The Bard

11 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

@Harry sorry, but I kinda disagree with bits of your OP.  Not hugely, but enough to reply.  Happy that you maybe covered in posts elsewhere in this thread, but OTIB is posting too much for me to read everything!  Or maybe this is kinda what you meant???

I think we had a football structure of RG and NP (and DR on fitness) that had a vision of what was needed to reach the PL.  That vision turned into a strategy / plan to get there.

Re Academy - I think it was less about playing one-way all the way up the age ranges, but recognising what was needed to develop young players of the capability to play in the first team and / or at the next level.  We saw the u21s adopt different systems / formations, but they pressed like Nige’s first team, they played a bit more pragmatically (direct?) than a lot of other academy teams.

I think that readied them for first team exposure (training initially), as there was less of a bridge to gap.

Re Recruitment - more profile based, but aligned to principles of being able to run, compete, power and pace. Then add technical ability.

I don’t think it was about a playing system per se, and subsequent managers would follow.

BT was involved in this, but not understanding it enough, so that when he has to take it on, he can’t articulate it.

And I think that is where JL, GM, and BT misunderstood the plan, why it was created the way it was.  They’ve fallen for buzzwords, without understanding them.  Which is criminal from Tins point of view, if he thinks LM matched the brief.  The other two I can sort of forgive.  They aren’t the alleged football expert.

So when I hear JL say “we’re now gonna play the same way through the academy now, 1) it shows ignorance of what has been happening and means 2) he has no idea what it really meant going forward.  So he’s pissing in the wind.

And when I hear BT say “we’re gonna play the same way through the academy”, but then adds “like we have been doing”, again I think, he didn’t really get what Nige meant.

And therefore at every pull of the lever, the club gets further and further from the vision and the plan put in place.  And they don’t know what they’re aiming for, so don’t know how to rectify.

FFS

Jeese that's depressing.  You've articulated exactly why we're going to struggle ongoing.

21 hours ago, Galley is our king said:

I know there are plenty of candidates for the walkout but.... may I humbly suggest 0-4 down at half time home to Leicester under SOD?

 

McInnes

22 hours ago, luke_bristol said:

Given the left in the USA used their media dominance and an army of online activists (and Wikipedia) to redefine the term “recession” to protect Biden from criticism (no such luck for right-wing Rishi Sunak when our own two consecutive quarters of negative growth came along) and organisations like Mermaids in the U.K. are trying to paint anyone who objects to kids having their tits cut off in the name of gender ideology as bigots, I’d suggest the left aren’t shy of a bit of cultural warfare either. 

Steven Pinker did a decent job in the early 2000s of outing scientists and left-wing academics that were putting politics ahead of facts, and you could argue it goes even further back to the emergence of particular branches of social science and psychology (dominated by the left both then and to this day) in the 1970s.

As a political centrist with leanings to both left and right on particular issues it’s certainly a topic I find fascinating and horrifying in equal measure, as you can probably tell! 

There is not any left wing media dominance here. 

Unless you think the Times  Telegraph, Mail, Express, Sun, Talk TV, GB News etc are bastions of Socialism. 

Not having any kind of actual left wing to counterbalance the gun toting lunacy has left Americans with a choice between someone who is mad and someone who is senile.  

53 minutes ago, TDarwall said:

Have you seen the traffic in Bath ???? 0

Have you seen Weston full stop?

4 divisions below seems too much of a drop.  But it's better than not playing.

On 25/02/2024 at 10:08, W-S-M Seagull said:

I think Anis gives us a glimpse into the future under Manning. 

He's not a Manning signing but considering he was out of favour and that Manning went public that he wanted to sign him at Oxford, he can almost be considered a Manning signing. 

It comes across as he is desperate to prove that he was right about Anis. 

Naismith was quite vocal about Anis yesterday. That's worrying that his peers are having the same concerns as us fans. Does that then lead on to players themselves questioning the managers selections? 

Your first sentence is possibly the biggest argument for not renewing my season ticket.

Future is the least reliable member of the squad.

36 minutes ago, Winterstoke toad said:

Had to pay the victim £13,000 as well. Am I the only one who thinks that’s low and would want much more  if someone of his financial status broke my skull ? .

Especially someone clearly well remunerated.

On 20/02/2024 at 21:16, Davefevs said:

Was chatting to a poster at the weekend, my City “career” started with a 1-0 win over Liverpool, followed by a 5-0 win over Coventry.  Boy, they sucked me in good and proper!  Bastards!

That Coventry game was my first game.  

26 minutes ago, cidercity1987 said:

Not wrong is he

However I lay the blame squarely at Lansdown and Tinnion

I don't think there is anyone who is really going to be markedly better than Pearson was with the resources 

This.

If we'd kept Nige we'd probably have the same points more or less. Would probably have done better in games v likes of Millwall and QPR but probably wouldn't have beaten Southampton. 

If we'd backed Nige we'd be better off   I'm sure

On 01/02/2024 at 12:01, Mr Popodopolous said:

I dunno what % of the Kop or how much put in yet has played out tbh but I totally agree with the idea that standing fans more likely to sing, chant etc therefore we do need a 2nd or bjtt3r Safe Standing area.

Of course it adds to it, at the West Ham and Nottingham Forest games more seemed to be standing than usual and the Safe Standing area looked maybe a bit overcrowded..shows that demand clearly exceeds supply for this.

It wasn't a bit overcrowded.  It was ridiculously overcrowded. Weren't checking tickets. Started doing it 2nd half

17 minutes ago, Back of the Dolman said:

Kind of the ref to allow Ten Haag to substitute Casemiro at half time !

should have been a red card and United know it 

Luton will stay up. Hopefully Forest will go down. 

Ross Barkley is looking top level.

4 hours ago, GrahamC said:

Agree, Williams had to come off (he’d already lost his rag with Andersen once & I’m pretty convinced he elbowed him off the ball) & none of us knew the logical replacement TGH was going to be so poor, but the others made no sense.

Mehmeti is frustrating but I actually thought he improved after Bell went off & he (eventually) switched to the left.

As for those saying it was hindsight I said at the time it was incredibly brave/mad to give Mebude 32 minutes & so it proved.

Mehmeti and Mcrorie is not a combination I like the look of at all.

As soon as he switched he woke up. Don't think he likes playing on the right. 

2 hours ago, TomSutton said:

Didn’t get him coming on at Rb if anything Roberts was the one absolutely blowing after 60 mins didn’t put another sprint in past 75.

McCrorie can do a full game so leave him on the pitch.

Agree R.E Cornick game was not suited to him yesterday I actually thought bringing him on was the correct thing but by 70 he had been on the pitch for nearly 50 minutes and had not grown into the game at all.

Twine being on the bench yet quite clearly not being fit enough to come on says a lot around how Manning views the current state of the 21s which are a bit of a dead crop now and it seems we are just waiting for the 18s to be ready. 
 

All the subs who came on yesterday did not make an impact in fact I feel worsened us as a collective I would’ve left Mehmeti 1v1 against Jimmy Dunne who was awful for them a real clumsy footballer. 
 

Just highlighted our offence weaknesses yesterday, lack of an incisive passer who can play on the floor through back lines (twine, KP to an extent esc) and pace while being in control on the wing as Mehmeti and cornick both lack pace. Mebude has pace but not the control and it was clear we singled out dunne as their weak link and to try get in behind him with bells pace.

That unfortunately went to pot after the injury and we just didn’t have a plan b players didn’t look confident in playing through the pitch as QPR defended narrow.

what we were left with was a slow casual sideways passing approach waiting for a magic moment which never came

Everyone focusing on subs is ignoring Tanner being dropped for Mcrorie. It massively weakened us defensively and having Mehmeti in front of Mcrorie was a recipe for disaster. Took them about 5 minutes to start arguing.

We're Bristol City not Man City. We don't look better with a right back who pushes high and leaves big gap to his centre half.  We need solidity and should play from there.  

Mcrorie needs to be sub so he can add something late on in games like he did v Southampton.  Manning created a situation for himself with the original selection.

He needs to learn from it.

18 hours ago, MarcusX said:

Talking about not have the time to work on it again.

How often do they actually train? Anyone would think he’s managing a part time team the way he talks about training sometimes.

Pathetic isn't it.

I hope we don't get an LJ situation where 2 weeks of just training leads to a load of confused players who've had their heads filled with overly complicated jargon. 

Just now, Graham76 said:

I thought bringing Cornick on was a terrible decision.  What a sign of intent by Manning! 

Needless to say he went on to have an absolute shocker. We need to get rid of him asap. 

We were shite before that sub with the exception of Bell who started really well. Presume Sykes wasn't up to 70 minutes hence he wasn't brought on. If it wasn't for our core Max  Zac, Dickie and James it would've been catastrophic 

Just now, GrahamC said:

If Geographically centred, like a Baltic league clearly would be, it makes sense.

The Scots, Dutch, Portuguese idea was random with no clear unifying purpose.

Aberdeen playing away to Porto isn’t quite the same as Zalgaris in Vilnius travelling to Skonto Riga.

Some minor European leagues with no logistical issues could definitely consider this.

As said above the two former countries of Czechoslovakia who parted amicably (unlike Yugoslavia) is definitely another possibility.

Dynamo Zagreb v Red Star was a major catalyst in the civil war.  

https://www.soccerphile.com/soccerphile/news/balkans-soccer/football-war.html

On 16/02/2024 at 12:35, Harry said:

I must admit. Until recently I always thought the cheap kids tickets (with free shirt) were only available in the upper Lansdown family stand. 
 

Only in the last couple of months I’ve seen comments on here about it being available elsewhere too. 
 

Seems a bit baffling to me. I always thought the cheap family tickets were only for the family stand. 
 

So I agree with your idea. 

I had Sts for my 3 kids in all 4 stands over the years.

On 15/02/2024 at 16:51, GrahamC said:

On Tuesday I think there is the additional factor that it was on Sky, I know several ST holders who don’t live within walking distance (like me) so rarely bother to attend these games due to the difficulty in parking & then getting away afterwards.

I also think there are as usual a fair few South Stand ST holders who move into any vacant (much nicer) seats in the Lansdown, exacerbating this issue.

They also get into the corner.  It was ridiculously overcrowded v West Ham.

I think the main point is there are too many games.  I can't believe that clubs would really lose out if they lost a couple of evening home games a season.  Our actual crowds for some are really low. Club still have to fork out for stewards etc but probably take very little in terms of matchday revenue. 

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2024/feb/17/baltic-league-could-be-pioneer-for-cross-border-football-in-europe

Interesting. Makes sense as the Nation state isn't always the best basis to organise a league. These 3 together are similar size to England. It will improve the standard of their clubs and players.

Surely only a matter of time before they try it in Ireland. Linfield v Derry would be 'Interesting'.

Would they try it in Yugoslavia or Czechia & Slovakia?

1 hour ago, Davefevs said:

Russell Martin continues to learn sweet FA about playing against us!

He transmitted panic last night. Arms waving about. Their players' body language at 1 0 was really poor. With there being 4 very good sides I Can see them struggling in the play offs too..

Leicester + Leeds or Ipswich and I bet Coventry to go up via play offs. 

9 hours ago, RedLionLad said:

What makes you say that?

He doesn't know. That would take a degree of self awareness and insight.

As usual the problem isn't the idea itself, it's football's inability to implement changes in a logical way. 

It makes absolute sense to have a sin bin for certain offences. I'd suggest for all cards. A caution is supposed to be a deterrent.  Atm its seen as something you sometimes have to accept for the greater good. But by differentiating between different cautions, they make the refereeing of the game more complex.  

They never seem to copy the good bits from other sports or learn their lessons.  Just try to create a whole set of new problems of their own making.   

If they introduced Sin bins for all yellows, that would speed the game up.  Then VAR review if it should be upgraded to a red.  Ref just needs to decide if it's at least a yellow. That will be quicker. Game isn't stopped as much. 

You would hope a couple of irritating things would end immediately such as Goalkeepers time wasting and 'taking the yellow'.

14 hours ago, Bs32red said:

Should be amber cards not blue though.

Yeah.  

Red is Danger

Yellow a warning.  Amber a serious warning.

Blue is the colour of harmony and contentment.  

9 hours ago, bcfc01 said:

He has no idea.

 

It's the coaches decision isn't it? 

1 minute ago, Super said:

He's a striker.

Just like euros you need to look at who makes the decision not the takers themselves