Nibor

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Excellent result, well done City!

Should be on 30? That's insane. Do you expect him to go to Brazil as well? He'll be our first player to hit 20 league goals since Lita 10 years ago, try and be just slightly realistic.

Not in the least. Why on earth would it?

As I've said several times I'll be delighted to be proved wrong. I suspect this will still be a bad appointment in the long term and don't like the bloke. Anyway I'm glad the opportunity to be a troll on the Internet brought some sunshine to your life, Making premature "I told you so" posts is a really ace hobby.

Good to get another result, and that much closer to safety. Well done City!

Good result, well done City!

Better performance and a good result. Well done City :-)

Two separate things: 1) because you were hyper critical of SOD yet now defend Cotterill from criticisms that roughly equivalent. 2) because you complain about the endless SOD v SC roundabout yet are one of the principal posters who causes it. I haven't taken any umbrage I just generally respond in kind. There was a poll on here prior to his appointment that had a sample size more than large enough to be reliable that made it clear that appointing him was opposed by the majority. Not that he wasn't the first choice, people actually saying NO to him beinb manager. The "we'll see how he does" sentiment emerged after it was a fait accomplit, as would be expected from fans given they can't change it. The consequences of appointing someone objected to like this are obvious - the complete lack of a honeymoon period and no real tolerance from fans who have in the main given other managers time. I think this is the reason there is no unity / siege mentality at AG, and a huge amount of malaise. Every potential appointment will have some objectors but few will have a clear majority objecting. Warnock is divisive in a different way - he polarizes. You either despise him (me) or love him. Probably this is in roughly equal measure. The nonsense things he says sometimes are there but not really what I mean. When I listen to him being interviewed I find all kinds of warnings going off in my head. The same kind I get from a tactless salesman. It is very hard to get behind someone you dislike and I find him dislikable. I think a majority of people do, but that is anecdotal. I haven't really commented on how he manages the team as it is too early but concerns are there. What I am more worried about though is the long term change that I believe is fundamental to any decent future the club might have is in my opinion at risk with someone like Cotterill in charge. Whilst relegation would be a complete arse, I'd take it if it was a consequence of a series of changes that meant a healthier club five years from now as opposed to scraping by and bumbling along at this level making a huge loss for five years. I believe SOD was working for the long term hence why I was disappointed to see him sacked. I believe Cotterill thinks no further than this weekend (and would do even when not in a relegation battle).

Fair enough, I've miscounted. I think SOD would have achieved more had he stayed than Cotterill has, for me the signs were there and IMO we'd have done better in the transfer window than players like Elliott and Barnett - signings which fill me with dread. I would be delighted if I am proven wrong about Cotterill but when even his fiercest defenders have no confidence in him what does that tell you? If we were sacking SOD we should have made a better appointment than one most of the fans objected to. I disagree, there was plenty of vitriol about SOD whilst he was here. Also, I don't think pointing out that someone doesn't come across as intelligent but as a bullshitter is vitriol either.

You've spent 3 months arguing in a majority of your posts about our ex manager so the irony here is almost funny. I guess I'll repeat it one last time for the hard of thinking but there is a big difference between already supported by a majority of the fanbase (something I didn't say), and objected to by a majority of the fanbase (something I did). They are not opposites.

Ah the old hypocrite's flounce. G'nite.

I think 1) was entirely predictable given how many objected to his appointment and 2) is inaccurate. There was plenty of vitriol, venom and character assassination directed at SOD often by the very people bemoaning legitimate criticism of Cotterill as the same now. For every "dumb, bullshitter" comment about Cotterill there was at least one "boring, miserable" comment about SOD. I've even seen one poster who slated SOD for having a boring black country accent defend Cotterill on the basis that people only think he's dumb because of his accent. You could hardly make it up.

We've gone from not enough points per game to stay up, to not enough points per game to stay up. You can say anything you like with stats.

I think many would beg to differ. You've even carried on kicking the horse for three months after it died. I agree it's pointless. You don't need to micro analyse what Cotterill says to get the impression it's bullshit however. Thanks. I find people tend to read / enjoy posts someone has put a bit of thought into. I do certainly.

If anybody was doing that it would indeed be just as hypocritical as your remarkable about face from vilifying the last manager to defending this one, or turning every thread into a dredging up of that particular history and then complaining about it. His last and only success was at Cheltenham, 12 years ago. No theory involved in that fact. My prediction is that he won't succeed here. It's based on a lot of things not least the two points made above. It's obvious that nobody can know the future so I don't see why you make that point. The irony here is that even the cheerleaders for getting rid of the last manager can't find the confidence to predict success under this one. That's what happens with poorly thought through decisions. It doesn't advance that hypothesis actually, that's an error of logic. It says divisive appointments are bad, unlikable appointments are bad and appointments which are both are terrible particularly in a relegation battle. There's a big difference between appointing a manager more than half of your fans actually object to, and appointing a manager that is the top choice of less than half of your fans. Cotterill was the former, and because of that the fan base is anything but backing him despite our perilous position. There were any number of appointments we could have made that would have been far less objectionable. Likewise you confuse likeable and liked. As for names, there were a number suggested at the time so please do go and read all those threads. It's moot now because the mistake is made.

You owe me a new keyboard, I just got coffee all over this one. Please refrain from absurd levels of hypocrisy in future! I'm not judging Cotterill on 3 months as City manager.

Shame? Come off it. My opinion is that Cotterill was a terrible appointment. There are loads of reasons for that, some of which aren't for the public domain, but there are two that are absolutely fundamental: 1) His appointment was divisive. Before he was appointed a massive majority were against it and even after it was a done deal a large minority of fans still did not want him. The most divisive since Pulis or Osman. 2) For many people he is extremely hard to like as a person, because he comes across as a bullshitter. No, that's not objective but it is reality for many fans. When you've got either of those problems you've got a bad appointment but both together in a relegation battle makes it terrible. The board dropped a giant 3.5 year bollock on this one and no amount of hypocritical forum defence is going to change that, particularly when results are pretty much unchanged, signings poor and performances maybe even trending downward. None of the opinions about the manager affect the support shown for the team however, so where you get the idea of shame from I don't know.

I think the outcome hinges on whether Farage is allowed to make things up or not.

One of the many reasons I was horrified by the appointment of Cotterill is that he's got a long habit of saying moronic things in the press that piss the fans off and cause disruption. He's really not very bright at all. I hope we scrape by this season, but I wouldn't bet on it sadly.

Great result, well done!

Worst first half performance I've seen for years.

The reality is that what you're defining as "gilt edged" and "clear cut" are merely decent chances, and if there were 22 of those plus the 14 he scored that's slightly better than most strikers do. The standard you're trying to hold him to is absurd and nobody would meet it.

What theory? They've scored and created lots of goals, that's not a theory. We've scored 36 league goals. That's enough to be comfortably top half. That's not a theory either.

They can also fall victim to confirmation bias. Stats help you to apply some objectivity. You don't need stats or particularly sound judgement to realise that complaining about our strikers when they're both scoring and creating more regularly than any we've had since before Brooker and Lita, and that the rest of the team is frankly a complete shambles, is churlish to say the least. It's embarrassing.