wendyredredrobin

The pitch was a mess from all of the recent rain and rugby and what were they doung 15 minutes before the game? Watering it when it clearly needed drying out.

Well if SL or his mini me don't open talks fairly quickly, Nige will be looking at other options and he may be off at the end of the season whether they want him gone or not 

Whilst I don't like him much based on the way he deals with yhe media, he seems to have created a culture and work ethic in the club which was sadly lacking before he came.  He has brought on some youngsters and has lost a few of his best players.  He is also hamstrung by a small squad and reduced wage budget.

Even against this backdrop he has managed us up to 8th place in the division and in my view done a very good job with more than one hand tied behind his back and clearly deserves a new contract, whether it be for another year, two years or a rolling 12 months.

It would be such a shame if he left when he is still probably only half way through a pretty ling term project and other than the journos he has upset I haven't really heard a bad word said against him from anyone who really counts.

Maybe the Lansdowns want a yes man and Nigel is inclined to say, or at least insinuate, what he thinks but I think it would be a big mistake to let him go as things stand.

Let them win the world cup. Allow Putin take the applause then arrest the bar steward and take him to The Hague to be tried for genocide.

Should be a banker away win and whilst no game in the championship is easy, I hope we do not think we have won the game again when we go 2-0 up and stroll around to lose 3-2 again.  The Stoke game showed that we have a serious problem with our mentality and it's not the first time we have "fooked it up two nil" is it.

Well RobinsTV won't be working tonight as the Rotherham game is on SKY so I guess it's going to have to be a dodgy stream for many of us.

Still RobinsTV is little better than a dodgy stream at times.  The major advantage is that you don't have to listen to Downsy wittering on.

Correction:  I now see that it is on RobinsTV but you will have to be very careful which country you fly to.

Brighton, Bournemouth and Luton are all teams with a lower league history who managed to get promoted, though for Luton, it will probably be for only one season.  We are a bigger club that any of them were and had higher attendances and income, so on that basis, promotion to the Premiership is clearly possible.  However the desire and funding needs to come from the top and I'm afraid I can see no sign of either at present.

That said, SL has invested a huge amount in the club and does not have unlimited funds, so has probably come to a place called stop until an outside investor can be found and none of us know how likely this is.

But money alone does not guarantee success.

5 minutes ago, redkev said:

We are around or possibly in the play off positions would Lord Steven open thee old wallet a little if needed ?

I get the feeling that he thinks he's put enough money into the football club already and doesn't intend to put any more in. Also bear in mind the HL shares he has left are only worth about a third of what they were a few years back.

Is it just my imagination or haven't we seen a lot of him or his son lately either.

On 18/09/2023 at 10:09, CrackingCheeseGromit said:

When all is said and done and worst case happens, it's £9 so when you tot up the cost of an away day, its not a huge amount. I read somewhere about Welsh people saying they will never fly from Bristol again as the journey over incurs the charge. I mean, come on, honestly ?

Certainly beats having to drive at 20 mph everywhere

1 minute ago, Malago said:

Trevor Jacobs, Tony Ford, Ray Cashley, Donnie Gilles, to name a few, all played out the sunset of their careers in front of the unwashed hordes.

All badly scarred from the experience I imagine

3 hours ago, pongo88 said:

Compare this to the new stand at Barnet FC, that mighty National League team. Not a supporting pillar to be seen 

Nor a tent

1 hour ago, DaveInSA said:

it would be peak Bristol City to win this 5-0. and not score again for five games

To score 5 goals we would probably need to create between 50 and 75 chances.  What is the likelihood of that in 90 minutes of football?

2 hours ago, TheReds said:

Close prediction.

Always easy to predict after the event, though I did qualify the statement based upon what we have seen to date.

Nice to see such a spirited performance though and hope that we are able to build on it after the international break.

A lot of decent individual performances today too and I can't think of a single player who didn't have a good game.

Funny how football can change from week to week and great to see us back in the top half of the table.

Not expecting us to produce a shot on target today let alone any goals judging by what we've seen so far this season.  I guess the sheep are going to have more excitement than we are.

Are our players really that bad or is it down to tactics (or possibly a lack of any).

20 hours ago, Numero Uno said:

Totally agree with Pearson's stance on this btw. Why should he answer the questions on investment in the club? Not his pigeon. We have a CEO, a Chairman and an Owner.

And where are they?  Not showing a great anount of interest in the football club at the moment which will be heading towards L1 based on the dross I've seen being served up so far this season.

Still, enjoying the lovely sunshine in the Channel Islands or Bermuda or wherever they may all be at the moment.

To think that not long ago we were looking towards the top six, beating premier league teams month after month (including a full strength Man Utd) and even giving the Premier League champions a run for their money.

You can't blame FFP, COVID or the economic climate because it's the same for every club.

Something stinks at this club at the moment and if it looks like sh1t and smells like sh1t it usually is sh1t.

12 hours ago, mozo said:

Meanwhile Brighton (Brighton!) have signed Ansu Fati on loan from Barcelona...

Reminds me of when we signed Lee Tomlin.

But on the subject of Steve Lansdown, I think he probably feels that he has chucked enough money down the drain as far as BCFC are concerned and may well be looking for a way out but possibly feels that BCFC is actually worth a lot more than it really is.

And so far as Jon is concerned, it does seem to me that he is chairman on paper but as far as I can tell, it's no more than 'on paper' though I suspect he is getting a tidy annual salary from the club for not doing anything whilst the playing side is having to tighten its purse strings.

I wonder how many others are employed by the club for doing very little tbh.

Whilst I could pick a number of combinations in defence and midfield, I am stumped for something that could work up top where none of our forwards look likely to frighten any championship defenses.

I wonder whether playing Roberts at LB and Pring left midfield might work as he looked good going forward last season.

Maybe bring Gardiner-Hickman in at RB as Tanner seems to have no idea when it comes to going past the half way line.

It seems to me that when our players get the ball in an advanced position, they are being told to pass it backwards rather than attack the opposition's defence.  Maybe that's the reason why they look rubbish.  Could it be the negative tactics rather than the players?

How many times do we seem to find ourselves on the edge of our opponent's penalty area only to find it going back to Max O'Leary two or three passes later.

Not having a target man is certainly not helping our cause either.

On 21/08/2023 at 19:35, mozo said:

After all this, we'll probably beat Hull 5-0 and our bi-polar identity crisis will swing the other way... 

Well we managed 5 shots on target v Hull so you got half of your wish.

But back to only one in 90 minutes again last night.

Unless things change, we will be the lowest scoring team in the division by the end of the season.

20 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

How many shots on target would you like us to have per game?

Isn't that like saying "how long is a piece of string"?

The key metric is the ratio of goals to shots on target, so the higher the better for both.

Of course we are all aware that it is no good having 50 shots per game and only putting away one or indeed letting in 3 but tactically some things need to change.  

A few ideas might include taking throw ins and free kicks quickly before the opposition get their markers in place or stop faffing around with short corners which never seem to achieve anything.

A lot of you defending what is a disgrace here.  I find it hard to understand why so many of us find this acceptable and whilst I agree that shots on target don't tell the story, you need to have a few of them to score goals and if you don't score goals you don't win games.

I'm not sure what is going on and whilst our strike force looks seriously deficient, I'm sure it has more to do with our tactics (or lack of them) and a lack of any meaningful creativity in midfield.

According to Sky, we had 3 shots on target v Preston, 1 shot on target v Millwall and 0 shots on target v Birmingham.  Thats 4 shots on target in 270 minutes which equates to less than one shot on target per hour of league football played this season.

Even worse, we've had only one shot on target in the last 2 games (i.e. 180 minutes).

Either we have a bloody awful team or we are tactically inept ( or even possibly both).

Whilst I know we have sold a couple of players, the manager has been here for long enough to be producing a far better output than this.

Based on this data, it seems unlikely that we will survive the drop unless something changes drastically.

Zero shots on target says it all for me.  This team looks like it's going to struggle badly in this league and I'm certainly not sure if we will find ourselves in league 1 next year from what I've seen so far.

Reinforcements are clearly needed before the window closes.

I also think that I will be watching a far better game of football at 11 am tomorrow morning.

1 minute ago, ashton_fan said:

You don't get blinded by the sun

Good point, though a cap solves that.

17 minutes ago, shelts said:

Biggest newest most expensive least used stand . Doesn’t make any sense 

It's still just a seat along the side of the pitch and the view is no better than the Dolman though. It's not as if the seat is any bigger, has a cushion or gold plating or anything else.

17 minutes ago, old_eastender said:

Conundrum as to what our best starting 11 is at the moment.

We have looked most creative with Roberts & Mehmeti on the lhs, but do you leave out Pring who has been solid defensively just not reached the highs of last season supporting attacks. If you start Mehmeti,  do you switch Bell to rhs (he is predominately right footed), but although Cornick seems a bit of a headless chicken, our 2 league goals have come from his really good long throws, so do you keep him as rhs attacker? Remember Rory Delap (who I'd say was average at best as a player) made a career out of having a dangerous long throw! 

Sykes was poor against Millwall, but his track record is good playing the rhs attacker role.

Then in m/f James seems nailed on starter, Knight has to play ACM role, and I'd start Naismith ahead of Williams if he is fully fit.

Nice problems to have.

 

I'm not ready to drop Cam Pring yet but Roberts is certainly going to make him work for his place.  Mehmeti from the bench maybe but his output has not yet convinced me that we should start him.  Naismith looks good in midfield and I would start with him but I'm afraid that Harry Cornick looks about as much use as an icecream cornet so far.

Sykesy is a bit of a conundrum.  He's had some brilliant games but not so good in others.  He still has a lot more to offer down the right than Cornick though.

It has to be Bell and Wells up top I suppose.