Wanderingred

The team that night:

It was the middle of the night/early morning for me in some northern industrial Chinese city. I bought some red champagne to pop open when we clinched it but for some reason I wasn’t expecting it to be that night, Bradford away was a tough game back then. So promotion bubbles, followed immediately by eight hours of work. Awesome.

1 hour ago, formerly known as ivan said:

Absolutely mate. I’ve been around long enough now to not be hurt by other people’s opinions. Unfortunately it seems some still don’t like it when your opinion is different from theirs. The very funny and well thought out reply of “you’ll be missed” in relation to not renewing is wrong. Yes, I will be missed. Not by individuals on here, but by the club. Fans are the life blood of every club, both financially and physically. Just look how empty the ground was again yesterday. And the atmosphere, yesterday must have been one of the worse of the season and that’s saying something!

I’m assuming season ticket sales aren’t going well as I’m sure the club usually release updates on numbers. Also noticed the promotional video being played on TV a few times to promote season tickets. That will come at a cost and seems pretty desperate to me.

But I am just a fan who isn’t needed by all accounts…

No matter what people say, you’ll will be missed. We aren’t a big Premier League club, where a seat will immediately be taken by a person on their season ticket waiting list. Every fan is valuable. I hope the club realises this too because the trend of increasing attendances won’t continue without a better quality of product on the pitch and if we end up going backwards, they’ll need the core fanbase to stick with them more than ever.

I’d renew if I was still living in the UK but only because it’s a chance to spend time with my father, and it’s an age old routine that I couldn’t imagine not doing. It must feel harder and harder to justify it though when two thirds of the games we play produce football like that. People want to see exciting performances as well as results.

27 minutes ago, Banjo Island said:

Manning out

Idiot 

2 minutes ago, transfer reader said:

But as others have pointed out, this is you curating a selection to be the worst possible for Manning.

It's probably the only permutation of consecutive games you can use for this outcome.

So, why would anyone reasonable person hyper focus on one set to try and push a narrative that doesn't apply to any others, doesn't apply for the established ways that form is generally used (past 5/6 games), and doesn't apply over the established methods even with our recent upturn in form disregarded?

If I showed a similar table with us top or close to it because of our wins over Sunderland, Hull and Watford in December would that mean we were on course to win the league?

Absolutely not. Intentionally selective datasets are a dishonest way to conduct an argument one way or the other.

Thanks, you’ve just put across my thoughts in a much more eloquent way than I’ve been able to !

Ive just tried selecting the form table for random groups of 13 games across the season using that website. I’ve seen Preston, Norwich, Sunderland and Watford appear in that bottom 3, all teams nowhere near relegation. I’m sure I could find a lot more teams if I could be bothered. It’s no way to try and establish an argument.

4 minutes ago, Silvio Dante said:

You are totally right.

Again, I wonder how many teams have been bottom 3 in the form table at some point this season, particularly when artificially selecting a group of games?

16 minutes ago, Silvio Dante said:

If you want a bigger sample, since the start of the year up until Easter it was P13 W3 D2 L8 Pts 11

Over a season that’s 39 points.

Whatever way you cut it, that gets you relegated. 
 

 

Relegation FORM pre Easter.

Edit - I’m more than happy to say if we got 26 points from 13 that’s promotion form. 11 from 13 is relegation form however it’s cut!

You’re doing it again, carefully selecting groups of games to try and prove something that’s not there. You’ve picked out a bad spell of form sandwiched between 3 successive wins and our current good run, a time when we also had four cup games against Premier League opposition. You could probably pick out a bad spell from any team outside the top 4 this season and call it relegation form.

The only way to judge Manning (although I’d say it’s way too early to really do so ) is by looking at the overall picture. He’s won as many games as he’s lost in all competitions. 

24 minutes ago, Supersonic Robin said:

That's 23 points from 20 games, so 52.9 points if you extrapolate to a full season. Last season, that would have produced an 18th place finish, so it's in the bottom third. I think we're splitting hairs a bit about whether you call it "lower midtable" or "near relegation zone". By the time we had 5 losses from 6, I think fans' frustrations were very much justified.

No need to compare to Pearson, but if you do want to, then most metrics (including points per game) were showing that we were worse under Manning than Pearson (especially if you consider the relative injury situations).

I'm glad we've looked better in recent weeks, but it really wasn't that unreasonable for people to be questioning Manning's job.

 

I very much agree with your last point though. I don't trust the board to make appointments in any part of the club, manager included. The ownership is undoubtedly the reason we're stagnating.

 

 

Looking at the last decade, 53 points is almost always nowhere near a relegation spot, the only exception being the year when Blackburn went down with 51 points, a freakishly high points total for relegation. I stand by my opinion that we have not been in relegation form under Manning (unless you take a really small sample of games). Some of the football has been so bad though, that it’s probably made things appear worse than in reality.

24 minutes ago, Silvio Dante said:

I’d argue that five defeats in six would have been relegation form, but each to its own! Course of a season that gives you about 23 points at best.

He’s been in charge for around 25 games. You can’t just select the six games with the lowest points return and claim we’re in relegation form. We’ve collected 12 points of the last eighteen which over a season would see us comfortably promoted, but you’d rightfully laugh if somebody tried to claim we are in promotion form now.

27 minutes ago, Supersonic Robin said:

Is it that shocking?

Across Manning's first 20 games or so our form was near relegation standard. Results were poor, performances were poor, underlying numbers were poor, eye test was poor.

I never got quite as far as calling for Manning to be sacked, but you can absolutely understand why some people did.

6 wins, 5 draws, 9 defeats in his first 20 league games. That’s the form of lower mid table, the position we’ve finished for the last two seasons under Pearson.

Calling for Manning to be sacked was pointless. We all know the real reason we are stagnating as a club and it’s not the manager. Sack him and then what? They’ll only make another appointment that satisfies their agenda. May as well give the guy a proper go at it.

“Stop gloating and just enjoy the win” is something I read a lot on here but it doesn’t really make any sense does it ? Why would one be exclusive of the other?

People here post their opinions in a public space, some of which are very partisan. They shouldn’t then be upset when those opinions are scrutinised by others, particularly when in hindsight, they may appear to have been reactionary.

1 hour ago, lenred said:

We should been pushing for top 10 this season.  Pearson or Manning.  Anything less than 10th would be a disappointment.  As said elsewhere let’s see some proper consistency. Long shot but we may well yet make it. 

Realistically with Preston and Middlesbrough in good form and Hull and Coventry 4/5 points ahead with a game in hand, the top 10 is probably beyond us. If we can finish above Cardiff in 11th, with a positive goal difference and more wins than losses, that would be a very positive end to the season.

15 minutes ago, HengroveReds said:

Interesting to think 9 years on and the following players from both City & Swindon on the night still playing at our level or higher:

Frankie Fielding- on books for Stoke (0 playtime)

Luke Ayling - Middlesbrough 

James Taveriner - Rangers

Joe Bryan - Milwall

George Saville - Milwall

Greg Cunningham - Preston 

Swindon:

Wes Foderingham - (premier league sheff Utd) 

Jack Stephen’s - Southampton

Michael Smith - Sheff Weds

John Swift - WBA

Also Massimo Luongo and Harry Toffolo who played regularly for Swindon that season playing for Ipswich and Forest respectively! That was actually a really good Swindon team, shame they didn’t have the balls to finish the job.

Our worst performances of the season have come at home against relegation threatened sides. In fact, four of the bottom eight have beaten us at Ashton Gate, so the prospect of back to back home games against Blackburn and Huddersfield doesn’t exactly fill me with excitement. I think we’ll come out with one 1-0 win and one 0-1 loss, but not sure which will be which.

We were made of absolute steel that season. One of our few defeats was at the County Ground early on.. A huge sense of injustice fueled us from Wade Elliott’s early red card (which was unprofessionally celebrated by Harry Toffolo), the over the top gloating from their players and fans at the final whistle, and their “title winning” lap of honour. I remember Franky Fielding confronting a Swindon player who was on his way over to the city end to gloat.

There was no way that Cotts and this group of players were gonna let this go. An empathic 3-0 victory showed that lot why we were the CHAMPIONS. “It’s Bryan, it’s brilliant”!!! Awesome atmosphere and performance which all but secured promotion, culminating in Flint’s famous words. Nobody messed with BCFC that season and I’d love to have some of that spirit back.

2 hours ago, Top Robin said:

Does it matter if he did a good or bad job at Dons...we are not judging his managerial performance, we are respecting his passing. Rest in peace.

Surely there’s no better way of respecting a persons passing than talking about the things they’ve achieved in their life, and the good things they’ve done?

Well I was expecting much more from Argyle than that! A competent performance against opposition that offered little. Our remaining fixtures don’t look too bad, and we should definitely be aiming for a top half finish now.

Argyle are in deep relegation trouble and they hate Bristol City. Their players and fans will be 100% up for this. Any faffing around, any passengers in the team, any lethargy or tactical mistakes and we’ll get murdered. 

7 hours ago, steviestevieneville said:

I’m far from sensitive . Of course I enjoyed it. So if you’re the opposite of blindly following then you might have similar views to me . Why have a pop at people boycotting games. Instead of trying to bait people , just enjoy the win . 

Seems like you are a bit oversensitive, given your other posts in response to similar comments. I guess I shouldn’t judge you for that, I also got quite upset by a nasty comment made at me from another forum member a few weeks back. 

I don’t agree with the bile that’s been directed by some at Manning, it’s made this forum unreadable at times for me and it course I’m feeling a bit like I want to playfully bait those who have been overly negative. I can enjoy the win and be happy for Manning, without losing sight of the bigger picture that we have serious off the field problems caused by our owners. The two aren’t mutually exclusive.

Anyway, enjoy the feeling of three hard earned points.

He’s named after the wrong room in the house. Andrew Toilet is more apt. 

6 minutes ago, steviestevieneville said:

I watched the game. If you’re happy to blindly follow the owners without question that’s fine . That’s your decision. I have my own mind & make my own decisions . We played well & I enjoyed the win . Play like that consistently & I might change my mind. 

Don’t put words in my mouth. I haven’t said anything of the sort about”blindly following the owners”. Quite the opposite in fact. If you really enjoyed the win then stop being so overly sensitive about a one sentence post.

2 minutes ago, steviestevieneville said:

Congratulations on being smug From my point of view it’s against the owners & there poor decision making . Id never want the team to lose , ever. 
were you posting like this after the Cardiff, QPR, Sheffield Wednesday shit shows ? 

Hope you managed to get some DIY done today.

I hope all the boycotters enjoyed their visit to B&Q this afternoon.

It’s only no games ago, we played Leicester.