Puckle_red

Different type of players but I really like the look of Roberts, his attitude too seems great, a real winner. Jay was good too, I think he suits Coventry well, ironically he would suit Manning too!

Tanner on the other side is very good as well, not as talented with the ball but an excellent defender and very good 1 on 1 defender too, just goes about his business, never shows much emotion other than a professional poker face. Great to have 2 young lads like that for Free and £300k respectively. 

If we can get Atkinson fit, then with Vyner and Dickie we are sorted at the back for years. 

Great free kick, very little else. 

I mentioned a couple of months ago I'd hoped he was a young Jamie Paterson, so far I've seen nothing to suggest he's as good as Paterson was.

He goes missing a lot and personally I'd pass, and get someone less hyped, maybe from abroad.

2 hours ago, Ian M said:

I wonder if this part is accurate as, in my mind, Joe is our CM most likely to look to play incisive forward passes this season. But he does have the odd game where his passing is atrocious. Fortunately those have been fewer of late imo.

Ironically, he played a nicely weighted pass through to Conway who went on to assist the goal today. 

To be fair, you dont need world beaters in there to compete (Morsy and Luongo at Ipswich, albeit they have promotion momentum). I just think it's too little too late to warrant a new deal.

A midfield player who rarely scores, doesn't run with the ball, isn't strong in the air, rarely passes forward and is injury prone. But he tries really hard and makes rash tackles - seems a perfect fit for a Bristol City midfielder at this level.

10 hours ago, MelksRed said:

Not questionable. Just seen the highlights. He raises his left arm to block the ball. Current rules (anybpart of the arm) is a pen all day long. 

Professional defender should have arms pinned in....left arm not out for support to land....it the upper arm.

Ref got it right  

Just seen it back. Never a penalty in a million years. Even worse than seeing it Live and I'm in that corner of the South Stand.

On 12/04/2024 at 14:08, pillred said:

I have to say that's a very negative spin on 4 good results, and I still don't agree that Leicester had a hatful of chances and should have been out of sight etc, don't forget we also had chances as well, we weren't lucky or outplayed in any way, and when 3 gas heads in the Duke grudgingly say we deserved the win take it from me we must have.

Fair enough, difference of opinion is fine. Leicester was one of our better performances since Manning took charge, but we were very fortunate to get anything from the game.

Today was another example. It's now 5 unbeaten, but that was dull, boring, painful to watch...again.

Unlike the Blackburn game. There were no gifted goals today to paper over another poor performance - apart from the referee giving us a very questionable penalty.

It's not just performances though.  The togetherness isn't the same as it was under Nige, something I enjoyed was we worked hard for each other. Now it reminds me of back in school when you'd play up when a supply teacher came in.

2 hours ago, wendyredredrobin said:

Which City are we going to see against The Terriers tomorrow?  The City that just annihilated Blackburn or the Manningball City we have seen of late?

Huddersfield are only out of the relegation zone on goal difference so will be playing for their survival and I am not sure which team we will be putting out or what they will actually be playing for other than new contracts and places in the starting 11.

A repeat of the Blackburn game will suit me fine, but I would be surprised if Huddersfield were as bad as they were.

I still don't think we're playing really well. Leicester missed a hatful of chances and should've been out of sight. Plymouth we took our only chance, they didn't. Sunderland we were poor but not punished. Blackburn handed us 4 chances, which we took well.

I don't think the performances are much different, but we are getting a bit of luck, which has got us results.

Tonight showed what a strange game football is. 

I don't think we created anything of note, every goal was gifted by an awful Blackburn defence. We took the chances we were given.

We've had a flukey win v Leicester, a smash and grab at Plymouth and a poor performance at Sunderland which went unpunished.

Fingers crossed he has worked out we can be an effective Championship side when we setup like we were under his predecessor.

On 01/04/2024 at 22:24, Kid in the Riot said:

Ah, Claire Young. You can tell we're in a GE year. 

Surely there won't be the required interest in this anyway given Yate is full of gasheads, gypsies, and shops that still have pick n mix? 

Nope, over the past 10 years or so the scales have begun to balance out in Yate, maybe since Rovers non-league days? Frampton and Coalpit Heath you see as many red as you do blue.

There was once a one off coach from Sainsbury's Emersons Green to Ninian Park when we played Cardiff away, coach was full.

20 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

18 months?

I'd have given him longer personally but totally agree with your post, length of contract aside.

I'd have given him another 3.5 years personally. But taking our decision makers into account, 18 months minimum would've been sensible.

There will be somebody smarter than me to explain it. But we were lopsided weren't we? 

Sykes was left wing/left forward, Knight central behind Wells with nobody on the right. TGH was right of a midfield 3 but nowhere near as high as Sykes and way more central. Worst I've seen TGH, he looked confused, like a few of them.

The irony is, it's LJ-like in that as soon as you give these 'modern' young coaches time to coach, the performance suffers and players look confused.

11 minutes ago, Robinsfan said:

The reduction of the wage bill, the squad, and the injuries? Is that unique to us are we somehow special in this division? I'm not saying Pearson was a bad manager he was just mediocre and his tenure was mediocre. That's fine if that's our ambition the Lansdowns should've sat on their hands and continued buying low and selling high with a manager who was never gonna take us up or down. I just genuinely thought we had higher ambitions than this. Unfortunate. There are plenty of clubs that had far less, who were in far worse positions who did more than what we did under Pearson because they had a top-quality coach. 

The mess Ashton and LJ allegedly left behind following years of overspending, meant NP had to pull a rabbit out of a hat to make us competitive. This season was really the first season where we were less hamstrung financially and in typical City fashion had a lot of injuries. 

We weren't in a financial position (financially) to be hiring and firing coaches left right and centre. Then, once Nige had the opportunity to push on and improve us, we sacked him at the first sign of a bad run (during an injury crisis).

Context is important. QPR might've been playing crap football but they didnt have a crap squad, very different scenarios.

6 minutes ago, Robinsfan said:

Yeah, you're right. If by the end of the season the results haven't turned he should go that is kind of what I alluded to. My general point is that we have given every single manager we've had in this stint in the championship too much time.

Pearson was still building from the mess left behind by others. He gave us a team playing for each other, who worked hard and gave it a go. Not always the best quality but I enjoyed seeing the team progress. He needed and deserved another 18 months.

1 minute ago, LondonBristolian said:

Is it?

When Pearson went, we had 18 points from 14 (which I make around 1.28 per game)

We now have 44 from 34 (which I make around 1.29 per game)

Without a big chunk of our first team.

We had to play Sykes as a left back and a kid with Zero senior appearances at RB at Cardiff. Conway returned to the bench for the first time in months, wasn't Vyner out too? Different scenarios, Manning has a strong Bristol City squad to pick from and has done since being here. 

I generally like us to stick with Managers and give them time.

But I'll happily put my kneck on the line, Manning is not the one. In an ideal world he'd be gone tonight.

The problem being with that is, we get Tinnion and JL picking the next one, and around we go again.

Nige had 2 spells at Leicester...would he?!

7 hours ago, Three Lions said:

Not at all different times. Most of us came from the same parts of the ground. Knew each other and things were very much about traditions and chucking a few flags in. Now? All this euro ultra stuff. Cringey as to some a turn off..  

I'm not a fan of the Euro Ultra stuff either, but different ideas and groups are nothing new, as per my previous post.

As one of the 247(ish?) season ticket holders when the EE re-opened, I didnt know anyone other than the 2 mates I went with.

Respectfully, I think people are just trying to enjoy themselves. I'd prefer a more traditional support but there is room for both.

9 minutes ago, Riaz said:

Football songs should be simple and loud. 
Some of the songs they come up with are dreary. And they kill the atmosphere.

At one point they were purposely signing another (crap) song, quietly.. they are like a little choir

And some were responding by singing an even worse song about Ross McCrorie...classic Bristol City all of this.

Within a small section of 1100 people, there are multiple distinctive groups all with different ideas. 

Just like it was 10+ years ago, with netters, older lot, middle group. Then later the drummer lads.

21 minutes ago, Riaz said:

The guy i saw (a few blocks over) put his hands out and shouted “we are Leeds” 

He shouted "We all hate Leeds scum" not "we are Leeds". I vagely recognised him, pretty sure he's been a City fan for years.

21 minutes ago, Ashton Yate said:

Thanks. Not bringing child with us to this game, but just not sure my dad (over 65) will appreciate the standing etc!

My Season Ticket is in S25. The rail seating is S25, S26 and S27 and it's entirely standing for the duration of the game. If you think your Dad would prefer sitting, I'm sure you can contact the club to move it elsewhere.

Enjoy the game!

9 hours ago, Merrick's Marvels said:

I would encourage you to watch again.

We played far more vertical passes at the earliest opportunity, looking to move forward as quickly as possible- compared to previous games. The pennyvisxstartingvto drop with the players, Manning's message starting to connect.

Yes there was sideways passing but it wasn't just metronomic sideways passing for the sake of it to my eyes, there was purpose. There were even times we feigned to go sideways, threw the opposition off, before going up into midfield. Dickie really is excellent.

Manning talked before the Watford game about his style being cat and mouse but qualified that by saying the players had to learn when to go sideways and when to break the lines vertically. He said they had to learn that it might take 1 sideways pass or half a dozen before going vertically.

Tonight was the first sign I've seen that the players have got the message.

From back into midfield and forward again was excellent tonight. Now we need some killer forwards.

I appreciate the constructive reply.

Maybe watching it back would make me appreciate our play a bit more.

But my raw feelings on the night were 'this is dull' we never looked like scoring.

It's possible I just dont enjoy the style of play we are trying to implement. 

COYR

18 minutes ago, Merrick's Marvels said:

We dominated possession against Premier League opposition.

Whereas we've spent years barely able to string 3 passes together, relying on counter attacks and being half decent at "pressing"

Tonight we looked like we could play football, proper football.

The attacking improvements are needed and will come. Probably needs new players for that though - so the summer.

Possession for possessions sake in my eyes. We don't play dangerous balls with attacking flair. We just work the ball wide, play it to the free man then cross it.

Dont get me wrong, this is a level we rarely excel at (I appreciate tonight was an FA Cup game against a decent outfit), but I'm not excited by our play, we rarely threaten at the moment. We rarely do anything much, it's safe, passive yet solid football. Defensively we look decent.

I've no idea what game others have watched but we passed it round the back, occasionally got wide only to have a cross blocked - dull. It feels like we are coached to within an inch of our lives with absolutely no attacking freedom.

35 minutes ago, The Swan and Cemetery said:

Think if I listed things I was hoping for from Twine, I’d get to “quite good at macramé” before a young Jamie Paterson. 

I'm not sure what that is so it's gone over my head! 

Paterson was underrated here, a clever player, technically gifted, could use both feet, score goals, create goals. Often labelled with going missing but I just didnt see that at all. 

Twine was ok today, but hopefully can prove to be as useful as Paterson was. 

One other thing, LM said playing on the left doesn't get the best out of him, and ok, he wasn't hugging the touchline, but he was definitely left of centre.

Good corners, got up very well for the headed goal but the game passed him by other than that.

Only 1 game of course, but seemed to lack pace and strength, but didnt replace that with quality on the ball or clever passes and vision.

I was hoping for a young version of Jamie Paterson, upon first viewing he's not as good or clever as Paterson in open play.

Hopefully he improves, but part of me isn't really fussed as we've only got him for 4 months!