Jack Dawe

Canaries? Or robins??

Thanks mate. If all football fans got a "sense of perspective" the professional game would die outside of the PL. But thanks, anyway.

A reasonable point you make but I think you are making the mistake of attributing the habits of what - 40 to 50? 60 to 70? Shall we say 80? - 80 City obsessives and "nutters" on here posting on this thread, the same ones mostly, over and over, and maybe a couple of hundred - shall we say 500? - checking and reading but not posting anything, mostly out of habit and boredom at work, you are attributing their habits to the rest of our support (some 14 to 15 thousand every week, currently). That's a minority, even if you double the 500 browsing this thread to 1000. It's the same few people posting over and over. Most City fans I know barely give the Rovers team a second thought (and would struggle to name two of their team), their historic and memorable relegation two years ago being an exception. That momentous own-goal was hard to ignore and seemed to inspire most of this thread - and as others have said, purely the opportunity to mock and ridicule them, having taken so much grief from Wembley 08. Years ago, it was all Holloway this, or Randall that, or Penrice, or Alexander, or Lambert etc. In other words, players we knew about because they had hurt us on the pitch and could do so again. Not so anymore, not for years. I could name every one of their team years back, now there's Taylor that scores goals and ? What's he ever done to us? Very few people sing anything about Rovers at AG, or join in with others singing stuff about them, the Atyeo lot being the exception. When they do, it's not even half-hearted. There's no feeling in it. Because the Rovers team are irrelevant to us, they can't hurt us. They don't matter. Maybe they will in the future, but they don't now and have not for many years. Meanwhile, at the Memorial Ground, so I read, it is another story, with "are you watching Ashton Gate" belting out and other rather pitiful, "don't ignore us" type songs being sung. The equivalent songs of which you just don't ever hear at AG. And then we get gas sorts coming on here insisting they do matter to us, which I get rather tired of, so I thought I would take the trouble to point out to one how I see things. So, like I said, Rovers fans we cannot escape. The Rovers team generally only enters our awareness (the majority), outside of final score on matchdays, when the inescapable Few bend our ears at work or in the pub and come on here insisting they still matter to us. To my mind there is no obsession with Rovers, there's little in the way of that sort of "passion" at AG anymore and if you think there is, you're spending too much time on here.

You can understand his giddy excitement. They have average 8 thousand, just, this season (with some help from those 4 × family tickets for £20 Post vouchers), almost as many as Luton. And Plymouth. But hundreds more than Oxford! Last time they were promoted from the 4th Division, it was 5,400.

I'm not too sure about "scuffy"? Is that even a word?? But cheers, anyway

Hi. City fan here. Rovers do matter, because we live cheek by jowl, in this small city. We cannot avoid each other. That's it, really. We try to make out that you are not relevant, and, on the pitch, you are not relevant to us, and have not been so for some years now. Because you are not in the same league as us. But you are relevant, or more precisely, your fans are relevant to us, not your team, because we live and work and socialise cheek by jowl in this small city and whenever you get the smallest opportunity you bend our ear with prowed boasts and big promises and stuff about Lansdown and so on, so you lot won't let indifference take hold south of the river. You sing things like "are you watching Ashton Gate" the reverse of which is never sung at AG. When you were in the Conference, your scores were not read out at AG because your team did not matter to us. If the roles had been reversed, it is difficult to believe our non-league scores would not have been read out. You dream of more Bristol derbies, whereas for us, the Bristol derby means failure, going backwards, godawful football. Everything to lose, little to gain. Our dreams are different. Our managers never refer to you or your team because you and your team do not matter to him or us, because you are not in our league. The teams that matter to us are Aston Villa, Leeds Utd, Derby County, Sheffield Wednesday, Nottm Forest, Wolves, Cardiff. Teams like that. Teams newly promoted to L1 do not matter to us, not while we are a cut above that level. We have enough to contend with there, without watching what is going on in lower league football. But we do not live cheek by jowl to the fans of teams like Aston Villa, Leeds Utd, Derby County etc, we live and work and socialise next door to and alongside the fans of a team newly promoted to L1, fans who noisily ensure we cannot ignore them and forget them, like we have their team. Your team matters no more to us than do the teams of Northampton and Oxford. On the pitch, you do not matter. Your goal highlights come after ours, on a separate programme, for lower league football. We turn off before your goals come on because your team and its goals do not matter to us. Your fans, we cannot avoid, and are relevant but only because we share this great city and you are in our ear with your little bro' jibes. The day we sing, "are you watching Memorial Ground?" is the day I'm ready to pack up and do something else. Appalling thought. Singing that is "obsession." That must never be sung here. (Not everyone feels like this. Some seem to long for the "passion" of the Bristol derby. But many of us are happy to have moved on and want to see us compete at the top of the Championship. This is a great league. What about both of us in this league? We don't need that, there is more than enough excitement for us in this league for now. Give me wins over Leeds or Derby or Villa, not scuffy games v Rovers. No thanks).

Probably not a yellow in Argietina, mind

I think both sets of supporters should leave this leaf from Senor Pochettino's book, below where it is. In Mr Pochettino's book.

You lot need a Roof. And a Tailor. And many other things besides.

Dopey: "Bristol City - I'M COMING UUUOOOGGHHHhhhhhhhaaaaahhhhhhyeeessssssss!!!! FOR YOU!!!!!!!!!"

Can you lot please stop coming for us. It's disgusting.

I just asked the missus: "are you watching Ashton Gate?" And she said, "I'm coming. For you. I'm coming. For you." This has made me re-evaluate the Blue Few's "we're coming for you. Bristol City, we're...." They really fancy us, but we're just not that into, er, we're just not into them.

That's not as snappy as: "are you watching Ashton Gate?" Can you whittle it down a bit?

Us - #MakingBristolProud, Rovers - #MakingBristolProwed. We have so much to be prouwed of, here in Bristol.

When I heard that Rovers were promoted - again - I thought they were lying - again. But it's true. They're not lying. Not this time. The table doesn't lie. Lying ****ers!

We are watching Ashton Gate, on the Stadium Matters Subforum. Very nice it looks, too.

Leicester have spent one of their 110 years of league football below this division. And 47 in the top division. They've reached the FA Cup final four times, all of them post war, and won the League Cup three times. They have competed in Europe on three occasions. They've had players like Gordon Banks, Gary Lineker. All this before we get on to this season. So I'd agree with you, we're a bit like Leicester, in that we play football and we're called City.

I don't think there's much danger of Mark Ashton not talking this club up, but when spud says we are a small fish in this league he's referring to our record of underachievement at this level, as much as anything (I think), and how that influences top players thinking when choosing who to sign for. We are seen as perennial strugglers in this league, and the best players want to be at the clubs most likely to be chasing promotion. Keeping expectations in check makes sense. If we match or exceed them, wonderful, but we are in a highly competitive environment with many big guns. This ain't little ol' League One or Two!

Don't give up!!

And morally repugnant. Twice, Rovers have sniffed around the anticipated corpse of the sporting clubs of this city, with their "noble" intentions to "buy" the greatest asset, at the most convenient time for them. Funny how they weren't making offers to "buy" Ashton Gate or the rugby ground at any other time. They have helped themselves to their own ground not through their own graft and endeavour, but by biding their time and through sneaky opportunism and mendacity. Parasites

One difference could be that the buying and selling of players is an everyday, common occurrence in football. And the money an impoverished club receives for it's better players will go some way towards getting themselves out of an immediate problem. On the contrary, football clubs trying to buy other clubs grounds is not a common occurrence. Let us not forget, at that time, Southampton and Ipswich came together to help us out. Whereas Rovers came sniffing round to help themselves. There is a moral difference. Likewise, the vulture like taking advantage of the rugby club's predicament, under the guise of saving their skins by taking the ground off them.

Trying not think about Tuesday

And yet, Hull were 3 wins in ten going into yesterday. It sounds like you were "beaten" before the game started, and possibly one or two of the team!

You will get bigger crowds with a new ground but the ticket sales at Wembley last year suggest we are drawing our support from a larger pool. Not sure that has changed just yet. You might reasonably say, it was a non-league final; we might reply, it was another bloody tinpot cup final. A final I didn't attend, by the way. I don't think I was the only one to pass up another final. I don't see us doing a Brighton, never mind you lot. Brighton, remember, were quite a bit better supported than you chaps years ago - when they were promoted from 3 to 2 in '77 they averaged 20k (and the next year, 25k); when you were promoted from 3 to 2 in '74, you averaged 13k (and the next year, 12k) - and still probably draw upon a larger pool of support. Building a ground, ironically, is the easy bit. Building a competitive, winning team year after year, above the level of L2, is the difficult bit. The higher you go, the harder it gets. Without the team, the new ground won't keep the new "fans" you attract forever. Success brings challenges and problems, difficult decisions to be made. Let's see how Wael gets on choosing a new coach when the one you've got now is poached. And then finding another goal scorer when the one you've got now goes to someone higher up. Cope with things like this smoothly, and that will be worth taking notice of, and maybe being a little concerned by. Struggle to cope with this, and who knows after that? Some of us getting worked up on here by the day-dreaming amongst you lot is no great surprise. But I don't see the rest of football losing sleep over another club, a lower league club, getting a new ground and building there hopes up.

Fair points, mate. I just think when the opposition do have classier players, it's even more important to pay attention to the little things, like mental preparation and so on. Where you say we paid Hull too much "respect" I would call that "fear." I think our record v the top six sides, with a number of four goal hidings now, suggests we are missing a trick or something here, but it might be too much to expect LJ to change that now, this season. It's better that we have secured wins against the bottom four recently I suppose.