LondonBristolian

This is it. I reckon there are at least seven players in the squad still that Pearson wouldn't have signed if it had been his choice and who he'd happily move on if he had the resources to do so. I also reckon another three are only at the club because they fitted the budget rather than because they were who Pearson would have chosen in ideal world. That only really leaves eleven or twelve senior players and a smattering of youngsters who are actually players Pearson would ideally be working with if he had the choice...

Job for Cotts?

I'm not so worried about West Brom. Anything we get from it is a bonus but, whatever happens, it won't define our season. The issue for me is Barnsley Saturday week. We may come into that on the back of 3 defeats and, of course, our terrible home record. I really see that as a genuine must win game.

A fundamental issue for me is that both Martin and Weimann dip massively in effectiveness once they're playing two games a week. Weimann is largely treated as undroppable by managers - and, for a good reason as he offers something we don't have in the team - but I'd rather he had 36 very good games and ten where he is rested rather than 5 very good games and 41 where he's under par due to needing a break.

Personally I’d like to see the young hungry strikers we already have on the bench a little more but I take your point. I really hope Conway plays a role once fit but I’d like to have seen Bell as an option last night as all our senior strikers were on the pitch.

In answer to your first question, I honestly don’t know. I’d like to see our young strikers more but I honestly don’t know what their form is like in training, how their fitness is or how they would do if they were playing. What I do know is that, in the past, players like Reid and Massengo have substantially upped their fitness with a regime over a number of months and they have not got their overnight. I know nothing about Britton, his lifestyle or his body type so don’t want to speculate but - speaking generally - there is only so much a club can do around an individual’s fitness and much of it is on the individual themselves. Regarding your second question, premier league loans are not free. Clubs have to cover wages, pay a loan fee, pay a penalty fee if the player does not start etc. It could easily be more expensive than a permanent signing with no guarantee of any better result.

That was my real motive for starting this thread!

If the papers are to be believed, we were being quoted £1 million for a Martin-standard striker from Rotherham. I have no doubt strikers were out there but we have proven several times in the past how easy it is to sign a player for the sake of a signing who does not then improve the squad. We need to move on some of those signings before we have got space to shape the squad to where it needs to get.

I think his metaphor misunderstands the fundamental concept of buses. Aside from that, he is making no excuses and saying the right things: https://www.bcfc.co.uk/news/i-feel-for-the-fans-pearson/

I get what you mean but - at the same time - I couldn’t actually tell you who I thought played badly last night. Baker had a disastrous last two minutes but, had the game finished on the ninety minute mark, I think we would have seen it as a decent, solid performance all around. The issue for me isn’t player performances but the players we don’t have. We don’t have any pacy players, we don’t have any creative players, we don’t have a quality finisher and we’ve run Martin into the ground due to a lack of options to hold the ball up. Plus the few options we have for running and impetus in midfield are either injured or recovering from injury. I’m frustrated with how we are doing but - short of spending money that presumably is not there with FFP on players who may not have been available or attainable in the summer in any case - I don’t think any manager would find quick fixes.

I think Pearson has done an important job. He’s largely stabilised us, brought down the size of the squad, bought two quality players from the lower leagues and integrated some younger players and it feels like he has made some changes to the infrastructure too. All of this needed to be done and was going to be a shitshow for whoever did it. In that sense, I think he has been a good appointment and I don’t think it has been a mistake in any sense to give him the job. At the same time, it sometimes proves the case that the person brought in to clear up the mess isn’t the person who gets to enjoy the benefits of the mess being cleared up. I think we saw that with SOD. It is very hard to look back at his time in charge with any fondness but I don’t think Cotterill could have done the job he did if he had replaced McInnes straight off the bat. It may be that Pearson ultimately does not succeed and, if that were the case, I would love to see someone like Ryan Lowe get the chance. But I think, whenever they are appointed, our next manager will be far better placed to succeed with what they inherit from Pearson than they would have been with what Pearson inherited from Holden or what Holden inherited from Johnson. I have no idea if Pearson will succeed in the long term but I think the job he is doing will help the club to do so.

It really does. I'm as frustrated as Hell after tonight. I just think we have to be realistic about where we are at the moment.

For me, it's not about being happy. It's about pragmatism. I honestly don't see what we gain by abandoning a rebuild half way through and tearing up the plans again. If I thought we'd gain anything by changing a manager, I'd be quite happy for us to do it. But I really don't think we'd gain anything at all.

I largely agree with this with two caveats. 1) I am going to fault Baker for the penalty. Mistakes happen but, for a senior player to make that sort of challenge late on was undoubtedly a mistake. 2) We did not react at all well to the goal going in. It was probably a handball but we shouldn't have been that easy to penetrate immediately after conceding. Nonetheless I'm gutted for the players. They worked hard and did well for 90-odd minutes only to throw it away in a minute of ridiculousness.

Fundamentally this is it in a nutshell. I don't blame the club at all for not buying attacking players over the summer - if the right players weren't available and affordable then I'd rather we bought nobody than signed for the sake of it - but the reality is that our attacking options are incredibly limited. I'd like to see Conway get a chance once he's fit again, I'd like to see Bell play a bit more and - for pace alone - I'm anxious for Semenyo to return to fitness but I'm not expecting miracles from any of those players and, as it stands, we're hamstrung by a lack of creative players and a lack of attacking quality. I think we've made good signings in Atkinson and Tanner. I think James is decent too so I've no issue with the signings we've made but there is lot of quality that needs to come in for us to play well.

We had approximately 697 touches in the box in one chance alone in the first half when everyone passed it to each other rather than shooting...

I think one follows the other. Ultimately Pearson is trying to grind out a win in a team that we know currently panics at the last minute. I think that, once again, we dropped too deep and subbed too many attacking outlets. But I also don't know whether I think we dropped too deep because we subbed too many attacking outlets or Pearson subbed the attackers because he had spotted that - whether or not it was his instruction - the team were instinctively panicking and dropping deep.

Sack @Fordy62 there I said it he has to go.

Is there a restart game button somewhere?

I think the overarching issue is that we don’t have a huge amount of pace, quality or creativity. There’s a fair bit of endeavour and I think, over the course of the season, we’ll do enough to get an upper mid table position, but I think the uncomfortable truth is that most of this season will be about compensating for and minimising our shortcomings.

I agree with this. It's easy to criticise the police and the security - and, as you say, it's important to investigate whether any steward did anything wrong, dangerous or illegal - but I don't think the police and the stewards could reasonably have anticipated the level of crowd trouble and attempts to gatecrash that happened. Clearly there is a need to up security in the future but responsibility ultimately lies with the people who chose to force their in without a ticket and/or to misbehave in and around the stadium. Sadly, as ever, it's mostly the law-abiding fans and the players who pay the price as we have a game without attendees but responsibility has to lie with the idiots who spoil things for everyone else.

For me, it's not that the wrong team was picked - although I do think the wrong sub was made when Williams went off - but that, having performed as we did on Saturday, there needs to be evidence of meritocracy in future team selections. Vyner, Scott and Palmer have all not been selected for perfectly valid reasons, whilst I think Wells actually looked outstanding at QPR and is unlucky to be back out the team again. My feeling is that, right now there are a number of players - Martin, Bakinson and O'Dowda being the first three I'd mention - who haven't done enough in recent games to justify starting whilst others, such as Pring, have tailed off a little. If it's fair that Vyner, Scott, Palmer and Wells have been dropped for their performances - which I believe it is - then it's only fair that this applies across the squad. @Davefevs suggested on another thread that Vyner could come into the midfield until the injury system abates and I agree with this. I also think it's time that Wells was given a chance ahead of Martin and that Scott or Palmer gets another chance too. I'm not saying any of those players would always be in my first eleven but, if the team is being picked on merit, that has to apply across the board and I think there are certain players who would benefit from being made to work for their place again.

I think it's always a mistake to read too much into a run of 2 or 3 games. We could win our next three and still tail off dramatically after Christmas. Or we could lose all three and still make a play off push. I see it more as 8 days that could define the next 8 days...

I feel we can take a fair guess from the obvious omission on the team sheet. https://twitter.com/BristolCity/status/1449359769232449537/ My one concern is I wish we had Vyner rather than Simpson on the bench. Real lack of cover if a centre-back gets injured.

I really like it. I really don’t like another kit announcement mid-October but I really like the actual kit.