Fuber

1 hour ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Is Dilks a Derby fan? Barely seen any of the podcast.

Could he still be holding some kinda pettiness there from his brief stint there in 2016-17?

That was my thought in the Rotherham thread.

22 minutes ago, BCFC11 said:

They really haven’t got the slightest have they

I’m sure he knows a lot more about business than you and I Topper.
You could argue he is ruthless because he ditched the UWE deal as he didn’t get the deal he wanted…. Despite knowing it would be devastating to Gasheads at the time .
As he explained clearly in his interview, that he sees the Gas as a love and an investment. By improving the infrastructure and climbing the leagues losses will hopefully fall and we may even post profits in the future .
If he bought the Gas for ( total guess) £5m
, he’s spends 100m to get the Club into the championship in a new stadium….. how much is the club worth then ? I’d argue a lot more than £105m .

What in the Bristol's cocaine riddled water system is that logic?

I've seen some stupid takes - but dear lord. If that makes Rovers worth £105m, what on earth are we worth? -  Someone tell SL to up the asking price pronto.

46 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

 

I didn't read Sutton's tweet as saying he thinks we should sack Pearson and switch manager now. Dilks was saying that, but I read Sutton's as a more general point that maybe Pearson isn't the guy to take us to the top6/PL. If Sutton was advocating for a switch now then I retract my agreement.

My misunderstanding. Thought Gabs feedback was him being tagged into discussion Dilks' point.

2 minutes ago, Red-Robbo said:

 

My view as well. It was a push and if the ref didn't see it, he needed to consult his assistant in front of the Dolman, who got as good a look at it as you and I.

Not the only thing Josh Smith bottled in that game. His is a name that I'd not noticed before, and I sincerely hope I never have to read again. 

To be fair to Smith - thought he was generally good first half. Just completely fell off second.

1 hour ago, grifty said:

If you take Transfermarkt.

Engvall - £1.1m also apparently recouping £600k

O'Dowda - £1.2m

£2.3m is not more than £3.5m.

I get people don't like LJ cos he was short, believed in himself and ultimately didn't deliver, but my god some people make stuff up!

Transfermarkt has Engvall at €1.6m. And undisclosed with regards to the Mechelen fee. Talk at the time and since also pointed towards very inflated agents fees as part of the deal. I'd also point out I'm not only slighting LJ, but MA and JL as well.

Transfermarkt makes errors, a common problem is not exchanging to GBP.

My error was actually thinking we signed O'Dowda for £1.6m - the above correction is valid, again noting Transfermarkt have the fee in Euros in error. However, being the case, I remove Cornick from my £3.5m total. Doesn't change much, does it?

I could put immeasurable other signings from the MA/LJ era.

Wish people would stop assuming any criticism of LJ is somehow being heightist - odd tangent. I have never insulted LJ personally in reviews of his terms as manager.

Fact of the matter is, we blew nearly £35m of which only a small portion will be recouped, Kalas, Baker, Bentley, Palmer, DaSilva; alone nearly £22m in fees. That's indefensible.

42 minutes ago, Son of Fred said:

If those sums are correct,they do bring perspective - Nigel's work here thus far is clearly impressive.(not to all,mind!).

I'm nervous now about what can be achieved with a few quid in the back pocket! 

Nige has effectively spent £3.5m on Atkinson, Tanner, Mehmeti, and Cornick.

LJ spent more than that on Engvall and O'Dowda.

9 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

Us needing a "Complete squad overhaul" and "new identity" is a ludicrous opinion. Switching to a different manager in order to take the next step - not so crazy in my opinion. Not this summer, but when Pearson's contract ends this time next year then there's a valid debate to be had over whether to renew/extend it or whether to look for a new option.

I agree with Sutton.

My only reason to disagree with Sutton - is that too often managers don't get enough time. We've cleared the deadwood now and improved upon last season. Let's see where momentum building now takes us into next season, especially regarding recruitment -would be remiss to sack Pearson now.

Nige's contract ends next season anyhow.

8 hours ago, grifty said:

2016 - Finished 18th

2016/17 - Finished 17th

2017/18 - Finished 11th

2018/19 - Finished 8th

You say it was "his failure to improve City's league position season on season..."

I used to think people gave you a hard time on here, but you actually don't know what you're on about.

My general personal view with LJ is that spending and performances, irrespective of league position, were woeful. I was all for countering the opposition, the problem with it, is that when you can't counter the opposition - you look a bit stupid. Que the zero shots on target etc, and our general lack of having any idea what to do with the ball at the end of his tenure.

I'd take the current football under Pearson over anything LJ served up in his final 24 months in charge. Namely because I actually see us trying to play with an identity, irrespective of opposition, with an academy pathway, something much mooted under LJ that never actually happened, Kelly aside being the only example.

We're on task to finish 14th, roughly 4 point behind LJs 63 point finish in 2020.

Signing fees of LJs 18 most played players -  circa £46m. Pearson - £9m, of which £6m was two LJs signings (Weimann, Wells).

Wages, £34m per annum vs £25m per annum (circa 26% reduction in playing staff cost).

On another note - Ryan Dilks of the Second Tier pod really needs to do some research before spouting some utter bollucks. Not sure why you'd put out an opinion on a club without basic fact checking or feedback and be surprised when you get pilloried for it. Had us favourites to go down, we're midtable, still insist we need a 'young and upcoming manager' without providing a viable name as an example and reckons we need a complete squad overhaul and new identity.

Then the next second praises the younger players. I... what??

How does it not click that part of the the reason academy players have integrated so well is because of NP?

On 21/04/2023 at 09:08, Robbored said:

So what’s next?  Change the name of Whiteladies Rd? surely that has racist implications…..not to mention BlackBoy Hill………….

Realise this is said in jest but I can't help myself.

Actually it's not - BlackBoy Hill, at least, is a nickname of Charles II.

Think based on his last 5-6 games - I genuinely fail see how Weimann keeps a first team spot next season.

Need fairly sweeping recruitment in the Summer; GK, CB, CM, RW, AM, and ST.

3 hours ago, pillred said:

I have unfortunately but can't understand why a club like Boro who themselves have had no PP are in so much of a better position than us.

Simple. They (MA and LJ) spunked it, and more, up the wall on wages than Boro did.

End of Story. 123% of turnover wasn't just Championship norm, but stupidity.

1 hour ago, Davefevs said:

That’s one way to spin it, and glaze over the big increase in “operating expenses”….wages up £3m, other costs up £6m, that led to losses doubling.

In other words, we now have confirmation the player trading strategy came from Ashton.

At least he got it right with Webster for us, but that was about it. It's not sustainable, as we found out the hard way.

15 hours ago, mozo said:

Benarous obviously has had a recurrence too, not that I'm trying to score a point with that

Him and Atkinson are ACL - that's simply more down to bad luck and chance than anything else, so I'd agree not much of a point score.

Williams and Kalas - as you mention, damaged goods from Rolls. I'd also argue King from his time in Belgium.

Naismith didn't have the best availability at Wigan iirc - think his availability has been slightly disappointing.

Think it comes down to squad depth, mostly - we're just way too thin in midfield and defence.

11 hours ago, Baba Yaga said:

Their last 10 games after the international break couldn't be much kinder. Lots of pts to be had here...

Leicester H, Leeds A, Southampton A, Everton H, Wolves A, West Ham H, Spurs A, Bournemouth H, Fulham A, Forest H

I would be interested to know what the players think about this because I can see this unsettling them if they still wanted him, presumably their fans are not very happy either. 

Worth noting I think in their last three theyve had zero shots on target.

Even missing a goalscorer thats pretty dire.

On 26/02/2023 at 18:40, joe jordans teeth said:

Ligue 2 is literally lower league 2 mate apart from maybe the top 2 who would be top half,think you overrate French football 

Not sure I completely agree with that, think it's more likely in the middle.

I.e. Ligue 1 being down to mid Championship or Lower and Ligue 2 being Lower Champ down to upper League 2.

I don't think someone like Kodjia was League 1 standard. Equally Arnie Garita did decent at Plym in L2 and he was National level.

On 26/02/2023 at 10:05, downendcity said:

Has Max replacing Bentley in goal made a difference to the collective confidence of the defence in front of him?

Underrated part for me.

Bentley never was at all preemptive with communicating with his defenders. O'Leary is less vocal than Bents was, the problem with Bents was it was all reactive - used to give me kittens when he'd come and and try punching it without a shout to his defenders.

Can't remember the game it was against, but earlier in the season before he got injured Kalas all but headed a ball out of a waiting pair of gloves that O'Leary gave a clear shout for, still can't believe people thought it was Max's fault - simply because Bents never left his line nor commanded his area.

Max still gives a me kittens with his distribution at times, but that mostly comes down to lack of experience, easy to forget that he only has circa 80+apps above non-league.

For context, Zak has 180+.

We don't have the cutting edge in possession and it shows. Add in Andi not match fit, no end product, and it was a disjointed performance.

Would have preferred Cornick on the right and Weimann through the middle, where the latter's press would have been a bit more consistent - not that Cornick did too much wrong, just think he needs to get a bit more match fit and then possibly moved across once a bit more comfortable and up to speed.

Anyhow - we go again, remain unbeaten, and in Nige we trust.

On the bright side, Wigan made me realise that we could be much, much worse.

Retires.

10 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

In fairness to Ian (did I just say that?) you need someone like him on the podcast, because his comments spark debate.

True - it would just be great if said counterpoint/debate was within the pod itself and discussed, not unquestionable 'fact'. Sometimes, something akin to "Do you have a source?" for some of his supposed figures would be interesting.

40 minutes ago, REDOXO said:

I like Ian (and @Curr Avon) 

leaving the latter to one side, Ian despite everything IMO is a supporter who wants the best for the club and isn’t afraid to say what he thinks. Yes you may not agree with some of it and he does get over the top down when we loose but that’s what the off button is for. 

What I typically do is not listen to the poddy for a while during wrist slashing weeks, but always go back until the next time I have to leave it alone. 
 

Incidently

Not sure why anyone would block @Davefevs on any media, the bloke is a rockstar on here.  I just see him as a more measured and thoughtful version of Ian with a spreadsheet!

Some take disagreement as some kind of personal attack, not constructive criticism. Agree with you as to why block Fevs - but then to be fair I tend to agree with his viewpoints myself.

23 minutes ago, headhunter said:

Ian is my mate and he can be a rude arrogant *unt but so's Piers Morgan and he has 8.3M followers on Twitter.

He talks out of his *rse quite regularly but what makes me laugh is that he's living rent free in the heads of all his critics on here. 

You should listen to this latest episode which also features the Sutton father & son duo plus Mark and Ian won't disappoint!!:

 https://foreverbristolcity.podbean.com/e/norwich-h-the-verdict-how-long-can-we-keep-this-run-going/

Fact is we're getting 5k downloads a month for our knee jerk, under analysed comment on all matters City. Now I'm guessing we're the 3rd most popular podcast behind 3Peaps & OSIB [our downloads are visible, theirs aren't] and I'll settle for that. It's fun to do and that's all that matters to me and I don't care if people think I know jack-*hit about football either.

To be fair HH, no one doubts the podcast itself to any degree, and in spite of many views, with regards to podcasts - more the merrier, more content for us fans, etc. Its going to do well as people will always want to see the contrasting opinion(s) across the fanbase - I can guarantee a portion of fans likely listen to all three for some context.

As for the bit of bold, that's basically nail on head. I'd amend it and say the biggest gripe with people, myself included, who quite like digging into the performance numbers - is that if he simply stopped saying "I've done the analysis" and said "In my point of view" instead, he'd get a lot less frictional views from members on here.

I have to agree with Fevs; he literally plucks numbers and draws his own conclusions with not much foundation. That is not analysis, as there's no balanced counterpoints to his own arguments to lend his views any credence, and the problem is there's nobody to bounce off of on the pod when he does raise points to encourage said further debate and analysis, at least with any statistical knowledge - I know myself and a few others have cursory coaching badges etc. When he is questioned - usually such as the twitter take below, its all evidently very shallow analysis, or at the very least lacking any context with regards to tactical system within which the players operate.

^ This being a prime example. 
If we were to use the logic above, James, et al, are going to be 6/10 every week based on what they can do and no better - they're playing on a system where job is essentially to screen, turnover, and play the ball up the pitch on the counter-press as quickly as possible - usually via the channels. Despite the fact even the statistical rating systems have the three of them rounded 8 (Williams), 7 (Scott), and 7 (James) respectively on whoscsored. Are whoscored always accurate? - by no means, however its worth noting that Sergeant (James' man), had 22 touches. Which is what I'd bring Ian up on - as he was marked from the game so thoroughly he was subbed off at the 60 mark for Idah. If that doesn't speak to James' performance I don't know what does.

In a team whose biggest weakness is defensive - to then turnaround and complain about a players attacking/creativity output in a defensive role?

17 hours ago, Coombsy said:

Should have been a red for that push

Not sure we can complain ala Nakhi v Preston - that at least was albeit arguably consistent.

29 minutes ago, Silvio Dante said:

Oooh, it’s an analyst feud!

For some reason I read this in Jamie Vardy Danish Friends vibe and now can't unimagine it.

Goddammit.

13 minutes ago, Silvio Dante said:

Just for you Dave, here’s Ian’s rationale, where he expands and confirm nobody was better than 6/10 as they could do better.

Total Belter.

 

(Ian hasn’t realised we play counter attacking football which low possession is a function of)

The part that beats me, is that he's literally listed all the reasons we have 35% possession (playstyle, player output, etc), and can't seem to work out the manager has realised - why play possession if we don't have the players for it, ergo playing a system to fundamentally get the best out of them?

By that logic he should go study Reading's record breaking season under Coppell - who averaged something like 42% possession and guess how many points they had. That would be interesting.

As for the input output comment - that's just tripe. As Mourinho said when we beat his United side, and many others have said the same - you make your own luck.

I usually take Ians post with a pinch of salt, but that's one of the most stupid comments I've seen be amended to football in a long long time.

3 hours ago, johnbytheriver said:

  16 hours ago, TeemuVanBasten said:

Bristol City

1. O'Leary - £0 (Youth)
2. Tanner - £300k
3. Atkinson - £1.8m
4. Vyner - £0 (Youth)
5. Pring - £0 (Youth)
6. Williams - £1m
7. James - £0 (free agent)
8. Sykes - £0 (free agent)
9. Scott - £0 (Youth)
10. Bell - £0 (Youth)
11. Wells - £4m
12. Mehmeti - £1.2m
13. Cornick - £300k
14. Weimann - £0 (Resigned)
15. DaSilva - £2m
16. King - £0 (Free Agent)
17. Kalas - £8m
18. Haikin - £0 (Free Agent)

£14.7m and yet, we're no better than them. We're no younger than them. We're 3 points apart in the table. 

I still can't quite get my head around how much money we've wasted on flops like Rashica and Tzolis, and how heads haven't rolled for it. The fees for those two alone exceed the amount transacted for Bristol City's entire squad.

Begs the question really, are we one of the most expensive mid-table sides in Championship history?

 

Doesn't just put Norwich's recruitment into Context, as the three most expensive players are by far LJs, one of which started.

24 minutes ago, awbb said:

Apologies for cherry picking, but I think Williams was probably half of that. Wigan were a financial mess and had just been relegated and they had a bit of a firesale. £1.2M is the figure I always thought.

Correct. Figure that I recall from the times was £1m. As Wigan fans were furious he went that cheap.