SouthS22

You’re ‘sick’ of it. Why? Because it happens so often? More importantly, what does this mean about you, and those others who’ve liked your post, that you feel so threatened when people have a different view to you. And that you are bitter enough to think that City fans are not going to be happy to see a win just because they may not be totally convinced by the manager. Enjoy the celebrations. Cheers ? (just pretending…)

How about this - Sorry to all the fans today, I got the tactics totally wrong and I set the team up badly for the game. I made a pretty average team in Birmingham City look like they were in a higher division than us and I was out-thought by Lee Bowyer who made me look tactically inept. Playing Sam Bell at right back was an unbelievably poor decision on my part and I apologise for any negative effects the game has had on his confidence. In light of the continued terrible defending which I haven’t been able to address in over a year at the club, I’m seriously considering whether my best years in management are a long way behind me. I take full responsibility for the substandard performance of the team over the season and I pledge to all I can to make use of the talent I have in the squad to improve our league position over the last 10 games. If I can’t do that I will do the decent thing and step aside for a more competent replacement.

You've made a decent counter argument right there. Make the fans feel a bit better. Its been a tough few seasons and some of us really want to feel a bit better about our club. If you're okay with seeing your football team surrender abjectly on a regular basis, giving away soft goal after soft goal, in the hope that its for the greater long term good, fair play to you. Me personally, and I seem to be in a minority on here at least, I'm more impatient and less optimistic that there are sunlit uplands ahead if we just hang on in there through the current grimness. I expect more than that after a year. I want to at least see some organisation, a solid structure, and a lot more motivation on the field and some good decision making on the side lines. Its true that threre has been progress on all fronts, and this is the thread that I'm clinging to as regards hopes for the future, but its an incredibly frustrating one step forward, a few indiscriminate shuffles in no discernable directon, and one step back again. I would argue also that accessing the loan market could very much be part of a good longer term strategy. It's about momentum and trajectory and creating a sense of positivity and optimism about the football cllub again, and surely that's worth a few extra quid and NP compromising on his bloody-mindedness, and getting with the reality of modern football for at least part of a season. I also don't buy the reasoning that getting loans will damage efforts to build a long term side and squad. How is one or two loans in positions where we are really short going to disrupt that? All football clubs see player turnover and unless this particular leopard has turned into a zebra during Covid, we're not going to be any different in the summer when the transfer windows. Given this reality in football, the focus becomes how you manage that turnover and how you get different players to fit into your philosophy and style, assuming of course that you have one. Are those three loans fatally damaging Steve Cooper's efforts to build a long term side and squad? I'm pretty sure he doesn't think so and he looks like he knows what he's doing to me.

Defences at championship level just can’t handle him. Pace, power and pretty unpredictable as to what he is going to do next. Brilliant at driving into the box and beating players , and equally able to create space outside and get shots off. What a goal that was today, top class. Middlesbrough have been pretty solid since Wilder arrived, but he had their their back 4 terrified. If we have genuine prem ambitions, we have to be looking to hold on to him for at least another year. Get the defence sorted, keep developing Scott and Massengo in the middle, and with Weimann and AS up front there’s no reason why we can’t be challenging for top six.

I havent analysed the games or reviewed the results, but I have seen most of them this season and genuinely I think that's not very many. 8 points that I can think of, Not even close anyway to the amount of points we've lost from leading positions.

Soft goal, after soft goal, after soft goal and so it continues., week after week and month after month. No one else sick of it yet? If not, I admire both your optimism and your patience. Individual errors and this player or that player at fault, terrible injuries, lacking in confidence, yada yada yada. I look enviously at the likes of Forest and Middlesbrough who bought a top class manager in. One of the major differences between them and us? In their case, the manager actually is good. You know, someone who knows how to organise a team, brings a style of football to the club, plays from a base of structure and being difficult to break down and beat. New manager comes in, there's an immediate impact in terms of improvement, and then the team continues to get better over time. Its a project, but it doesn't take over a year for anyting to actually change. I do see improvement, and you never know we might actually get somewhere after another transfer window or three. But, being on a promise and actually getting it, are two very different things: 'Not today, perhaps next week or if then maybe next season...' - its a long and uncertain wait, based on a lot of assumptions about keeping hold of our best players and building from there.

Yet another very dodgy performance, but this time we somehow managed to scrape a win. Good job Reading are shite, and we still managed to make them look decent. We’ve got to be better than shading a game against a side who have lost their last 5 and look like prime relegation contenders. A massively important 3 points, but big improvement needed or we are going to be on the end of some shockers. We’re lucky there have been points deductions and both Barnsley and Huddersfield have imploded this year or we’d be scrapping it out to avoid relegation. Anyway, everything is fine and going according to plan, so that’s alright then.

The definition of insanity is to keep doing the same things over and over again and expecting a different result. Something has to change in that defensive organisation before we all lose the plot. Soft goals, soft goals, and more soft goals, game after game it’s getting very very frustrating. All very nice to play attacking football, but with Chris Martin as our target man and giving away at least two goals a game, it doesn’t take much of an IQ to work out that we ain’t going to get many + 3 points

Great performance today from most of the team. Some really exciting football and we were by some distance the better team. Klosse looks a really strong signing and I thought we looked good with him in there until we made all those random changes late in the game. The exception was Weiman who had a bit of a mare. It was just one of those days for him unfortunately which is a shame because he’s been on top form recently. Why he wasn’t substituted I don’t know. Would have much preferred Jay to stay on, with Pring remaining at LCB and the structure of the defence kept pretty much the same. Not sure what the thinking was in the changes there but up until that final minute Pring had a really good game. Maybe Benarous for Scott, Vyner for Weimann and we take home the 3 points we deserved.

Their defence is terrified. On fire.

There are many possible reasons, but the most likely unfortunately is that he sometimes makes very poor decisions that really don’t work out and end up costing us. This looks like one of those and I thought it was harsh on Atkinson who did okay last game, unless there are fitness issues there. Another of those poor decisions was that he signed Simpson which means we have no back up right back, and Vyner has to play out of position there, when he’s been good recently in the middle.

Gutted by that loss. Team selection was good, the first 20 minutes was the best I’ve seen us play this season, we were competitive even when down to 10, great atmosphere and support at the Gate, and everyone put a massive battling shift in, apart from King because he got himself senselessly sent off. Thought we’d sorted the conceding from corners thing out, so disappointing to lose it from one after everything everyone had put in. Hope we can quickly put that one behind us and go again with the same approach against Millwalll - new year, new habit of winning…

We need to get some in and some out in January to freshen the squad up a bit. Its too same old, same old, particuarly up front. Great to see Semenyo back, but we can't rely on him to get us enough goals and both Martin and Weimann are looking a bit done in, especially when we have two games in a week, I've had great hopes for Wells, but he doesn't seem to know whether its Chrismtas or Easter at the moment. We're also looking lightweight in the midde of the pitch - James and Willilams are both quality players, but when both of them are out, we lose cohesion. I'm not sure Simpson is the answer (even when fit) and, while I rate Massengo and Bakinson looks increaslingly like he may be stepping up, the two of them haven't found the same book, let alone the page. Loans out could create some space, and some creative transfer dealing could bring some quality in, even on just a short term basiis. Somewhere out there could be another young Tammy just waiting for some competitive game time....

Thanks once again for the match report, always enjoy reading these and usually agree with the vast majority of the commentary. That first 20 minutes was worrying. Obviously the goal was disappointing, but it was very well taken. It was our response that was most concerning - its supposed to be the team who has just gone down in the match that gets hold of the ball and applies the pressure but we could neither get it back not retain it on the few occasions when we did. Once again, too many poor decisions and hopeful hoofs . Fortunately Pearson was on the touchline this time and Matty James was in the middle and between them they somehow got some sort of sense of order back and we grew into the game. I thought Semenyo had a decent game and alongside Matty James was man of the match. It wasn't perfect and some more instinctive play might have seen him get a few more goals, but he brought strength on the ball, retention of possession, ability to beat a player or two and to create chances and make things happen. He was our best attacking threat by a distance. Its early for him back from injury, but promising signs, espeically if he can get some confidence from that goal. I admire the work rate of Weimann and Martin up front, but they brought very little quality yesterday and I would really like to see alternative options being tried. A Semenyo / Wells combination might be worth a look, with Scott or Benarous playing in the advanced creative midfield role behind them. The rating for Massengo was perhaps a bit harsh. Definitely for the first half, but clearly words were said at half time and he looked much better second half - getting the ball down, looking for passing options, making himself available alongside James, and then providing the energy when Matty clearly ran out of it towards the end of the game. Their second goal was typical City. The left side disappeared, getting completely out of position and we practically invited them to score. Real shame, because we were the better team up to that point, and it felt like we shoudl have gone on and won it. Its progress though that we pushed for the equaliser rather than surrendering, and we got what I thought was a deserved point out of the game.

I can’t see that HNM will sign a new contract - why would a player with potential like him want to spend more years not developing his game under our current dinasour coaching? Work your arse off for 95 minutes trying to retrieve the ball that’s being constantly lost due to lumping it long either to a striker who is running away and hiding or to one who couldn’t make the ball stick if his boots were covered in superglue? No thanks. In his place I’d be looking at better options. So, yes, probably we have to see if another club wants to take him though it means another big loss on investment, because we won’t get what we put in but we have to get something. Personally I’d love him to stay and be developed as he should be in a team that doesn’t just play hoof ball. Apparently that’s not possible though because we’re in a ‘development phase’ where we can’t expect any actual passing and movement for at least another 2 years. Far too late for HNM and probably a few others too. I guess we should look to offload them all to free up funds for more Leicester old timers who can keep the bench and the treatment room warm.

This ‘bed wetting’ thing is like the toddlers retort of ‘you smell’. I imagine that you have progressed in literacy beyond pre-school, especially with a username of ‘bard’, unless of course that is ironic? That was another disappointing performance, whatever way you look at it. I didn’t see the whole game, so I might be accused of not having the right to comment, but for the 55 mins I did see, we didn’t look competitive today. Such a shame after 3 half decent performances and the opportunity to build a bit of momentum and confidence. It is worrying that we are so reliant on two key midfield players - one of whom seems to be unable to play more than two successive games. Without either James or Williams, we seem to lose all ability to play in any kind of coherent way. Massengo and Bakinson haven’t worked out to play together as yet and seem to make each other look like average players when they’re on the same pitch. Worse than that though is the bigger impact on the team’s ability to do the basics. On a positive note, my kids’team had a good win today - I think I might have seen better football watching them play. Now, where were those clean sheets…

The squad is not balanced for sure but I’m not convinced on the coming back from injury argument. We’ve seen the same thing happen many times this season, especially at home, with different members of the squad on the pitch. Perhaps it’s a fitness thing, but given that we’re being told the team is fitter this year than ever, I think more likely it’s more a confidence issue, with likely some bad decision making also in the mix. We would need less energy anyway if we were able to keep better possession because there’s less running needed to chase the ball down. Bakinson, Scott, ODowda, and Williams were a big improvement in the first half, and I think James will make a difference when he’s back, so maybe we can address that better in the not too distant future if we can keep them all injury free.

I’m not talking about dominating, just simply retaining the ball for periods of time to break up the opponent’s play and relieve the pressure on our defence. It felt like deja vu again today for most of the second half, and I’ve lost count of how often we’ve retreated in that way after half time. The difference this time was that we did actually manage to respond after they’d scored, which was a big change on the collapses we’ve seen before. Can we say that was down to us and the amount of energy we forced Blackburn to use to get back level? let’s give ourselves the benefit of doubt and say yes and hope that we can be more positive for longer on Weds.

About 18500 was announced

Have you been watching any games this season? It’s a major factor in why we’ve been surrendering so many, especially at home. Start well, play some decent football, then get too passive, retreat further and further back, panic on the ball and start lumping it forward, defence comes under increasing pressure and concedes. if that doesn’t concern you, I’m happy for you. Perhaps you can tell me where to get your rose tinted specs, I could have done with some of those to watch us in the second 45. As I said, there was progress, and when we get James back playing alongside Williams and Bakinson I hope there will be more. Even O’Dowda looked half decent today, so there’s got to be hope.

Mixed feelings about that one. Some massive positives - Williams makes us look like a different team and is a driving force from midfield, Bakinson looked good next to him for large parts of the game, and what a player Alex Scott is, even looked good at wingback which can’t be a preferred role for him. Vyner showed what a good player he can be when he cuts out the mistakes and both Kalas and Baker were mostly solid in that back three. Benarous gave us something different, there’s clearly potential there. The major concern for me though is that we only seem to be able to perform for half a game. We were the better side in the first half, but why couldn’t we continue like that in the second? Instead, we did the usual surrendering possession and falling deeper and deeper. Their equaliser was almost inevitable, and it wasn’t just down to one player, it’s a whole team issue. We finished the game string however and that’s progress. If we can just keep the first half levels going for 95 minutes we’ll be in some danger of becoming a decent team.

Seems to me that there are many excuses being made here for poor coaching and management. Are we really suggesting that the way the team is organised has nothing to do with how shockingly bad we are? That the problem is a lack of concentration or application, or that somehow we’ve ended up with a group of players with serious personality shortcomings? We are being outplayed week after week, even by 10 men for half a match today, we are dominated by other teams in terms of possession, we have no discernible pattern or style of play, and we often look like we don’t know what to do or how to play together. It’s the players fault. It’s the Lansdowns fault. It’s Mark Ashtons fault. It’s Lee Johnson’s fault. It’s the fault of Bristol,Sport. It’s Dean Holdens fault. All no doubt are issues, but the truth is that Leadership is fundamentally important in all areas of life, and that most definitely includes football. That’s current leadership, not leadership that was in place 9 months ago. You don’t need to be Nostradamus to know that if you haven’t got the right management in place for what needs to be managed, you will not succeed. Anyone who is a manager knows that the buck stops there, and unfortunately It seems to me this buck has come to a horrible grinding halt. Sometimes time and patience are needed, but sometimes what’s required is a change. Confirmation bias anyone?

That’s it. Patience is all used up. Life’s too short for this shit. Pearson has got to go sadly. Just can’t take it any more

Fans came through for the team today big time. We were not going to let them lose, practically willed the team home. Best atmosphere at the Gate in the last 15 mins since Man Utd. Celebrated like we won the league too. Somehow made it over the line, and hopefully that turns a massive corner and is a huge confidence boost.

I’m.not sure he should have started but definitely should have come off. We were crying out for someone to put their foot on the ball and keep possession and Martin today was all flicks and attempted layoffs which rarely came off. Would have loved to see Scott on for the last half hour to bring us a bit more composure.