Supersonic Robin

39 minutes ago, Robbored said:

If City can get that amount for Conway then fair play but at the same time whoever pays it are mugs in my view.

How many chances did he miss today? I can think of two that a proper striker would have buried. The penalty he won and then converted was because he’d messed up another one and one and the keeper brought him down. How many pens has got this season? - they add to his tally of course.

I think a 21 year old striker who has scored 12+ goals for a midtable Championship team in consecutive seasons very much qualifies as a "proper striker".

Some of the disrespect towards Conway over the last few months has been very strange.

Think Conway is underrated by many on here.

Easy to forget he's only 21.

1 minute ago, ExiledAjax said:

Just for context. 2 is (rounded from 1.93) the average number of goals conceded by Rotherham this season.

Par.

Good point. Worth remembering just how poor Rotherham are.

1 minute ago, And Its Smith said:

Incredible save from Max to keep it nil nil…..

Not this again......why do some have to pretend that every bog standad save O'Leary makes is world class?

Poor effort from Sykes.

Think he made an almost identical error from a similar chance vs Blackburn too.

On 14/04/2024 at 00:37, Swede said:

Actually today, in a tight game you could see a value. He popped up many times in good positions, in between the lines. These fine margins could be the difference between winning and losing. This is what I think Manning sees. He's a very intelligent player always thinking on the front foot. Unfortunately for him I don't think he affects enough of what we need in a game. This is down to his slight physique & perceived lack of pace. So he's never going to out pace or out muscle a defender.

He is never worth £4M, I would say more like less than half of that.

Agree, Twine is clearly a good player, but doesn't seem a great fit for us in some ways.

In terms of pressing and defending, he leaves a a lot to be desired. That's okay if you're getting a goal or assist every other game, but Twine isn't. In general, Twine hasn't quite been the huge outlet of threat and creativity that I'd hoped.

A good player? Yes. A player I'd spend £4m on? No.

On 13/04/2024 at 23:31, Nescot said:

Twine is worth every penny anything 4mil or under sign.

On 14/04/2024 at 11:42, Jeez said:

Everyone is crying out for progress but at same time lots are poo pooing a player like Twine who is arguably the minimum level throughout the squad / 1st 11 you need you win promotion.

Are these views based on what we expected of him, or his actual performances for us?

Don't get me wrong, he's a decent player, but I wonder if the fact "it's Twine" is making people see his performances through rose-tinted glasses.

Robins TV cuts to a clip of Section 82 celebrating at about 30% capacity 

2 minutes ago, Wanderingred said:

Looking at the last decade, 53 points is almost always nowhere near a relegation spot, the only exception being the year when Blackburn went down with 51 points, a freakishly high points total for relegation. I stand by my opinion that no point have we been in relegation form under Manning (unless you take a really small sample of games). Some of the football has been so bad though, that it’s probably made things appear worse than in reality.

I agree that 53 points would be incredibly unlikely to get you relegated. No doubt we've been in relegation form at times though, as per Silvio below.

13 games is a reasonable sample too - more than a quarter of a season.

Glad that we're improving now though.

8 minutes ago, Silvio Dante said:

If you want a bigger sample, since the start of the year up until Easter it was P13 W3 D2 L8 Pts 11

Over a season that’s 39 points.

Whatever way you cut it, that gets you relegated. 

26 minutes ago, Wanderingred said:

6 wins, 5 draws, 9 defeats in his first 20 league games. That’s the form of lower mid table, the position we’ve finished for the last two seasons under Pearson.

Calling for Manning to be sacked was pointless. We all know the real reason we are stagnating as a club and it’s not the manager. Sack him and then what? They’ll only make another appointment that satisfies their agenda. May as well give the guy a proper go at it.

That's 23 points from 20 games, so 52.9 points if you extrapolate to a full season. Last season, that would have produced an 18th place finish, so it's in the bottom third. I think we're splitting hairs a bit about whether you call it "lower midtable" or "near relegation zone". By the time we had 5 losses from 6, I think fans' frustrations were very much justified.

No need to compare to Pearson, but if you do want to, then most metrics (including points per game) were showing that we were worse under Manning than Pearson (especially if you consider the relative injury situations).

I'm glad we've looked better in recent weeks, but it really wasn't that unreasonable for people to be questioning Manning's job.

I very much agree with your last point though. I don't trust the board to make appointments in any part of the club, manager included. The ownership is undoubtedly the reason we're stagnating.

12 hours ago, HunstantonRed said:

Wow some absolute whoppers early in this thread. Shocking people were actually calling for him to be sacked.

Is it that shocking?

Across Manning's first 20 games or so our form was near relegation standard. Results were poor, performances were poor, underlying numbers were poor, eye test was poor.

I never got quite as far as calling for Manning to be sacked, but you can absolutely understand why some people did.

Good performance and good result.

Think everyone played well. We look much better when we press more aggressively.

Really feel we need to caveat the game with the fact that Blackburn were SO bad. Very rare that you get gifted 3 or 4 goals for free.

1 minute ago, mozo said:

And just a reminder, we can now tick off:

Beating teams below us 

 

Personally think we need a few more before we can say that with confidence

6 minutes ago, Bas's perfect hattrick said:

C'mon he basically cupped the ball. Hand stretched out. Definite penalty

Back turned, clearly not deliberate. Defender knew nothing about it.

6 minutes ago, ChippenhamRed said:

Surely you don’t think that should have any bearing on the referee’s decision?! This isn’t under 8s.

More that if there was any uncertainty, the referee could have easily not given it and it wouldn't have been a particularly controversial decision in the context of the game.

FWIW, I can absolutely see why it was given. I'd just feel very unfortunate if I were the Blackburn defender. I always hate the penalties where it just hits someone's hand accidentally, rather than them deliberately moving their hand towards the path of the ball.

As someone who also played at CB for a while, I also tend to side with the defenders in these situations 

1 minute ago, HunstantonRed said:

We have been excellent tonight.

We've been good, but have to massively caveat our performance with the fact that Blackburn have been utterly dreadful.

I can't remember us ever being gifted so many goals in a game.

Think that's slightly harsh. Not a deliberate handball, didn't really deny a goal, and Blackburn already 3-0 down.

Good goal from Mehmeti.

Poor effort from Sykes

Blackburn look absolutely awful defensively. 2 gifts of goals.

Just now, One Team said:

Nice to hear from Leroy but saying it’s a nice positive start after 40 seconds is a bit much!

Not only was it a great start, we were also "dominating possession" 

On 07/04/2024 at 10:22, Dastardly and Muttley said:

They obviously haven’t seen much of us. We’re only capable of soundly beating the best teams. Against everyone else, we struggle.

That's fair.

Our current record against teams in the bottom half under Manning - P13: W2, D4, L7

The recent wins against Swansea and Plymouth, and the draw against Sunderland, have made that record look a bit better than it did a few weeks ago. Granted, the general sentiment seems to be that the Swansea and Sunderland results flattered us.

These games against "inferior" opposition are the ones where I really want to see Manning improve. With games against Blackburn, Huddersfield, Rotherham, and Stoke remaining, he very much has an opportunity to do so.

5 hours ago, ralphindevon said:

It’s memories like this that make you realise just how few great moments we have as City fans.

That was a truly great evening, beating our local rivals after what had gone on earlier in the season, a comprehensive win and a general feeling that there would be no stopping us winning the league.

It just feels like days/evenings like that are very few and far between for us. 

And how crap those "great moments" are compared to many of our peers.

Let's be honest, beating Swindon in League 1 and our CB saying something funny after the match is pretty pathetic as great footballing moments go 

A couple of the more common lies presented (perhaps accidentally) by many football fans in terms of performances appear present on this thread:

1) "I don't really care about results or where we finish in the table. I just want to be entertained and watch us play attacking football."

No you don't. You'd be jubilent if we were 1st in the league and winning 1-0 every week. You'd be livid if we were 24th and losing 4-3 every week.

2) "We need to play fast, exciting, attacking football because that's our club's true identity!"

No it isn't. The identity of any team is dictated by how the manager chooses to set that team up.

Besides, every single fanbase in world football seems to think that this is their team's identity. I'm yet to meet a fanbase who describe their club's true identity as "slow, defensive, long ball football". If every club claims to have the same identity, it's not really an identity, is it?

2 hours ago, ExiledAjax said:

Yes absolutely. A "good performance" doesn't necessarily mean you play "front foot football", or that you get a clean sheet, or that you dominate a team. I'd say it just means you play the best you can within the circumstances and context of the match. 

Do you effectively deliver and execute a plan, and is that plan the right one for that game?

Exactly this. Good performances aren't about how many players you throw forward or how dramatic the match is.

It's about executing a plan to influence the match, such that you increase your chance of generating a positive result.

Results will always ultimately be what's most important - football is a results driven industry.

However, performances are the best indicator of results to follow. As @ExiledAjax excellently put it - "Look after the performances and the results will look after themselves." Good results generated through poor performances are generally unsustainable.

So the question really becomes - What's more important right now? Current results, or an indication that we can consistently generate good results next season (i.e. performances)?

As a team with nothing to play for right now, I think the answer is definitely the latter.

2 hours ago, LondonBristolian said:

We still don't know what the "true" Bristol City is. 

1 hour ago, Bristol Oil Services said:

Yeah we do, it's stuck somewhere between about 14th in the Championship/second tier, and just a little bit higher than where the Blue Few currently fester in L1. Letting in a little too many, not scoring quite enough. In front of about 12,000 people.

So we're doing alright, as things stand. Manning in (until ....)

And this is exactly the mindset that has kept us there whilst every other club of our size has achieved far more

7 minutes ago, Merrick's Marvels said:

Naismith isn't out of contract - 1 year left.

I agree about not including him though! I'd sell this summer.

Sykes is one of our most consistent performers, one of the first names on the teamsheet. So for me he's not an understudy to anyone and certainly not to one of our most inconsistent performers.

Him, McCrorie and Tanner are sufficient numbers on the Right hand side, I would have thought - if we are continuing with a small squad.

For the same reason, we don't need a deputy for Dickie as him, Vyner, Atkinson and Roberts, with Tanner and Pring as emergency cover, should be enough numbers even with our wretched injury record. Roberts can also cover Pring. 

I don't think Bird hasn't signed for us to be an understudy either. I guess one of James or Williams will be allowed to leave - I'd go with you and keep James.

Which leaves the No.10 - the critical position to fill this summer it seems.

Well firstly - big ask, no pressure - but I'm not giving up on Benarous.

If we signed Twine or similar and Benarous was back to full fitness, that's your starting 10s. Mehmeti as cover but I have my doubts about him because the problem is not with his talent but what's between his ears.

Having said all that - we still can't be sure how Manning plans to line up - will it be 3 at the back or will it be 4 - will it be 2 no.10s or just 1? 

But whichever way he does line up, it seems we can be sure it will be a lone striker and at least 1 no.10. Which means there's one other puzzle to solve:

What to do with Sam Bell.

I find it hard to believe we'll jettison him just yet but where he fits into the above is a bit of a head scratcher. 

Thanks for the heads up re Naismith. I think he's a decent player, but not sure where he'd fit in. We seem to have good numbers in CM, and he's not quite the right profile of CB for my liking (I'd prefer another strong aerially dominant CB a-la Dickie/Atkinson). Still, if he's under contract then I'm happy with him as an option at CB.

In terms of who starts and who's cover, that's not too important to me right now. I'm really just trying to get the "first 22" down. That being said:

• Agree Bird has likely come here to start, but also can't see James or Knight being dropped if they're available. Maybe a gradual phasing from James to Bird through the season?
• Sykes vs Mehmeti is a tough one for me. I'm a much bigger Mehmeti fan than many on this forum. I think Mehmeti has performed well recently and is a slightly more natural fit for the creative AM role, but I think Sykes is a more consistent and reliable option. I'd be happy to start either.
• For me, Sykes and Mehmeti are both miles ahead of Benarous. Given how little professional football Benarous has played and how long he's been injured for, I'd be slightly hesistant about even having Benarous as cover. Absolutely no idea what level he's at right now. Unfortunately, such major injury issues can really derail a player's progress.

In terms of cover in general, I like 2 players per position. Though we have a few players capable of covering multiple positions (e.g. Pring, Sykes, Tanner, etc), that starts looking very precarious once you pick up just a couple of injuries.