Merrick's Marvels

1 hour ago, alexukhc said:

A cross

We all have our crosses to bear. 

Ours is the City! 

8 minutes ago, Finley_Smith10 said:

From 9th to 16th in just over 24 hours. 

Which feels about right. 9th was absurd, not that I was complaining! 

32 minutes ago, Enter Sandman said:

This squad needs pace, ball retention, composure, creativity and steel. 

Jesus is there anything it doesn't need?!

9 minutes ago, phantom said:

They are the same company

Good work Sherlock 

Superb effort by the Post - copy and pasting straight from another newspaper. Top work. 

Well said Richard, btw. 

2 hours ago, Loderingo said:

Fundamentally it feels to me like where we were in 13/14.  We had had a series of short-term managers and had bought a lot of panic buys.  When we ultimately got relegated, the better players left leaving us with a load of deadwood.  13/14 was then just about stabilising the club after Cotterill came in and waiting for contracts to expire so we could start again (particularly Liam Fontaine).

This time we have also had the issue of COVID, putting more pressure on in terms of FFP and also making to hard to move players on.  According to Transfermarkt, the following players are OOC in the summer:

Simpson, Martin, King, COD, Bakinson, Wiles-Richards

I would expect Bakinson, Simpson and COD to go. King and Martin might get 1 years extensions.  The challenge will be offloading Wells and Palmer who aren't OOC until Jun 23

 

I'd be surprised if King doesn't have an option and I'm sure I read somewhere Martin has too, perhaps based on playing a certain number of games.

Which means the room freed up by natural wastage (one way of describing COD) will be minimal and the enforced sale of someone we'd rather not lose (Kalas, Bentley) is more likely.  

2 hours ago, VT05763 said:

Fair comment but  we should have improved, even with the players we had and also have brought in.

IMO.

We have improved, bar last Saturday. 

But we had sunk so low, were in such a mess, that those improvements haven't quite been enough to see us win more than we lose. Yet. 

1 hour ago, beaverface said:

I said on another thread last night, I'd be tempted to sell Bentley (even though I'd like to keep him), to try and speed  things up, and to also up the quality of players we can afford.

Or Kalas. Like you say, wouldn't want to but we're in a tight spot right now and, hey, we sell our best players anyway!

And there's always Massengo, Scott or Semenyo if they were to really come good this season. Massengo will surely catch someone's eye the way he's going. 

What I'm worried about is what division we might be in come next summer! 

34 minutes ago, Numero Uno said:

Things are so complicated with us. We have an Owner whose heart and even more importantly money is clearly in the right place but he just doesn't have a football brain of any kind. He never even used to follow football as a kid and doesn't it ever show at times. We have Grade A facilities, that's on Steve and a totally mismanaged club with a collection of mediocre players to go with it, that's also on Steve unfortunately. The worst thing that ever happened to this football club was the mantra of "clubs in the bag" spouted by Gary Johnson all those years ago because that's all we've collected ever since. Shall we sign quality players on high wages? "**** that, lets get a few more clubs in the bag for the price of one good player".

A manager who has been around the block comes in and immediately says he wants a tighter squad, he doesn't want his Golf bag so heavy with ******* clubs that you need a forklift to carry the bastard. The problem is the tighter squad he wants just happened to coincide with Swiss Tony and Lee Johnson having spent more money on players than any other individuals in the club's history and now, financially, we are bollocksed. So we don't have a tighter squad higher on quality, we have one of the same LACK of quality as we've always had. This is the same Swiss Tony that the Owner clearly stated was a great bloke and totally misunderstood by fans..........who got that one right? 

If Steve Lansdown was a fat cockney who can down a pint of lager in one (no names) he would have been hounded out years ago. I actually think his current policy of "leave it to Nige for the next three years and stay well out of it" will, if we give Pearson the time, be the right strategy. What I do know is that if he interferes again and we end up with a Mike Flynn/Michael Appleton in charge then I might replace season ticket every season since I stopped playing football with pick and choose. Been there too many times before. 

Agree 100% with all that. I'm ahead of you on one thing, though - the season ticket's been exchanged for picking and choosing already  but if Pearson gets enough time, I fully expect that to change.  

Loving the Swiss Tony thing btw!

2 minutes ago, Coxy27 said:

Is it?

I think you have a short memory in the relative history of the club.

Being an established championship club is no disgrace.

But he's talking about the mess - not the fact we've been a Championship club for 6 years.

In the wider historical context, that is good going for us but the current mess is a disgrace. And whatsmore, it's putting that status as an "established Championship club" under dire stress.  

3 minutes ago, BS3_RED said:

I disagree. He picks them, he picks the style of play, he trains them and he makes the subs. Thats on him. 

You're right, he does pick them, and the style of play. Doesn't mean they always do what they're supposed to, under pressure, though does it?

I'll meet you half way and agree the subs might have been better utilised last night but he wasn't exactly spoilt for choice. I don't suppose he expected Palmer and O'Dowda to basically disappear once he'd put them on. 

I reckon he doesn't rate about 50% of our squad - they wouldn't be here if he had a blank piece of paper and could write down 18 names of his choosing for a matchday squad.

That's a situation he's inherited, albeit one he walked into with his eyes open.

So he's basically training and picking a lot of players that no matter how much instruction you give them, don't implement those instructions consistently.

Guess what, Johnson and Holden had the same problem too! So if 3 different managers have come to the same conclusion, I reckon the problem might be with the players, not the bloke training and picking them - although the bloke(s) who thought it was a good idea to buy them in the first place might well be culpable too.

If you gave Pearson that blank piece of paper, let's say it had 2 columns on it one headed Keep and the other Bin, how many of the current squad do you think would be in the Keep column?

I've no idea how old you are, so if you're a young un, I'm asking which players do you think Pearson would "swipe Right" for?        

2 minutes ago, italian dave said:

It's a complete joke, isn't it? They've been "considering" all those matters for 20 years or more. 

I agree Tom, I fear this is simply kicking the can down the road and deliberately so. It's not going to happen but they don't want the political fallout that realisation would cause. 

As Greta T said, "build back better blah blah blah" - although she probably didn't have Portishead in mind!

Agree with you 100% although I'm not sure what political fallout they're worried about - North Somerset would continue to be a very safe Tory seat and the votes they might lose in Bristol are irrelevant anyway.

Imo, they don't want to stump up any money for it. Plain and simple. 

Perhaps Covid and working from home, which has changed the commuter landscape, means the car journey to and from Bristol during the rush hours is no longer beyond a joke? Which it certainly was for many years. 

2 hours ago, KeepUpLino said:

It’s was absolute suicide for him taking this job and I’m amazed he even bothered, let’s face it we’d be lucky to get anyone with any calibre to replace him!

The mess left by LJ and MA and overseen by SL is nothing short of a disgrace, no money, no prospects, league 1’s a certainty and it’s not the fault of the manager!

Agreed - other than the "league 1's a certainty" bit. I'd say a relegation struggle is a certainty instead.

2 hours ago, BS3_RED said:

While I agree with the sentiment, There was no need to make the changes he did last night. Swansea were absolute dog sh!!e against us but managed to see the game out by keeping the ball for long periods of time in the last few minutes. We can not do that cos we panic and thats on the manager.

That's not on the manager at all - it's on the players. They're the ones who lost the plot last night.

41 minutes ago, Enter Sandman said:

Getting boring now isn’t it. 
how many times have we heard this from Pearson. But nothing changes. 
who is he taking about this time. Bentley? Baker? Martin? Weimann? Dasilva? 
Will he be dropping any of these from the squad completely? It’s all empty threats and is boring me. 
Pearson needs to stop saying shit like this and actually start doing something about it. Like giving his players the confidence to be able to keep hold of the football and not concede oodles of possession so late in games. 

Perhaps he's talking about O'Dowda who, for the second game in a row, was useless? O'Dowda might reasonably turn around after last night and say "but I'm not a striker, whose bright idea was that?" (although he may decide discretion is the better part of valour).

Perhaps Weimann who was using those concrete boots he sometimes wears? Although Weimann might reasonably say "yes but I'm not a midfielder". 

Perhaps Martin who had less impact than usual? Although Martin might reasonably say "yes but I'm not a Sat-Tues-Sat type player".

Perhaps he's talking about the fact he has to include players in every matchday squad he's decided are a waste of a wage and so aren't a realistic option when he turns to the bench for help?

More likely, I think he might be making a general, over-arching point that where we are as a club at the moment, in this division, with the current resources, we need all 11 players plus the subs to be at the top of their game week after week after week if we're going to get results but if even just one or two are off their game on any given day, we're not good enough at the moment to grind out results in this brutal league. And there were one or two off their game last night.

Playing strikers in midfield and midfielders as strikers and flogging Martin to death doesn't help though. Nor does the absence of Semenyo.  

22 hours ago, Roadrunner said:

I am going with the Barnsley match.

20 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

Me too.

And me but so long as we don't lose tonight I'll be happy enough 

18 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

it would’ve been easy to label me injury prone / sick note / the Darren Anderton of local football

 

Oh come on Dave, I bet you got called a lot worse than that 

We need Massengo, Semenyo or Scott to have a blinding season and get sold for daft money. Plus one or two of the top earners to be out of contract at the end of the season(are there any?). That's the only way to create a bit of leeway.

Otherwise, we go on being a hardworking, pragmatic, unremarkable team with little ambition but to avoid relegation for a good while longer. 

1 hour ago, Rocking Red Cyril said:

Yrs total agreement. We have to keep our best players and young academy stars  long term to give the basis to bring in players in making us a promotion side. But I still feel Mr Lansdown does not want to fund it that way. And I do feel we do need more finiscial.backing than just Lansdown if we are going to teach the promised land. 

It doesn't make any difference how many financial backers we have.

FFP will still only allow us to spend a set amount, whoever's paying the bills.

I agree about finding a way to keep our best players for longer though. 

3 hours ago, GTFABM said:

Not sure he makes it that far. Either from his point of view with this squad and lack of options to sign better more suited players, or from higher up losing patience.

So Lee Johnson got 5 years but Nigel Pearson will get just a couple before he gets the boot? 

Our owner has his moments but that would take the biscuit. 

He's fckd. Best if he's put down and we move on to someone else. 

54 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

Think that’s Clive Whitehead, mate.

Definitely Tainton with Sir Geoffrey, I find myself getting pretty emotional at that photo & also the one of the Sween & TV Tom.

Bloody legends, I should say so..

Yes it is Whitehead - shaved his tache off but his accent gave the game away!

Got to shake Sir Geoff by the hand last night. Bloody marvellous.

Latham got quite emotional when mentioning Coops too.  

1 hour ago, Davefevs said:

Martin peeling onto Kelly.  Bentley should not kick down Cahill’s throat.

I want to see Martin giving Kelly a tough afternoon physically. We might get some joy there, if we make best use of the limited possession I expect us to have. 

Personally think they'll be much too good for us but we shall see.  

1 hour ago, Davefevs said:

The keep them guessing bit.

I like your confidence. Not sure I share it!  

2 minutes ago, Engvall’s Splinter said:

I’m not knocking the decision to start Foden deeper. I’m talking about his substitutions. Southgate’s inability to make the right changes and at the right time, has hindered us previously and will continue to do so.  

I think he was spoilt for choice about who to take off!

13 minutes ago, Engvall’s Splinter said:

Southgates had a shocker tonight. 

At home, against a bunch of fascists with nothing to play for, he's entitled to pick one less defensive midfielder and pick an attacking one instead.

The rest is down to the players.

Disappointing result, against an entirely negative opponents, that still lives us in command of our own destiny.