Boston Red

What I object to about Mr Lansdown's tenure is this. Bristol City used to be its own football club with its own ground and no debt. It is now just a sub-section of a Land-based, Multi-sport, Property-development, Profit-motivated, Speculative Franchise.

In the last 30 years City usually only get five or six years in the second tier before the club gets relegated and has to re-set. We wasted four years under Johnson selling all our best players and wasting the money on bad signings, and now a South exit from the Championship is looking more likely than a North exit.

Didn't we beat Forest away on penalties in the 2006/7 promotion season in the LDV cup? Jevons scored an overhead kick from the edge of the box in the fog, it finished 2-2, and we won on penalties. Then lost to the Gas in the semis but went up.

CRASH OUT OF THE PLAY-0FFS 4 by Lee Johnson. CRASH OUT OF THE PLAY OFFS 1. 2016/7. In October 2016 City are 6th. Although Johnson still has two years to run on his contract, Lansdown extends it. This proves embarrassing for him, as City immediately lose 13 out of 16, including an unwanted club record 8 in a row. City just about avoid relegation, and finish one place higher than last season, 17th, but after spending 10 million on new players it is a disappointment of a season. CRASH OUT OF THE PLAY OFFS 2. 2017/8 On Boxing Day 2017 against Reading, City win 2-0 with a Paterson curler into the top corner and a goal from youngster Lloyd Kelly, making his home debut as a substitute. City are SECOND in the Championship. They then are 1-1 and 2-2 with the great Manchester City over two legs, and although they concede last minute goals in each leg to go out 5-3, it is a mightily impressive show against the best team in Europe. 6 Premier League managers ring Lee Johnson to ask advice on how to play Man City. The club say "We are a Premier League club in training." CRASH. Flint, Reid, and Bryan all say they want to leave the club and won't sign new contracts. City lose to Wolves and then 5-0 to Villa. City only win a pathetic FOUR league matches for the rest of the season and finish in a miserable ELEVENTH. CRASH OUT OF THE PLAY OFFS 3. 2018/9 City win 9 games out of 9 over December/January/February 2019. After a few defeats and draws they then beat Sheff Utd 3-2 away (Weimann hat-trick), Middlesbrough 1-0 away (Webster), and West Brom 3-2 at home (Brownhill, Weimann, Hunt). Team P GD Pts 1 Norwich 40 34 84 2 Leeds 41 26 79 3 Sheff Utd 40 30 77 4 West Brom 41 22 70 5 Bristol City 40 10 65 6 Aston Villa 40 17 63 7 Middlesbrough 41 7 61 8 Derby 40 5 60 9 Sheff Wed 41 -2 59 10 Nottm Forest 41 5 57 City are fifth with only six games to go. If they can beat Derby at home, effectively a shoot-out for 6th place, they only need 5 points from the other 5 games to finish in the play offs. But they lose to Derby at home, and only take 5 points from their last 6 games in total. They finish 8th. At this point a narrative sprung up that Johnson was improving City year on year, based on final league position; 18th/17th/11th/8th. This implies that City are not a play off team, but we are steadily improving year on year and are creeping up on the play offs slowly but surely. The truth is rather different. The truth is that Johnson had absolutely no difficulty whatsoever getting City into the play offs, it is just that we crashed out again. Now, we crashed out to a higher position than the season before, but so what? A miss is as good as a mile. CRASH OUT OF THE PLAY OFFS 4. 2019/20 In February 2020 City beat QPR away 1-0 (Fammy neck-busting diving header). It is their 5th win out of 6. They are 6th, with 50 points from 30 games. You know what is coming next. The next 11 games? Win 1 Draw 2 Lose 8. With only 5 games left of the season City have slumped to 12th, on 55 points. Not even the Lee Johnson party trick of pointing to an improved league position will work this time. Lansdown has had enough and fires Johnson. So I am pleased Lee Johnson is doing well at Sunderland. He gave his all at City. When asked whether he ever had a day off he paused and said "No." His wife elbowed him at 11.30 pm in bed for taking a work call. Dean Holden banned Lee Johnson from contacting him with new ideas between the hours of 10pm and 8am so that he (Dean Holden) could get some sleep. Can't fault the bloke's commitment. Hope he takes Sunderland up. But can he get them over the line and not crash out at the end? That remains to be seen.

What's disappointing is that LJ does not cash his successes. Da Silva is forced to come on against Brentford, sets up the winner, plays well against Hull. Does LJ run with that bit of luck? No, drops him, and loses an advantage. Taylor comes on against Hull, looks great, sets up the winner, gives us life. Does LJ run with that and start him? No.

Cheers pal, I understand. I once watched 5 successive 0-0s at home under Pulis. And that was in the third tier when we had million pound players up front.

Any chance you could elaborate briefly, Dk? Genuinely interested. PS At least one of us is going to be happy tonight.