Beni71

@headhunterits a great achievement, congrats. It takes a lot of hard work and commitment to put the show on after every game. As you and others have said you need the right combination on the show to make it work. This obviously includes the pantomime villain, Ian Gay. The show is at his best when you have good balance and this includes Neil and Dave alongside the pantomime villain as they base their views on fact & Ian knows his place. When you lose the Dave/Neil balance the show loses some of its credibility as Ian turns into a prize ********. He really has no idea about football and his comments by and large are knee jerk and based on emotion. I tend not to listen to these. I do appreciate its difficult to get people on the show given diary commitments. Keep up the good work

This does make me chuckle that “something is brewing”. It hasn’t just happened this season. These things take time and doesn’t just happen by accident. The likes of Ian Gay/Forever Bristol City continual sniping and comments like “results based business” demonstrates their fan passion but lack of perspective and understanding in what it takes to rebuild and restructure/transform a football club. Arsenal - all or nothing is a good example of the challenges when looking to transform a club on & off the pitch, albeit at a higher level. Great to see the much deserved progress at Bristol City but only two bad results from the negative comments to re-emerge.

Spot on @Davefevs more balance less emotion, win , lose or draw. I know Ian had a dig at corners/set pieces but TBH I felt we were trying something different on Sunday. Looking for near post flick ons and then also moving their defence around to create a shooting opportunity on the edge of the Cardiff box. Given that only only c3% of corners ever lead direct to a goal, it’s not a bad idea to try new things and mix it up.

@headhunter listened for 15 mins and then switched off. The show can be good but with just the three of you it sounds like three grumpy old men down the pub having a moan. You need a more balanced less emotional voice round the table to enable better discussion and debate. The small bit I heard re Pearson and has he run out of ideas. No, not after 3 league games and a cup match… Suggesting Vyner in midfield is laughable, especially if I quote Ian’s favourite saying “square pegs, round holes” Feels like NP/RG are sorting the club out behind the scenes but need to translate improvement into the first team whilst reducing the playing budget and using the Academy to bridge gaps in the team. I do agree we are tactically naive at times, but surely that’s we have coaches to provide input.

Leeway required IMO Inherited awful, highly paid squad who were not worth what we paid. First job was very much off the field in managing out the shirkers and we are making good progress on that front. Has he made mistakes? Yes, I’m sure he reflects on Simpson, which has been made a lot of. When there was a magic money tree we made lots of mistakes we recruited Rodri, Doni, Stefan dodgy keeper, Kent, Engvall and probably other players I can’t now remember. Despite the magic money tree we only finished 8th. We now have no financial leeway so my expectations are lower. I do think we are tactically naive at times and Nige has a key role to play in this. Not what fans want to hear but this is the reality of the situation.

We definitely lost control in the 2nd half where we couldn’t retain control of possession. Despite that Martins miss from 6 yards and Wilson’s miss kick at the far post from 8 yards were two excellent chances to get something from the game.

Don’t disagree with any of that and the board never challenged or held Ashton to account and that has SLs finger prints all over it. But my point is that you can’t question SLs ambition towards the club. But it does make me roll my eyes when you see some fans question him given his level of investment/commitment to the club and city. Oh and yes he’s made some mistakes, it’s almost like he’s human……

Agreed we are lucky SL not like Morris. When you say “mess” do you mean ambition that didn’t play out as expected?

Yep agree on Taylor was consistent and strong throughout. Interesting on Zac Bell, thought he had a poor start but defo grew into the game and offensively a real threat.

Decent game. Thought Coventrys 4141 made it difficult for us to find space and break the lines. Looked better balanced with Wood on the left hand side and losing him to injury was a loss. Thought Rose stood out for us (is he only 16?) and Edwards was a threat but final ball not quite right on the night but great movement for his goal. Considering Kadjis age I thought he was pretty impressive in front of the back four. Thought Coventrys keeper was decent and a unit compared to Buse. Entertaining game.

A real low for me on FBC this week. Missed Neil’s balance and thought leadership and transcended into the angry old man’s club again. Ian’s random comment generator this week - get rid of the whole midfield - De Silva not good enough - Pearson has until the World Cup - Pulled out his old favourite about Derbys point deduction and how they would be ahead of us on points if they hadn’t cheated. Such lack of balance in Ian’s comments and so knee jerk. Given his astute business knowledge and his pearls of wisdom re Calum O’Dowda’s contract last week, you would have thought he would consider his comments more carefully. @Davefevsdid Ian ever give his view on where we would finish this season?

Neil is an excellent addition to the podcast and has kept me listening. Hats off to @headhunteras really keeping Ian under control over the last few weeks. I think Ian has some sort of complex where he has to drop in “when I spoke to Richard Gould”. The problem is with these type of comments is he is becoming less and less credible and I no longer believe a word that comes out of his mouth. I had a relatively long journey yesterday and my wife was listening to the podcast with me and her comments were “is Ian a Hull fan”, “why is he so angry & rude”. I had no answer to her questions.

@Davefevs Lolz I meant his wages!

Decent game last night. Despite SU position dominance they didn’t create too many clear opportunities. Credit to our defensive shape for that, especially first half. Thought our counter attacking second half was good and caused them lots of problems. I would say our offensive play has improved over this season, still room for improvement but better than the last couple of seasons. I thought Berge was excellent for them first half. Interestingly his wages are in the Palmer range and shows what you can get if you spend your money well.

Renewed for me and the kids again. Using a football cliché, we are in transition as a club and recovering from Ashton. This season hasn’t been brilliant but better than the previous two seasons and also better than the division 4 days, which were tough times.

Some interesting points made @headhunterand the conversation which Neil was driving around club mentality is and will continue to be a point of discussion for me & others. I think a number of us for a while have thought there are a number of playing and non playing staff that have been stealing a living at the club for a while. I do think NP is trying to change that culture, but difficult to do if the men at the top aren’t supportive of that change. This is why I don’t think any thought process around management changes are as binary as some fans think. Change the manager won’t address some the clubs underlying cultural challenges the club faces. As Mark called out the last time we made the play offs was 2008 and we haven’t really got close since. Is this all down to the management on the playing side??

Well done @headhunterthought that was well chaired today. Much better balance with Neil on the show. Ian’s comment “when I spoke to Mark Ashton he confirmed there was no loan fee for Afobe”. Oh it must be true!!?

It’s a tricky one re NP as we’re not privy to what he’s been asked to do, but would imagine something like this. 20/21 season - keep us up. 21/22 season - keep us up and push for mid table. Not inspiring but I think most fans accepted a lower to mid table finish 22/23 - top 10 finish? At this stage this feels very ambitious given our financial position and what needs to change on the pitch. 4 players required to make us more competitive and consistent won’t be easy given we are shopping in Poundland Football fans aren’t a patient bunch and expect season ticket sales to be down next season, especially after yesterday’s performance. So an indifferent start and the Lansdowns will get twitchy next season. Question is do you press the reset button at the end of the season or let things play out.

It’s all about Data @Davefevs

Call me old fashioned @Davefevsbut don’t seem to have many teams have a player on each post (like the old days). Arguably Helik’s goal and Crooks goal could have been prevented/cleared?

Thought he was steady and improvement on his Barnsley performance. Decent in the air but limited with his passing, that said he’s developing into championship football and that will take time. A couple of points 1. Based on what I’ve seen so far Rob is no Webster or Baker. So NP needs to be clear on Rob’s role in defence and also does he help us move forward (top 10 finish) as a club or are we confident we can develop him to become a better player? 2. The other key point is we are shopping in Poundland and not Waitrose so the financial side will tick the boxes. I hope he succeeds but at this point jury is out for me. Hopefully he takes the opportunity and does well over the next 7 games and stays injury free.

In terms of agenda It feels it’s becoming anti Pearson, not by all contributors and the thinking is very short term. In terms of broader context some of the comments “we let too many crosses into the box”, “what do they do at the training ground”. The crosses issue have been clocked by NP and every manager in the championship. So why don’t we address? Is it the manager? Is it our player capability? Are other teams better than us? Is it our unbalanced squad? Probably yes to all the above! May be it’s just a “football fan” thing where there is a lack of clear objectivity and we all feel our team should be much better than they are. Our positions in the championship of 18, 17, 11, 8, 12, 19 and currently 17th are the reality of the situation of Bristol City in the championship. Maybe a more realistic approach is required to balance up the regular negativity.

When you say not accepting responsibility for defeat he did say something along the following lines “I’m responsible for this team, I’m the manager, I’m criticising myself” Or something like that but probably doesn’t fit the FBC agenda. From his interview you can tell NP is incredibly frustrated with the situation and the team’s inability to defend a set piece. Is that down to the manager or the players or both?

I don’t disagree re the chairman failing to hold the previous CEO to account. I’m surprised he (ex CEO) didn’t spend the Pension Fund. That said football in the championship (& in other divisions) like Financial Services back pre 2008, is/was very short term focused. For all the horror of COVID I do think it will bring some equilibrium (excluding parachute payments) back to Championship football and it’s much needed. Player/Agent power was ridiculous and as we see Championship accounts released over the few months it is a clear opportunity to press the reset button for clubs and the EFL. Will be interesting to see over the decade if Championship clubs revert back to pre COVID times. I personally hope doesn’t.

@headhunteryou have developed a good product, the challenge is how do you maintain that product. I personally would like to hear more of your views. I do appreciate its sometimes difficult balancing being host and panelist at the same time.