Silvio Dante

Ferguson said it AFAIK but it isn’t true for a few simple reasons. - Managers times at clubs are often transient, but contracts have to be paid up in the event of a sacking (unless clauses). Take Manning - he’s on a 3.5year deal. If he screws up royally and we get relegated in May, then I’ve no doubt he’d be sacked and the club would have a liability of 3 years. - Maybe not here, but higher up the pyramid the merchandise recoup from players is massive. Nobody’s going round with Roy Hodgson on a poster but you can bet there is a lot of Michael Olise goods sold. Commercially players make more for clubs than managers on a general basis - Players have value as sell on. Managers don’t typically. Eddie Howe is unlikely to get poached but Alexander Isak would fetch north of £50m if sold. If you have an asset that much you pay him accordingly. Ferguson was an exception as he pretty much guaranteed success so his value to the club was more than any player. Most managers aren’t near that ballpark. The only ones it may be true of currently - but still unlikely - are Pep and Klopp

To be fair, I think the reporter @Tristan Cork is a city fan, so may be an editorial as to reporting piece

Ex Players who are Ghost experts you say? Im going for this guy:

Well you won’t now at the newsagents across the road from Greville Smyth Park. Those of you who like a few beers on the wall pre game, plan ahead! https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/bristol-shopkeeper-loses-alcohol-licence-8991278#google_vignette

I can answer that. Jon is a bit confused between the abbreviation for the band and the abbreviation for the training ground.

7am start from Yate, home by about half seven at night and an exceptionally numb backside from the driving! However, sneaking through open gates rules!

Incidentally on the city centre shop thing it is worth noting a few things: - I’m not sure what people know how much a retail unit in Broadmead actually costs to rent. As a guide, a 120 sq ft unit in Cabot (so pretty small - just a kiosk really) is £40k pa on current listings. If you add in staff costs, rates, insurance etc and profit margin required on each item that unit needs to shift probably about £4K a week to get close to breaking even. The market is by nature limited so it’s not getting there and it’s a valid decision - Other clubs have also taken this view - Villa closing their Broad Street store for example. Clubs like Man City (Arndale) have one for the big club tourist buck but we’re not in that league (bizarrely PSG have a shop on Oxford Street!) and then outside of stuff like Liverpool/Rangers/Celtic shops in Belfast and the fantastically named “Everton Two” in the Liverpool shopping centre, it just doesn’t happen. - A pop up was tried as has been said at QF. And we all remember Massive! There may have been an opportunity for a Christmas market unit, but as has been said that relies on stock.. TL:DR - a city centre shop wouldn’t work

On a purely unscientific sample, today I had to take my 12 year old groundhopping as he’s trying to see all 92. And it shuts him up. We visited 9 clubs - Coventry, Derby, Forest, Notts County, Rotherham, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wednesday, Chesterfield and Mansfield. Of those, the range in Cov, Weds, Derby, Sheff U, Notts County and Forest was comfortably above ours. Rotherham about par, and we were better than Mansfield or Chesterfield who only really offered kit. Of which stock was plentiful. That says our retail operation is definitely league 2 level…

And I think it’s important to say that there was nothing wrong with that. In football it’s frowned upon to talk to players from other teams - ie “tapping up” - but in all other industries it’s normal. By all means don’t start formal negotiations until a proper approach is made but using third parties to gauge interest is sensible planning when it comes to looking at both players and managers

See a doctor

I think people have said pretty similar to me - that his shot stopping is not in doubt, it’s decision making and distribution where there are question marks. Definite MOM today but in the last game he was correctly getting pelters for his kicking - this isn’t an “I told you so” moment that solves that issue!

“Only ****ers in the Building”

I’d also add that I thought he defended well first half, and worked back. Makes the second half all the more bizarre as he did the “non performance” bit but as has been said, I think in the context of how he’s done so far, it’s a step overall in the right direction

Mac?

The interesting possession and passing stats are the first half - 38%-62% in their favour and passing numbers 186-316. If you compare that to the Norwich game we had 61%-39% possession and completed 652-416 passes. So, even in the first half, we had less ball by far than the prior home game and only completed 60% of the passes pro rata. Yet it was undoubtedly an uptick in performance - because we played to our strengths. We moved the ball quicker, we pressed far higher up the pitch. In a lot of ways it was more a Pearson than Manning half stylistically and because it suits the players, it was better than any half since probably Southampton. It’s a possible sign that LM has realised you can’t impose a style immediately and if that is the case, has to be good news. As for the second half though - we finished on 33% possession indicating that half we were in the 20’s. Finished on 287 passes so only completed 101 - barely 2 passes a minute! You won’t win many games like that as it’s too far the other way - we didn’t press high enough and although we defended well, I don’t think anyone wants to go through that again!

Great to see the clubs social media team are aware of the kickoff time. New intern Tina Briannan doing sterling work.

Just added the photo. Wells.

Well this is interesting…

As memorably sang by Blur and the first lines being exceptionally apt to the football under Liam thus far: ”You’re taking the fun out of everything…”

That was exactly what we saw under Dean Holden. The trick here is that most commonly, the data will align with what the eyes see in the context of whether a team is playing well or not. Again, I don’t see anything wrong in this quote but I think what may be rubbing people up the wrong way is that if the data says we’re not getting what we deserve by the evidence of the eyes it’s wrong. I’m probably one of the most unconvinced about Manning on here but the jumping down his throat on everything is getting tiresome. I’ll happily criticise on what I see, but not on an innocuous quote.

I’m not sure I see that quote as anything particularly irksome. All it’s doing is saying that if youve been on top in games the results tend to come. I’ve been far more narked by some of the other things LM has said, but that one seems pretty innocuous to me (I was more annoyed when he brought up Blackburn’s xG compared to normal for example). All assuming he’s looking at the right data though and not possession stats for the sake of possession stats!

I’ve got a bit of a split on this. One of the first things he said was to the effect of players not being able to hear him on the pitch so they have to make their own decisions - and that is right. The problem thus far is when he has had opportunity to influence (I.e at half time or in the subs vs Blackburn) he’s not made a positive difference. So he’s right that players have to make decisions. But he has to make the right ones as well equally, and that’s been his weakest suit to date.

Not back. King wasn’t asked about, Wells is closer but indicated Boxing Day most likely. Naismith on treadmill, Roberts seems miles away. No mention of Atkinson or (not that it was expected) Benarous.

I’m not sure that was true. What I noticed from that conference was a noticeable attempt to appear more “natural” and although mentioning data several times almost trying to downplay it as a decisioning aid. I think he’s aware of how he’s viewed and how it may be a factor that makes things more difficult for him that he may be able to change. So I reckon he did use data but didn’t want to state it as a major factor!