he brought in, but at least he was available to do the job.  My fear is us starting next season with a massively depleted squad, with the club’s excuse being we had nobody suitable and qualified to negotiate transfers to bring replacements in.

We need to fill his post very quickly and hopefully that’s what the club are working towards, otherwise we could find ourselves in very deep shit at the start of next season.

1 hour ago, S25loyal said:

No, hence they go bust. Loads of people are losing their jobs, over paid footballers shouldn’t be exempt from it. 

Footballers will certainly get a reality check through this virus, but unfortunately it’ll likely be the less well paid players and smaller clubs in the lower leagues who bear the brunt of financial fall-out from all this.

It’ll be interesting to see what happens if sponsors, advertisers and tv companies all want their money back, as that will directly hit the wealthiest in football, then the legal battles may become our main source of entertainment!

Credit where credit’s due, we’ve started surprisingly brightly and showing a lot more purpose.  

Not sure about the numbers of long punts, but definitely look more lively

1 hour ago, Riaz said:

 

Until we make it to the premier league, we will be viewed as a small club.

I don’t know how much we’re viewed as a ‘small club’ , but I think we’re widely viewed as a club with very big potential.

Sadly, I seriously doubt that will ever be realised, and BCFC will forever be the club that people say they expected to kick on and were surprised that it never actually happened.

I reckon this club are happy to stay comfortably around the Championship, preferably in the top half, to give fans the hope that with one good season we could progress.  This means any player who shines for a season will have a Championship price tag when they are inevitably sold.

That to me can be the only reason why we still have LJ at the helm, as to be fair, he isn’t doing a bad job in that respect, though I’d wager that the majority of the fanbase have little or no belief that he’ll ever take us up.

2 minutes ago, Shaun Taylor said:

I definitely think that's what you need to do speculate to accumulate to take you to the next level where you compete in the Premiership with the likes of Norwich, Bournemouth, Burnley etc even if you were a yo yo club for a few years to get established 

Sure you’re right ST and many of our fans have mentioned WBA as a good model too.

unfortunately for us, I really don’t think we’re that much closer on the playing side since Lee Johnson took over.  Some fans get fooled by only looking at the League table, but that only tells half the story.

I think Johnson is pragmatic enough to realise he isn’t a tactical genius or man manager, so he relies on playing a percentage game and grinding out results which are often undeserved. It really is turgid and painful to watch, particularly for a fanbase who are usually calling for attacking football.

There is a feeling that we’re just one good appointment away from really getting this club into gear and kicking on. Problem is, although we’re willing to spend very multi £millions on players, we insist on shopping in the Poundshop for our managers!