Olé

Our accounts for 20/21 are due by the end of February 2022 so they weren't needed now. You could certainly argue we are using this to soften the expectation in the transfer window. Last year we filed two months later on February 1st, but prior to that we filed fairly regularly in November (a month earlier than this) so I don't think it's too unusual .

To answer my own question @RonWalker 21/22 season ticket revenue is classed as deferred income. We also issued £4.6m worth of refunds in the trading year. ?

Good point but surely there is an accounting adjustment for early season ticket revenue on this season, which has not been fulfilled. I've assumed season ticket revenue as published is banked and relates to the 20/21 season only within the trading year. £700,000 is what, about 2500-3000 season tickets? If it's inclusive of early sales this year, that makes the benevolent actions in 20/21 much smaller. How many names were on that third shirt?

25% of supporters let the club keep their season ticket payment? (Probably more than 25% given that the initial take up after Covid hit would have been down on 19/20 season ticket sales). I know there was a gesture to put the names on the third shirt but had no idea the take up was this high.

I thought Downing and Simpson joined the day he was permanently appointed, not when he was put in temporary charge?

It's not even a survey (I think WSC or Football Away Days magazines have done proper ones of those which seemed fairly sensible as a democratic view normally is) this is just their writers coming up with a list. I think you could be right about a deliberate stunt to get publicity by winding up as many supporters as possible - Swansea/Cardiff one place difference, Old Firm one place difference, City/Rovers a few places difference, and Norwich top 20 and Ipswich not even in the 100. They seem to jump around between their criteria - location, atmosphere, history, quirkiness, new stadium design - in a way that makes so many of the selections contradictory. It would be hard to come up with a worse list than this without setting out deliberately with that agenda, which is probably how they started this sh*tstirring. Emirates stadium 11th FFS.

Evidently there are a few Gasheads working at FourFourTwo on a wind up 76 Ashton Gate 75 Twerton Park 71 Memorial Stadium https://www.fourfourtwo.com/features/ranked-the-100-best-football-stadiums-grounds-britain-uk-england-scotland-wales Bournemouth are 3 places above us, and Stoke and Bolton despite both being new builds in the middle of nowhere are in the top 50 if you want to get the measure of this ranking. Villa Park is below only Anfield, Fulham and Old Trafford in England, proving the people who came up with this nonsense have never been to a real match in their lives.

Match Report: West Brom away Match Report: Birmingham away Match Report: Coventry away Match Report: Sheff Utd away Match Report: Hull away

By virtue of 2 poor teams and very little end product at either end of the pitch this will be a spectacularly short match report - for an occasion where City spent a half reprising an anonymous performance last time away at Sheffield United, easily opened up behind our wing backs in a one sided 45, offering nothing ourselves from Zak Vyner long balls. Nigel Pearson seemed to convince his side to get the ball down to keep possession for a bit longer in the second half and City stole a just about deserved equaliser via Antoine Semenyo's second stab goalwards from a corner - only for Hull to again capitalse on poor wide defending for influential George Honeyman to put the hosts back in front. But despite offering little in a game short on end product, City at least provided their tiny away following a moment of excitement at the death as Matty James steered in what by then was a deserved equaliser but only in so far as Pearson's men had demonstrated that they were at least no worse than their briefly confident but ultimately limited hosts. When I say City didn't turn up in the first half this isn't me being flippant: we literally didn't in fact we didn't control the ball for over 20 minutes as like Brammal Lane before it, we watched in form Hull probe. In that time they inevitably roared into a deserved lead early on as with almost their first attack Longman curled past stand off City into the far corner. The first time we even shot was midway into the first half - from a short corner O'Dowda decided to launch it into space. It was the half hour before City's move of the match, Semenyo weaving along the edge of the box, James laying it back to Alex Scott out wide whose deep cross was headed back by O'Dowda for Martin's shot to be blocked. Wing back George Tanner entered early for an injured Scott but yet again Longman was allowed to cut in from the left and curl over. Five minutes later Bentley fumbled a cross and Malik Wilks almost tapped in. A brief response saw Martin go clear on the right but not for the first time misplace his cross with players closing in the box for the finish. City had been abysmal in the first half - lots of aimless Vyner long balls - but the restart at least seemed to bring a few more passes before that inevitable launch. On 50 minutes Andi Weimann got room to skirt the edge of box before a square short ball to returning Matty James who stretching to connect with the ball could only angle his clear shot wide. Happily a reminder that as poor as City had been Hull were not much better - a point that was proved as the hosts failed to clear their lines from a 54th minute corner from which Semenyo stabbed goalwards and hit the post but reacted quickest to collect the rebound and drive home an equaliser that City scarcely deserved - at the away end. In increasingly cold and now rainy weather the match degenerated and it took nearly a further 15 minutes - approaching 70 - for a rare but now building spell of City pressure to see a Kalas throw in from the left cause panic and when Semenyo recycled from the right to break the lines he slipped it inside and Wells turned and shot at the keeper. A poor match low on quality had only one predictable twist and it was Hull exploiting yet another loose defensive shape against a side that seemed to be finally getting a hold on the match, taking advantage of Tanner and Vyner from the right to cross for Lewis-Potter to sting Bentley's hands only for City to be flat footed and Honeyman slam home. This seemed the perfect way to complete a largely anonymous City display in a season of underwhelming football - but it wasn't over - Benarous for Atkinson signaled intent and in injury time Kalas recycled a corner and James hooked the ball goalwards and somehow it spun into the same corner Josh Brownhill's winner found five years earlier. Nonsensical pandemonium in the away end for fans who had been scolding their team for such a shapeless, disorganized display all afternoon but were now suddenly giving home fans both barrels. City were awful for 45 but they earned this draw against poor opposition - exactly what you love to see in an away end, and sparing City a booing off. Bentley 6 Kalas 6 Atkinson 6 Vyner 4 Scott 5 O'Dowda 5 James 6 Massengo 4 Weimann 5 Semenyo 6 Martin 5 Tanner 5 Wells 5 Benarous 6

There were a good number or them absolutely trolleyed at London Bridge at past 7pm as I was heading home. Not only did they have little chance of making kick off but they've obviously not been to Charlton for a while as they all marched resolutely in the same direction as me to the Millwall platforms, singing songs and chanting. I did briefly start pointing them in the opposite direction to little effect (Charlton train is literally the far other end of the station) but they were in their own little world & given their description of us as window lickers and bitter over Ashton I left them all to it.

With shares the asset has a real and residual value over time linked to the value of the company which has real buildings, real people and real profits - these didn't, they were made up, they had no real value, they were "synthetic" But even with synthetic derivatives (where trading platforms sell bets on shares or other investments) the platform can cover the bet and value by holding some investment in the real asset (ie buying those shares) - this couldn't, it had absolutely nothing to do with the players value and gained nothing from changes in that value And even then taking that all into account and falling into obviously the highest risk class of "investment", ie buying into effectively a token of no real value (like Bitcoin*), this went a ridiculous step further of paying dividends - at that point this stepped into Ponzi / Pyramid scheme territory and was simply demonstrating an incentive to participate by paying a small proportion of the market using money gathered from new entrants (dividends are typically paid from the profits generated by a company using its assets, but remember these guys had no assets nor a sustainable way to create profits). It was a house of cards and the biggest crime is the Gambling Commission or the FCA were completely asleep at the wheel and did nothing. *unrelated but Bitcoin I would argue has achieved some notional residual value and asset class based on its accessibility and utility in certain transactions/use cases (ie you can now invest in it through major platforms like PayPal or spend with it on certain other platforms), which creates some demand and value. But I use the example for perspective only as Bitcoin is still seen as one of the highest risk investments around but even then, it has never offered dividends and its' value is not linked to totally unrelated assets it had no way of monetizing - in this context FootballIIndex was off the scale of risk and unsustainability.

And one of Boreham Wood goalscorers used to be in City's academy under S'OD and Cotterill

That's the voice he uses when he's looking at himself in the mirror. He must have forgotten he was out in public.

I'm sorry I don't buy that. Cardiff is Gwent Police. Swansea is South Wales Police. The latter alone has the same budget as Avon & Somerset, can they not manage to police a separate football fixture - and the Rugby fans always lecture us about how civilised they all are. Also if it was just about the clash why isn't the game at 3pm on Sunday, rather than 1pm? As always this is simply about police forces in Wales making life as difficult as humanly possible for City supporters, when the same is not true in reverse. This has been going on for years and our club does nothing to stand up to it at all. With Swansea specifically, their last three attended fixtures in Bristol were 7.45pm on a Friday night this season and two Saturday 3pms prior to COVID where they were given such a big day out their biggest cause for complaint was marching from the pub to the ground too late and a load pouring in after KO. First world problems compared to our scheduling. Yes we had a 3pm in Swansea (the 1-0) and there was some trouble in town, but there was trouble in Bristol too after the 3pm fixture and they were invited back for a nice Friday night this season so I'm not having 'Police advice' for one second - and I'll say it again our club is spineless and laps it up, probably because they now care more about knowingly selling a load of TV passes to City fans on VPN, rather than actually encouraging a big away support. It's a sad & slippery slope.

Hell of a multi-tasker is our Mark. Represents Steve Lansdown's interests at the EFL. His own interests in our recruitment dealings. And Gamechanger/Ipswich Town interests during our US tour. If there was any time left in his busy schedule he occasionally did bits and pieces for City too, like deleting all references to Beard Construction from project updates about development of the High Performance Centre, before forwarding them on to Steve each week as his own work.

The trouble is clubs use future earnings to increase their buying power, if I can offer £1m now or £3m of future earnings the latter offer is more attractive to selling clubs unless they are in a short term hole. In a competitive transfer market that is a significant advantage, and the selling club is keen on it too as it offers them a bigger return. Also, your tin of beans example is pretty standard accounting regardless mate - even if you do pay all up front, after your first night of beans you still have 3 tins of beans to come and so only account for the cost of one. Putting aside your love of beans, it is amortization that means selling clubs know a club can pay much more over time. On parachute payments as a whole - I wonder if Norwich have broken the model? To my mind it only exists to encourage promoted teams to splash out on improving the Premier League product (literally being willing to jump even higher) - Norwich have been up several times and just banked the money and left (literally gone up in the plane and said I don't fancy it and come straight back down in the plane). They're not really using an expensive "parachute" and no doubt the PL would prefer to distribute it to teams like Villa who are only too ready to spunk it everywhere, sometimes before the plane has even left the runway (complex mixed metaphor this one)

The question for me will always be WHY would Mark Ashton reduce the network or close in on a far smaller counsel of individuals (and spreadsheet) for our recruitment. It doesn't appear to have saved any money nor been successful. So why do it? There must have been a reason - as bad as MA was, no one sets out to do the wrong thing and fail. Was it simply because it played to his sense of self importance? I don't believe even MA is that vain or spiteful Did it transfer power/control and eventually unprecedented remuneration in his direction? It seems to have helped build his remit/salary, but again I don't believe MA is stupid enough not to recognise success in the transfer market could do that even more effectively - why gamble on all the control and none of the impact for personal success Was there some other material benefit to restricting the scope and network of recruitment and giving him greater say? I've heard innuendo about a limited number of preferred scouts. Scouts as we know monetise transfers. MA loves the corporate game - in business many enjoy a high life of favour / reward from suppliers who stand to make money. I keep coming back to this and wondering if our transfers had some benefit to MA? All the other pieces fit. I wish someone could join the dots on that last one. I hesitate to make accusations of bungs which are a serious matter and I'm not here to slander the guy, but there seems to be little to explain the basis for his approach to transfers in other terms (not success, experience, or cost saving). So why did he close ranks and limit our approach so specifically? And let's not forget that MA first came to the club explicitly working as a third party making money from brokering transfers. I don't much like the conclusion I keep landing on, and hope for his sake he was just crap at recruitment and knew no better.

City's mini revival - and by revival I mean we won one football match - collapsed cheaply in the snow at Sheffield as the Blades under new management but with the same record as us, found it breathtakingly easy to carve open and outplay us for a comfortable 2-0 win that could really have been much more. Rhian Brewster was repeatedly given room to get in behind a young, largely anonymous City midfield and no surprise when he gave the hosts a deserved lead before the break - and even less surprise when Billy Sharp at the third or fourth time of asking converted for his usual goal against us, off the bench. Played in increasingly heavy snow - difficult conditions for the final half hour - Pearson's side showed absolutely no control or threat and were indebted to their central defenders who provided the only fight in a one sided fixture where City were often overrun, losing Nathan Baker to serious injury in a long delay. Sheffield United were all over City right from the start, finding it far too easy to move into space behind the visitors midfield and drive crosses into the box, from which Egan and Basham went close. The away side didn't lay a glove on their hosts, Gibbs White megging Bakinson outside the box and firing over. Past 10 Brewster looked suspiciously offside breaking from the right but both Hourihane and then the ex Liverpool striker would both get a chance to test Bentley as City offered little response, the latter firing wide. After 18 they bypassed midfield altogether Stevens clear on the left crossing for Bogle to head over. City had a rare spell to threaten that began as keeper Foderingham miskicked the ball to Benarous who worked hard to find a shot before laying off to Bakinson whose strike was deflected wide. From Scott's resultant right wing corner Martin drew a point blank save - as improbably City could go in front. They would win a couple of corners after a dangerous deep Scott free kick, but in truth it was a rare moment outside City's own half and inside 35 Massengo, part of a woefully porous midfield, lost the ball in the channel, then twice let his runner go as Utd threatened. Inside 40 minutes Weimann finally had the chance to open out his legs but his through ball to Martin in acres of space found the anonymous striker offside - and then a third City player to be booked for kicking the ball away in his frustration. It was comically bad and now heavy snow was starting to settle. So no surprise that Sheffield United went in front - yet again far far too easy playing the ball in behind our midfield and wingbacks, as the abysmal Bakinson, fresh from a new contract extension, offered no press and the easy square ball from Stevens to Brewster allowed the latter to swivel and slam home. The first "highlight" of a bitterly cold second half in Sheffield was fulltime clown part time ref Geoff Eltringham waving away demands for a yellow as United kicked the ball away at a throw in inside the first minute, a same offence he issued three yellows to City for just minutes earlier. Comically bad officiating. Then a huge injury delay as Nathan Baker went down in midfield fighting for a header - something our actual midfield was opting out of - and after nearly ten minutes he was stretchered off in not only a brace but also a series of blankets (reminiscent of shooting lame horses at Aintree) as the snow settled. The Blades were all over City from then on as the away side looked uncomfortable with the snow - though their best chance arrived inside 70 as Weimann finally got to run into space on the break, drawing defenders and centering for Bakinson's tame low shot on target that Foderingham held at the second attempt. Despite Wells being on it was a rare moment of purpose when at the other end perennially difficult opponent in Billy Sharp had also joined the action, inevitably setup easily to force a save, then after Norwood teed off on us from distance, Sharp's overhead kick was tipped over as we kept giving it back to them. City's last of a pathetic number of serious attacks saw Wells run the channel and turn on the keeper but rather than shoot he underhit a square ball to Weimann that was intercepted, while next O'Dowda, who did nothing all game, got into similar space on the left but his low cross deflected straight to the keeper. The pitch was turning white in now driving snow as Semenyo, on as sub, tried to offer a threat no other City players looked close to offering - but he also looked reluctant in the weather and having failed to challenge for a Bentley goal kick to him, Utd broke, spread it right, and McGoldrick crossed for Sharp to turn in. In front of 25,000 supporters the hosts had enjoyed acres of space getting behind City's young midfield and predictably non existent O'Dowda - and they saw out the game with chances to add several more, though Wells did stab wide from a Kalas cross after good hold up play from sub Atkinson near the end. There was a sense after clinging on against Stoke midweek that City had turned a vital corner but the reality is that when they do win - like then or at Peterborough - they are often second best, whereas when they lose, it could often be by much more. It's odd to say but City's league position flatters them. Bentley 6 Kalas 6 Vyner 7 Baker 5 O'Dowda 4 Scott 6 Bakinson 3 Massengo 4 Benarous 4 Weimann 5 Martin 4 Atkinson 6 Wells 5 Semenyo 5

I only support City because they wear the same colours as Benfica but I'm ashamed of the Portuguese football league it's such an absolute circus.

Bit annoyed Portugal didn't think about briefly declaring war on Italy so that UEFA would have to keep us apart.

I didn't need any reminder but it was still a reminder that there isn't an ounce of basic management or planning at AG. Given the benefit of Saturday as a first run, do it all exactly the same again and expect some different outcome - and leave stewards to adlib so some give up and let everyone in and others yards away from them persist in lengthy scans and get abused while a crowd of fans zig zags left and right to the most amenable steward like some kind of team event halfway between We Are The Champions and Pat Sharpe's Fun House. This is what a management vacuum looks like. Things that could have been done since Saturday: - tell people to get there early - fast track people with season tickets - have a plan for when the queues build up and don't leave it to some stewards to wing it and others that don't to get badly abused because there isn't a contingency - ask people to have jackets open (one of the most irritatingly familiar sounds at AG has managed to be infinitely more logical than the nonsense now, maybe that was the idea) - install temporary walk through metal detectors - if there is a serious issue then use the proper solution. They have these at big stadiums and living in a knife crime area my local station can set these up in 5 minutes flat of an evening for everyone leaving the station. City have the benefit of hindsight and do absolutely nothing to get it right. There is no other business that operates like this and plans nothing. On the plus side hot water came out of the Dolman taps I was so surprised I expected a genie next.

Wouldn’t it have been quicker to have people hold out their season cards and wave them through and only scan the rest? Because if you're a terrorist you're not going to have held a season ticket to watch football at Ashton Gate for any length of time or you'd have blown yourself up months ago.

Agree with all of that, and in a second half where we did next to **** all, he more or less made and finished our goal against the run of play, there is not another player in the side who would have tried to pick out O'Dowda with the deep ball over the top, and then he gets the ball back and takes on the shot from outside the area that results in the tap in. For my money he's also running more and working harder than ever, same at Birmingham where everyone told me he was awful but first half again I thought he was trying to be positive. But because he looks quite languid and not every one of his passes comes off, he is seen by a lot of supporters as the weak link and the source of all our problems. I don't think he'll ever succeed at City because too many now see him as the embodiment of soft touch and a mistake waiting to happen, and are ready to groan when it goes wrong. It misses the point he is the only one trying to open up teams - given the state we're in I'd far rather players who want to be brave than the ones who hide or go backwards.

He has a lot to learn (see Tuesday after Matty James went off) but the level of anticipation among City fans for him to do something wrong is ridiculous. No idea why he has become the latest "failure in waiting" when he is the only player that plays the ball forward and takes responsibility, today at least he did that more than anyone and never left the "box" in front of defence.