Clutton Caveman

22 hours ago, Ostrich said:

I mean it’s a problem in away ends (at least well attended ones) up and down the country just as it’s a problem in city and town centres up and down the country. And if you ever have the misfortune to find yourself at a big Saturday race meeting at Ascot and the like then it can be even worse.

Maybe this always feels the case but it feels like it’s getting worse. It ruins the day when you’re near them and it’s beyond embarrassing. I’m sure we’ve all had one too many at some point and not covered ourselves in glory but when you see the same people week in week out you can only feel pity for them. No idea what you do about it

There seems to be a part of our population that think you cannot have a good time unless you are totally off your face on alcohol or other substances. Whatever terrible things they do are excused under the statement, well I was pissed. They have no self respect and no respect for others. Sadly many of the people are perfectly good citizens when sober

11 hours ago, Red_Alligator said:

Something clearly needs to be  done about the way that PP's work. I can understand the need to prevent any club from imploding as a result of being relegated from the Premier League, but surely the cloth needs to be cut accordingly as with anything else in life?.

Perhaps making it compulsory that all player contracts contain a very large salary reduction in the event of relegation would help.

9 hours ago, Midlands Robin said:

The big problem as I see it with the "Lansdown model" is how can it work without a scouting network deeply embedded within the game?

If that is missing then how are we supposed to locate these players that other clubs have missed, snap them up for a bargain price and develop them into assets worth multiple millions?

on the flip side of the coin, Atkinson and Tanner both look like great signings who do fit the mold of the type of player we should be signing. Tanner was signed as that archetypal young player who we could mold into a first team regular and within a week or two he's already in the first team and starting.

That says something positive about our recruitment process if those two are anything to go by.

It would definitely appear that we have a significant amount of work to do to broaden and deepen our scouting and recruiting team but it can't be all bad if Atkinson and Tanner are anything to go by.

We don't have one football man in our senior leadership team, just a bunch of business managers. THAT is the problem

14 hours ago, billywedlock said:

I don't think many teams will want to face Antoine. He is exactly what we miss, pace and power and the lad is technically gifted. Missing some game nous , but he is a handful . I personally rate him highly and he will improve us. So I am hoping, with the others I mention, that when we finally get them playing together , we will be a far better footballing side. Nige has mentioned playing Antoine as one of  3 forwards too. 

I think Antoine has everything apart from Football intelligence and end product. He plays on instinct

11 hours ago, GrahamC said:

Absolutely bemused why the South stand isn’t called the Alan Dicks stand & also done whilst the great man is still with us & agree GG should have something in tribute, too.

Strange, I remember many games where "Dicks out" rang around AG before he got it right!!

9 hours ago, Dr Balls said:

I would suggest that NP still isn’t quite sure which combination of players gives the right balance between any sort of an attack and being able to defend. Can you have Wells, Martin and Weimann as a front 3? What is our best midfield combination if all the players were fit? Do we need 2 or 3 central defenders?

I still think having Bentley as captain is the wrong call as well. Usually you would say a goalkeeper isn’t involved much in the game, so it’s not a good idea. In Bentley’s case, he is too regularly having to focus so much on his own performance to even keep us in games that again it doesn’t seem a good fit.

I think the Captains role on the field is almost extinct. If a Bobby Kellard type gave a typical player of today a dressing down on the field he would probably be off for 6 months on stress leave.

2 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

In the absence of Semenyo he would certainly offer more pace, which we lack.

Can’t see him starting but agree he is worth putting on the bench.

Think the starting line up will be very similar to Forest (as none of the 3 I mentioned actually started) but HNM in & Martin out with Weimann & Wells up top, maybe.

They are a team of monsters. We will do well to get more than 30% possession and there will be plenty of high balls into the box

46 minutes ago, Major Isewater said:

We all know that on his day Pato is different class but , equally, we all know that his ‘ day ‘ is one match in ten. 
 

Would I have kept him over COD or Palmer? 
On footballing ability alone , yes , but add in his age, future sell on potential and the fact that he was out of contract and unlikely to sign a new one on reduced terms,that makes the decision easier. 

Pato or COD absolutely no contest. As you say Pato has the occasional excellent game, COD ..........

On 20/10/2021 at 07:49, KeepUpLino said:

It’s was absolute suicide for him taking this job and I’m amazed he even bothered, let’s face it we’d be lucky to get anyone with any calibre to replace him!

The mess left by LJ and MA and overseen by SL is nothing short of a disgrace, no money, no prospects, league 1’s a certainty and it’s not the fault of the manager!

Do I feel sorry for a man on a very attractive salary with very few other job offers living off past glories of a couple of good seasons with Leicester. No. If he is as good as his ego suggests he thinks he is, we are yet to see to much evidence so far. Yes there has been some improvement but we were at so a low point we could hardly have become worse. Yes he inherited a poor squad with low morale and awful team ethic BUT he had plenty of time to assess the situation last year. I have the horrible feeling that he is a "they manager" not a "we manager" and sitting in the stand hardly helps togetherness.

I truly hope things improve but so far the jury must be out.

9 hours ago, bexhill reds said:

Right so trying to get pace on the pitch was a bad idea? Agreed that lumping the ball at him was not going to work, but getting him running into the corners as an outlet surely makes sense, especially against tired defenders even if only to stretch the pitch out a bit, I’d argue that this was the best option with what was on the bench, just a poorly executed.

Especially when the remaining bench options were Simpson, Pring and Bakinson.

Pace, what pace, when was the last time you saw O'Dowd leave a defender in his wake. How this guy survived the cull I just don't know. 

10 hours ago, richyy66 said:

Odowda was not at fault for the last few mminutes of madness. I agree i think he should be moved on but to blame him for the defeat is a little harsh.

Wells knew what he was doing within the game plan and did it well. It was working. If we had a like for like sub OK but when O'Dowd came on the shape went to hell.

11 hours ago, Peter O Hanraha-hanrahan said:

Did well again. Great find.

When will he get a song? 

41 minutes ago, bcfcnick said:

Not in favour of managerial change but understand the question marks.   I think the Simpson and King recruits were mistakes but they are on one year contracts and young recruits like Tanner and Atkinson have been good.

The issue for me though is our inability to keep the ball.  I lost count of the amount of times players, such as Massengo, with the obvious ability to pass to his own teammate, regularly lost possession or passed into space where only the opposition were ever going to pick it up.  Is that down to our coaching team,  the manager and the way the team are set up or is it down to the calibre of players?  I'd love to see the stats for the times we lost possession after Bentley boots it upfield - it was probably 80% plus and that tactic surely has to be an instruction.

The positive points going forward are young players like Scott, Tanner and Atkinson and the hope that Pearson can add more of the same with decent  midfield recruits, wide players and a clinical finisher.  Above all, we need a team that is not having to defend with desperation and minimal possession for long periods of the game. When we do that there is an air of inevitability that we will concede and we do. 

It is very hard to pass the ball when half of the team is hiding. On Saturday we saw a team where every player wanted the ball all of the time. As soon as they pass they make themselves available to get the ball back. Each time their players looked up they had 4 or five options both short and long. For years we have had very little movement off the ball except when occasionally when we are 2 in front and have our tails up. I think this came from years of trying to stop the opposition instead of playing our own game. Last night for 90 mins I thought we were quite good. Some of the last ditch defending was great and we opened them up several times. For me we lost the game because we made substitutions for the sake of them and lost our shape (which had been very good) completely. The players that came on seemed to do their own thing rather than fitting into the shape.

3 hours ago, Wanderingred said:

Hate to say it, but the changing demographics of our fan base is going to make it very difficult to get back any sort of atmosphere. Middle class, first generation Bristolians and their children now populate Ashton Gate and whilst their support and money is very welcome, they mostly aren’t going to join in with songs and chants.

It’s just the way football is going I’m afraid and there are only a handful of grounds left in the UK that can still generate a good atmosphere.

At the risk of massive flak, I think the Gas heads often create more noise that we do. Purely from an acoustic and visual standpoint, our sound should come from the centre of the East End.

23 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Agree.

In the main we haven’t got enough controlled possession to build congestive attaching moves / threat.

if you ignore the goal for the moment….this came from a good press, a clearance under pressure where two or three quick passes (on our left wing) resulted in us being able to open out to the right wing inside their half.

We also see that with good territory gained (in a good shape) how good movement then enables us to create a chance. In this case a goal.  We also see James getting into the box in case there’s a chance to pull it back.  It’s pretty simple but very effective, and constructed off the back of two or three quick passes.

The Tanner / Wells chance was created from a couple of quick headers, Tanner bursting through, crossing (to nobody) but then us picking up the loose ball in their third…with several bodies forward.

When we attack in ones and twos, it’s difficult to string anything together.  I think we need to get up the pitch so James and whoever plays alongside him have less distance to join the attack and less distance to support the defence.

Problem is that our defence is reluctant to play a high line and condense the play because we are vulnerable to fast strikers and midfielders running past ours. When the defence plays deep we give our 2 midfielders a massive amount of space to fill. This year we are very short of options and NP just has to get enough results to keep us up. Hopefully if we can show a stable set up we can attract some better quality next season and our kids will be 1 year older.

1 hour ago, CliftonCliff said:

Exactly. And it's equally unfair to Paterson, who gets some quite outrageous stick on here. He's a regular starter for Swansea and has already had a series of good performances to his credit, to judge from the reports I've read. An outstanding goal and two assists on Saturday. What does he have to do before some people will recognise his abilities and give him credit for being the talented player that he is - walk on water? While he was here, regardless of whether he was fit or in form, he was, for me, probably the best footballer at the club and I am not in the least surprised that he's had a successful beginning to his time with his new club.

We've lost four big players from our midfield in the last couple of years. Brownhill was always going to a higher level and there was nothing we could do to prevent that, but we chose to move on Pack, Smith and now Pato and, whilst I'm not necessarily saying I'd have them back now, I did disagree with every one of those decisions at the time they were made. 

I wonder if you would have agreed with moving them on if you knew who we would get as replacements

28 minutes ago, Super said:

Basically means you make a pass then give it away!

We are supposed to pass and move. At the moment we pass and stand still, hence no good passing options and we lose the ball again. Good movement of the ball has been largely missing for several years

On Saturday with plenty of time to think, due to getting stuffed, I wonder how we can continue to give visiting teams such a great time.

Our singing section is tucked in a corner with virtually no noise until the game starts. Such a limited range of songs and few that others can understand and join in with. We sing the Dasilva song whether is is good or bad because its one of the few that we have.

At the other end !!. We give them a full end behind a goal. Why don't the away fans at the gate get tucked into a top corner somewhere like we do?

I started watching City in 1970. The East End then has some pride and character. The song leaders where at the back in the middle and the singing spread out wide to both sides. The noise then would put our current volume to shame. We had a song for each player which didn't need to be a musical master piece. Everyone could hear it and join in. We had real hostility when one of ours was wronged.

We briefly heard the far end of the Dolman on Saturday but it soon died out.

For Goodness sake. Lets move the singing section to the middle of the East End. Get some simple and decent songs and belt them out and finally lets move the away fans as far away from the pitch as we can.

Lets also turn the pre match music down so that at least the fans can be heard.

Come on, the team needs help and the noise and encouragement just has to be better

3 hours ago, GrahamC said:

To answer the OP, not really.

James has been good, with an availability record others don’t remotely match.

King is a useful squad man, if HNM & Williams were fit (& the latter now looks like experiencing another lay off) then he’d be a sub at best. When you then look at his last 2 seasons & the fact we only thought him worth a year after a short trial, he’s done fine.

I do find this Paterson revisionism after yesterday pretty hilarious, the consensus on here (but certainly not my view) in the summer was we were glad to get shot & Golden Boy Liam Walsh (how’s that going?) would be a big miss..

He always had one good game for us each season so that's it now for Swansea. With regards to King and James and don't forget Simpson, it starts to look like Nige looking after old mates with one last pay cheque. I would prefer Pack and Smith any time.

On 16/10/2021 at 19:14, And Its Smith said:

Bad day at the office for Nige. 

It all feels a bit them and not we in the interviews and sitting in the stand seems to emphasis this. How can we have effort like we saw against Fulham and then this?? Just makes no sense, we seem to need a goal to give us confidence before we can start to play

18 hours ago, Super said:

27% possession for a home game is incredible.

54% pass accuracy not great either

2 hours ago, LondonBristolian said:

For me, it's not that the wrong team was picked - although I do think the wrong sub was made when Williams went off - but that, having performed as we did on Saturday, there needs to be evidence of meritocracy in future team selections.

Vyner, Scott and Palmer have all not been selected for perfectly valid reasons, whilst I think Wells actually looked outstanding at QPR and is unlucky to be back out the team again.

My feeling is that, right now there are a number of players - Martin, Bakinson and O'Dowda being the first three I'd mention - who haven't done enough in recent games to justify starting whilst others, such as Pring, have tailed off a little. If it's fair that Vyner, Scott, Palmer and Wells have been dropped for their performances - which I believe it is - then it's only fair that this applies across the squad.

@Davefevs suggested on another thread that Vyner could come into the midfield until the injury system abates and I agree with this. I also think it's time that Wells was given a chance ahead of Martin and that Scott or Palmer gets another chance too. I'm not saying any of those players would always be in my first eleven but, if the team is being picked on merit, that has to apply across the board and I think there are certain players who would benefit from being made to work for their place again. 

We need but we don't have PACE. Teams can play a high back line and play in our half because we have zero threat in behind. Sorry to say that on Saturday we had no press, no snap in the tackle and few runners off the ball. I really hoped that we had seen the last of that but is seems it is back.

15 hours ago, Selred said:

With Bournemouth only playing 1 up top, I'd of matched them. I feel by having 2 up top it was 5 vs 4 in midfield, combined with the fact 2 of our CMs have the pace of a slug covered in salt. 

I understood to begin with, as Weimann could of gone wide right and Williams moved more central, but to bring on Wells really didn't help. 

For me Weimann is only effective in a central role. Elsewhere yes he runs a lot but is not sufficiently tactically aware to play deeper

9 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Add Vyner and Atkinson to that...Wells and Semenyo as well- Palmer has looked a bit better since the start of the season too.

Look we played FGR and our midfield got overrun. We had to play on the break. Our promised miracle midfield star is injured yet again.

Player quality you can't do much about but motivation, organisation and game management comes from the coaching staff and the head of our coaching teams prefers to be as far from the players as possible. 

On 27/10/2020 at 18:51, real_bristol said:

I also find this interesting. I imagine the council will try and squeeze every last penny out of this development, but you never know. We got our new stadium in the end didn’t we. 
 

The height might be ok when you think of the precedent the council has recently set including the height of the Lansdown stand and that development near bemmy train station. I think I read that got the green light? I think it will depend ultimately on what it does to the skyline from various viewpoints. We must have one or two planners in our fan base who are itk...

Not sure how popular the hotel would be unless it had a great conference program. If I was a visitor to Bristol I can think of far nicer locations to wake up in.