Mendip City

1 hour ago, Cannybluff said:

Just listened to the pre match press interview, following on from Tinnion earlier this week and the Southampton references are really winding me up now. 

I understand we won at home vs a side on a good run but one swallow a summer doth not make. 

By all means describe what you're trying to do to get the best out of the players but stop banging on about this one game. Let's be honest it wasn't even that great - we are now a team who wants to dominate the ball and had 32% of it. And I swear tinnion said it was 3-0 as well on the radio. 

I'm yet to be convinced by manning, but I'd happily change that if I see a more effective team and pattern in games, it might not be until next season with some additions to the squad but honestly stop talking about the Southampton game please! 

The Huddersfield home game is on the exact two month anniversary of the Southampton win…. I’m expecting a celebratory kit, players doing a pre-match lap of honour/open top bus tour, marching bands, sky-divers, special commemorative programme (yours for only £27.95) and limited edition O’Neills badly fitting underpants complete with the incorrect scoreline 3-0 printed on each cheek.  
 

Seriously, if he keeps doing it, I’d love it if the interviewer immediately butted in and added “swiftly followed by QPR, Wednesday and Cardiff no-shows”. I reckon he’d have a SOD “stupid question” breakdown.  

3 hours ago, Capman said:

It seems fairly obvious to me but I suspect that the whole club has no idea how to ‘manage’. The job of a proper football manager is to get the best out of the players, build their confidence, play a system which suits how they like to play, know when they need an arm round the shoulder and when they need a flare up the backside. It’s pretty clear the board did not know how to manage Pearson (or come to that Johnson or Cotts before him). We now have a playing management structure where no one seems to know how to manage the players. There are a significant number of individual players where we saw real progress over the last couple of seasons, Vyner, Pring, O’Leary, Scott etc. I have not seen much progress in the players over the last few months. In fact I think a number have gone backwards. That not only has short term implications on the pitch but longer term on our ability to raise money through player sales and improve the club. All very depressing but a reflection of the current state of Bristol City FC.

This is it. Our head coach doesn’t strike me as a people manager or a leader in any meaningful way. No emotional intelligence comes across in his interviews - either towards his players or us supporters. 
 

6 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

IIRC when it was initially mentioned, it was that they were consulting externally, and that sounded proactive.

But when Manning was quizzed, he said it was more Del Bonsu asking around his “network”.

Sounds about right. “Yeah I’ve chatted to few mates and it turns out we’re perfect… and don’t forget we beat Southampton once and everyone was happy oh and Brian says we need to take less time off training in order to stay fit and well, he’s been here 30 years, so it must be true.”

Case closed. 

1 hour ago, nickolas said:

Now there’s a shock. I wonder how our internal investigation is getting on for why we get so many injuries!

The bloke doing the internal investigation pulled a hamstring. Don’t worry he’ll complete the investigation when he’s back fighting fit in 2 weeks….. or maybe 6 months. 

8 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

Er...liberty, equality, fraternity...maybe diversity...and...insanity?

Or…..

Nepotism, stagnation, short-termism, nest egg and colouring in  

I think that was it and I’m bought into it. I’m off to buy my Brian Tinnion 30th anniversary full kit. 

2 hours ago, ExiledAjax said:

Five pillars mate. Five pillars.

Oh…. I’d forgotten the pillars. What were they again?

3 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Separating out the Women's team is often one I see on here..you mention the men's team.

Would be a fairly interesting step to buy one without the other- to separate it out us possible if course but the cost base really isn't so high for one and secondly it sits under the Football club anyway..can we think if any other recent takeovers whereby this has occurred?

Dunno…. My thinking was more about focus… let’s get the men’s team winning before anything else. 
The lack of focus is a massive problem for BS:  how many of these have been started and successfully reached a higher point in their relative sport: football, rugby, basketball, women’s football? Weren’t there also netball and motor sport elements at one stage? How about focusing on one, making it successful before starting the next? It’s a bonkers model. 

10 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

It's not an exact science by an stretch to be honest Fevs. I've seen valuation documents for clubs and honestly they often read like an essay written about that game at a funfair where you guess how many sweets are in a massive jar. All assumption, supposition, and "well the last jar that looked a bit like this one had X sweets in it so on that basis...".

But yeh I think something between £60m and £100m is fair and can be argued. Towards the top figure and Steve will be laughing, towards the bottom and any glorious new owners would feel pretty happy.

What the rest of the Pula group is worth I've no idea. My gut feeling is "not much" but there could be some hidden value in there somewhere.

On topic. I think if we had a new investor/owner who gave the sort of interview you've shared I'd be cautiously optimistic. I cannot imagine that 87.8% of the shares in Holdings is what's for sale though.

My gut expectations would be that Steve is looking to sell everything or 20%.

The wider group is our problem. 
I wonder whether anyone has offered SL anything for the football club?

Would £60m “take it or leave it” for the men’s football, stadium and training ground get him to the table? That would be great for us fans and get the ground and football club back into a simpler model and allow SL to carry on with the remainder of Bristol Sport on a much smaller budget than today - or sell it - or shut it down. 

19 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

@Davefevs He speaks very well. That is something often said but it's true here. He doesn't use too many words, there's a little bit of "business speak" but not too much, and he seems to reflect on both sides of a decision.

Looks as though he's happy to give Corberan a chance (a critic would say that's easy to do when you buy a club sat 5th with a cushion of 5 points and +14 GD over 7th) which is admirable.

I liked the line about blending young players with veterans.

However he's also hiding a ruthless streak I feel. The talk about expanding "the reach and the possibilities of the club" suggests something akin to what you see on Wolves' website where their chairman says "Our ultimate goal is to try building a top brand. I’m glad to see in an independent survey that we are already in the top 20 football brands in Europe, and it’s a big leap, but it’s not our final goal. For the next 10 or 20 years, we want to make Wolves an outstanding, legendary sports brand.".

Perhaps necessary in modern football, but not something I love to read on the site of one of the doyennes of English football.

This is interesting. 
would be good to see our “mission” or aims stated somewhere. Closest we ever get is “we want to be successful”. “We want the premier league” but no timescale, no long term vision. My believe is there is no vision other than “hopefully hang on in the championship and don’t spend too much doing it”. I guess publishing that wouldn’t look good! 
 

12 minutes ago, Natchfever said:

LJ M2

That’s harsh….

and I couldn’t stand LJ…..

12 minutes ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

I was pissing myself at this. 

JL previously said that it would be him and Tinnion conducting the interviews. We all know he was far more involved than that but even on the basic involvement of interviewing of course he had a say. 

@headhunter made a good point that the board are obviously not footballing people and that they are taking footballing advice from their technical director

Yeah surely this, JL wouldn’t be taking a technical decision over the manager. 
he should, however, have been all over things like: is this person a good fit for BCFC? would he have the correct media presence? Will supporters warm to him? etc. 

The biggest mistake was us (presumably led by Tinnion) dictating the sort of football and manager, sorry coach,  we wanted rather than getting people in and saying “here’s a group of players, a decent academy, not a lot of money to spend… what would you do to make the most of it?” You never know the candidates might have had better ideas than BT!!!

Good point @Davefevs these players are decent. 
It’s not about making them technically better - if they can’t do things now they never will. It’s about getting them organised and confident in what they do. 
Manning should have taken a pragmatic approach and evolved things, not a revolution - but is he capable/flexible enough?
I agree, it’s time to pull the trigger now. It’s a shame to have to start again but that’s the reality of it. 

9 minutes ago, Back of the Dolman said:

If anything I think he could give us fresh legs in the centre of midfield 

I think he looks like midfield would suit him (if/when fully fit).  

1 minute ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

"The plan worked, the players switched off" 

 

Aka “not me guv” 

So….. the underperforming Nige Pearson’s results will keep us up! 

So….. the underperforming Nige Pearson’s results will keep us up! 

14 minutes ago, CodeRed said:

Exactly, shows what a f uckwit BT is to think Manning could lead this club, 2 minutes listening to him drone on and I'd be 'thanks we'll be in touch and watch the door doesn't bang your ass on the way out'

Imagine the interview - those two droning on with  JL doodling new badges and not paying attention. 

1 hour ago, Engvall’s Splinter said:

I thought it was out of the ordinary for RB to be asking more pressing questions. Was good to see (finally!). Fair play to Andy Howard if that is his name. 

I liked that He asked about plan b…. Manning had no coherent answer… kept talking about working hard 

1 hour ago, Mattredrobin said:

I am obviously not talking about the last 3 games we have been shocking, but I don't think that is all down to manning personally I think the players look knackered which is understandable with how many games we have had recently (same as everyone i know ) but before these games we have looked dangerous in attacking areas we just have not been able to score I think we have looked better defensivley and more organised, obviously we should be beating teams down the bottom but that's how we have always been. We brought Twine in to be that player that can unlock sides and he's got injured ( Obviously injuries is another debate we could have but not starting that ) so Manning knows what we need he just needs the time. Obviously this is just my opinion I know I'm in a very small minority but I would rather get behind the guy than constantly slating him. 

Have we been better defensively? Before this abysmal run, when results were looking better,  I seem to remember feeling Max O’Leary being our best and most heavily employed player. 

4 hours ago, Hazelboy said:

Andy Howard… instigator of the great SO’D melt down and no more questions 

 

Oh was that him!!! Brilliant. I reckon Andy sensed blood again on Saturday!!

Seriously, I’d like to think Radio Bristol would keep him on our games for a while. He’s just the man for what are becoming turbulent times. 

Great performance @Davefevs

Special mention for Andy Howard, as others have said, well done on that post-match interview. Actually asking Manning some challenging questions. Best since 20man left. 
 

I was listening to Radio 5 Live yesterday as I was walking the dog, the Burnley Bournemouth game was on and Clinton Morrison stated “Burnley are playing as if following a manual”. I got exactly what he meant and it’s exactly what we’ve become under Manning…. a team filling a plan… regardless of the accuracy of the plan or whether all the parts needed are there to complete that plan. 

10 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

I think TGH has been really poor of late.

Not put together a consistent run of performances in ages.

He seems to get a free pass on here because he scored against Boro but I think he’s really dipped in form since the West Ham games. 

Maybe not helped by constant rotation. Though that’s chicken and egg… make yourself undroppable.  

55 minutes ago, 38MC said:

When you think the attendance was in the region of 20k, 30 odd blokes dancing around a park isn’t that much of a scene. 

In fairness, if you exclude everyone who left early and everyone left angrily booing LM…. 30 blokes is pretty much everyone! 

4 minutes ago, Capman said:

I think it’s becoming clear that Jon thought it was a bottom 6 squad and just needed the manager to get us there. 

Or did he mean top end of the division below - optimistic in my view!