LondonBristolian

I think it's far too early to write Bell off. We're not getting the best out of him at the moment for sure but there are plenty of players who've struggled at Championship level football at 21 and then it clicked for them a couple of years later. He's struggled this season but I certainly wouldn't say with any certainly that he isn't good enough. Mehmeti is a tough one. I think he could become a good player in time but the move here hasn't worked and I can see him slipping further down the pecking order as more players come in. As others have said, he could look very different with better decision making but what we have is what we have at the moment and "he'd be a good player if..." doesn't change the fact the if isn't there All that said, the pragmatic answer is very obvious here. It's a bit daft to start a "get rid of player x" thread two days after the transfer window closes. The reality is we have Mehmeti, Bell and everyone else anyone wants rid of until the summer so the only thing to do is see how they do between now and then and reassess in the summer.

Being honest, I’d say it was a mistake to judge how motivational a manager is or isn’t when speaking to players based on how they communicate with the press. How a manager speaks to those outside the club, how a manager speaks to the dressing room as a group and how a manager speaks to players 1:1 are three different skill sets and being good or bad at one does not necessarily mean they will be good or bad at the others. I have no idea how motivational Manning is in a dressing room because I’ve never seen him in a dressing room.

I honestly don't know what I think at the moment. I could easily be convinced any of the following three statements is true: 1. The team is still adjusting to what Manning wants and we look particularly poor at the moment as a result. But we've got Twine and Sykes to come back in, plus Mebude and then Murphy, Stokes and Bird to come in the summer. If we get a new forward in too, and Manning gets a full pre-season then we could surprise people next season. Despite the poor performances, there are genuine positive signs and those criticising Manning are going to be feeling a bit silly next season. 2. We've moved away from the strengths of the team and morale is in danger of collapsing. We'll stay up this season but only because teams are worse than us. We'll lose another key player in the summer and struggle to attract quality within our budget. Despite the odd decent result in the cup, there are major warning signings and those defending Manning are going to be feeling a bit silly next season. 3. Despite the manager change, we are what we always have been. An average mid-table team who'll get the odd streak of wins or losses but never be higher than 8th or lower than 18th. We'll spend the next few months arguing whether the club is doomed or on the verge of a great season only to find it is more of the same next time round. As I say, I could be convinced that any of the above is true. But I honestly couldn't tell you which of 1 or 2 I think is most likely.

My hope is there won’t be that much change in defence and midfield in the summer, bar the business already done. I agree James and King are off but I think we’d need at least one more midfielder or the squad would be thin and I can see that being a new deal for Williams I think it will be hard to keep Conway and I reckon Wells could go if we got two new forwards in. I reckon we could keep everyone else - bar Twine - and I think it would be a good strategy to do so as it would enable the recruitment to focus on the two positions that desperately need it. I can see our squad next year being: GKs 1. O’Leary 2. Poss Bajic if Manning genuinely rates him. 3. HWR or whoever is next on conveyer belt if HWR isn’t kept on Defenders 1. Tanner 2.McCrorie 3.Pring 4.Roberts 5.Naismith 6.Atkinson 7.Dickie 8.Vyner Midfield: 1.Bird 2.Knight 3.Murphy 4.Williams 5.TGH Attacking midfielders/Wide forwards 1. Key signing 2. Stokes 3. Mehmeti 4. Sykes 5. Mebude (if a success) Forwards 1. Key signing 2. New back-up or Wells 3. Bell Moved on: Conway James King Cornick Weimann Maybe moved on too: Wells (I rate Wells - this is just a hunch) Bajic HWR (only listed as his contract is up and I have no idea where the club feel he is in terms of his development)

It’s time to come clean. I’m the striker. I’m going to be loaned back to my armchair until 2026. Manning expects me to need a preseason until approximately 2037 to get anywhere approaching match fitness, and even then it is touch and go as I’ll be 55 by then.

To be honest, if the only way we can get the deal done is by agreeing to the loan, then we've still got a deal done ahead of the summer. It's not ideal and I'm sure it's not what the club initially pushed for but it's still good business in my opinion.

Williams, James, King and Wiles-Richards, plus Weimann who is obviously on loan. Plus Idehen and possibly Lewis Thomas, although only if he's been extended beyond today.

I think this is a very fair post and I'd agree, albeit with a couple of caveats 1) As others have said, mistakes can either be down to ability or what's being asked of the player. I think O'Leary was a very decent Championship Goalkeeper for how we played under Pearson but, as others have noted, he seems to be making more mistakes and that may be because his instructions have changed. It may be he needs time to adapt to how Manning wants him to play, or it may be he was the right goalkeeper under Pearson but not under Manning. 2) I agree on competition but firstly we don't know what Manning's opinion of Bajic is. It might be there's a belief that Bajic is not far away from competing for a first team place but otherwise I'd agree we need competition. At the same time, both Pearson and Manning have been working under limited budgets and I do understand why other areas have been prioritised. 3) What frustrates me about this thread in general - and I know I'm replying to a comment that is not saying this at all - is the whole "O'Leary is not a Championship goalkeeper" argument. He's closing in on 100 Championship appearances under 4 different managers. That is, by any reasonable definition, a Championship goalkeeper. I agree he's not an outstanding Championship goalkeeper but I don't feel he has anything to prove to anyone in terms of his ability to get selected at this level.

I prefer it to the old badges but that may be because I don't like the old badges. I've find heraldry-type badges - if that's the best way to describe them - a bit over-stylised and uninteresting. Similarly I much before our current badge to the last one for the same reason.

I wonder if he'll be in the frame for the Charlton job...

I feel a lot of that list is one that bookies have good to go for any Championship vacancy that comes up. Rowett, Neil and Warburton in particular are likely to be linked to every job that comes up until they take something. My guess is that Cooper would feel he could do better, as might Hughton, Pearson might or might not be ready to take something else depending on his health and Lee Johnson would very much be failing upwards if he got a Championship job right now. If I was them and that was the list, I'd be looking at Rowett and Neil but I feel it might be someone not on that list at all.

I find it amazing that a lot of younger Bristol City supporters don’t know that we only got the Robins nickname in 2005 after the then-board made a decision to change the nickname based on a vote for the fans’ favourite ever loan signing. The Robins narrowly beat the Rougiers and the rest is history.

I agree but, at the same time, it baffles me somewhat that a significant portion of our fanbase found us as a League One club signing a Premier League striker to be underwhelming in the first place. It shouldn't really have come as a surprise that it was a good move all round.

One thing I can’t help but wonder is whether Stokes and Murphy factor into the club’s thinking around the Twine loan. Possibly not and this may be very premature but we could have one or both attacking midfielders pushing for a place in the squad come the summer meaning that, if we could not agree the right price for Twine we still have options in the squad that enable us to maintain the same shape (even if they would obviously need settling in time and not bring what Twine could bring anywhere near as immediately)

It is. And any long contract for a manager is either going to be a stroke of genius if it works and they are coveted by other clubs or a massive error if the club find the manager hasn't achieved what they hoped. I actually lean towards the former - I think we could well see that a team with a pre-season under Manning looks a very different proposition to where we are right now - but I would want the club to recognise that the leadership and direction of the team is sufficiently important that they'd need to budget to be able to pay up on that contract and make a change if things were not working out.

For me, there was a fundamental lack of realism about three things. 1) Our team is decent but not one that anyone looking objectively would expect to be challenging for promotion. 2) The appointment of Manning - whilst I'd argue it was logical and consistent with direction Pearson had taken the club and the players brought in - was not an immediate continuity appointment in a way that Manning could be expected to hit the ground running without a bedding in period. 3) We've got some decent technical players but not a team immediately reading to play possession-based football without hitches. The reality is that the result will be a season of (yet more) transition and inconsistency and, as others have said, it won't be until Manning has had a pre-season to get his ideas across that we'll really know whether he can improve the team. I'm okay with that and I see no evidence so far that a January and summer transfer window under Manning will take us in the wrong direction or lead to a fundamental change of approach. At the same time, I think the level of rebuild we undertook under Pearson and then Manning means we can't allow us to get ourselves in another Lee Johnson-type situation of waiting three years to see if the appointment is going to pay off or not. I want Manning to succeed next season but - if we get to November and the signs aren't there - I'd be frustrated if we kept giving a manager brought in for immediate results more and more time to see what happens.

So, in summary, Wilder won't keep them up but he might keep them up, except no manager could keep them up so he won't keep them up but, having said that's, he's the type of manager who could keep them up if a manager could keep them up but a manager couldn't keep them up so he won't keep them up.

Make sure nobody tells them how frighteningly inconsistent we are...

From interested to completed in 17 minutes - and people say we're not fast enough negotiators!

I don't mind the angle personally but I suspect this is bang on the money. It's not as straightforward as just sticking a camera somewhere - it's building all the infrastructure and it's not going to be a quick or cheap thing and, without a bit of a redesign, would come at the expense of seating - which will probably be in a prime area. There's no rationale to spend the money until/unless we're on TV far more regularly than we currently are.

I rate Conway highly - he's certainly the most natural finisher to come through the academy since Leroy Lita and, whilst Lita went on to make 50 top flight appearances, I think Conway's got the potential to be a much better player. I'm obviously not saying he's anywhere near as good but he does have the type of strikers' instinct that you see in players like Shearer, Owen or Vardy had and that's not an easy thing to coach. Having said that, the challenge he might find is the current situation with football tactics where clubs tend to play with "forwards" rather than out-and-out strikers and, whilst I always thought Semenyo would ultimately get a Premier League move and do well there, I find it harder to identify which clubs would utilise a Conway-type player in their current systems. Part of me wonders if he'll go on to be one of these players that scores goals for fun in the Championship but never quite establishes himself in the top flight. But I am certain far bigger clubs than us will want to take the risk and find out.

I might be wrong but my memory is that players can only be punished retrospectively for incidents the referee missed. Right or wrong, the ref gave a yellow so I think that means the incident was dealt with and cannot be changed.

I wasn’t complaining.

We’re being complete arseholes - Williams in particular. I don’t think we’re making friends with many neutrals but we’ve long experienced teams being way more streetwise than us and we’re clearly learning.

O’Leary’s really leaning into the primetime BBC entertainment at the moment…