Nogbad the Bad

5 minutes ago, And Its Smith said:

Ultimately he will be judged by league position alone. No excuses on injuries or what if we had won that game etc.   if we are 20 games in and we are top 10 then carry on. If we are 11-16th then the calls to sack him will be growing.  If we are below 16th then he will be sacked and even his biggest fans won’t be able to complain about that really.  This is the season we need to show progress.  Until there is proof he’s not the man to give us that progress then we need to get behind him.  

Why would anyone expect us to be top 10, and why would there be growing calls for him to be sacked if we're in mid table?

Your expectations for the season are unrealistic.

2 minutes ago, maxjak said:

Considering we have lost two of the best game changing players of the last ten years or so.....is it too much to ask that the loyal fan base is given some hope and entertainment for the future?   While totally aware of wage restraint and budget concerns, we surely could invest a reasonable sum in a player- either a forward or midfielder - to excite and reward what i consider to be a very patient and tolerant fan base

Apart from Tommy, who is, as we know injured and Ayman too, I don't see one player in our squad who could be considered a game changer?   20-22K regular supporters need to be entertained or it soon becomes  15-16K? 

That's right, if we're going to be mid table that's actually fine for me for now but in that case there must be some entertainment, at home at least.

I think Nige knows that and is in fact really keen to provide a team that entertains, but he's clearly not being given the tools to do so.

Still have high hopes for Anis in the slightly longer term, but it looks like we might have to be patient there.

Basically we're just a workmanlike team lacking any real spark who probably won't go down but fans have very little to look forward to as they trudge towards the Gate.

3 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

 

If you're taking the job title of "Chairman" to mean the guy who does the appointments. In that case Jon gets the credit for appointing Pearson doesn't he? Dawe appointed Lee Johnson then? LJ was during Dawe's tenure as "Chairman".

What's the criteria for attribution here?

Steve's been majority shareholder during all of those appointments, I thought that was the problem people had with this? That the shareholder was appointing the manager?

Cotts' appointment was a one off, it was made quite clear at the time that SL had taken a back seat and the appointment was entirely down to Keith Dawe.

42 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

Firstly, is that true? He's been responsible for appointing the two managers who've achieved our two highest finishes in decades. He appointed the man who got us a League and Cup double in 2014/15, and he appointed the incumbent, a man who some have declared to be the best manager we've had for a very long time, and who many believe should receive a contract extension as reward for the great job he's done.

 

Cotts wasn't appointed by SL, he was very much a Keith Dawe appointment.

7 minutes ago, Lanterne Rouge said:

He would have missed a few because of it though I guess?

Definitely, probably accounted for at least half the number of games missed. I really can't remember.

25 minutes ago, Lanterne Rouge said:

Wasn`t a lot of that down to Marley Watkins breaking his jaw/cheekbone or have I got my seasons muddled up?

Almost certainly the season of the Watkins incident, but he must have missed matches due to other injuries too.

Pretty sure his jaw injury didn't rule him out for half the season.

3 minutes ago, Bedred31 said:

SL is 71 next week. That’s over a decade older than NP, who himself was talking last week about age, time and bucket lists.This will just be a number for many on here, but when your a bit older you have a profound sense of time and time running out. I’m sure SL desperately wants to see City in the top flight again, because like me he can remember 76-80 clearly. 

Did SL watch games or even have any interest in BCFC in that period?

22 minutes ago, mozo said:

We need a prime Albert Adomah to liven up the crowd.

So many games where Albert was the only City player worth watching, the one redeeming feature in an otherwise boring City team and countless dull performances

Without an Albert type entertainer modern day Championship football can be little more than a war of attrition between very fit, solid but mostly uninspiring players with long periods with little or nothing to get fans engaged, let alone excited.

Tackling, long shots, skilful players running past opponents with the ball, exciting moments that got the fans going, all increasingly absent from games.

10 years ago this month since Albert left the club btw.

15 minutes ago, Selred said:

He has only had last season where he was out a lot, season before he played 35 games and 40 prior to that.

19/20, his first season after signing permanently, just 23 league appearances.

28 minutes ago, headhunter said:

I agree we have enough to stay in the League. Having read the interview with Nigel in the Sunday Times today [he was with the journo in Scozzi in Clevedon Monday evening] and featured in another thread on here, I think he could well call it a day anyway - there appears to be more to his life than football  and there's that bucket list to achieve which he alludes to in the article as "you never know how long you've got". He's 60 tomorrow and at 67 myself I know what he means!!

There is, but another one on his bucket list may have been one more managerial success with a club he admitted to find 'fascinating', Bristol City.

He could easily have retired to concentrate on his bucket list before taking the City job - even through ill health - but the fact he was determined to take on the City challenge suggests there is still plenty of professional hunger there.

Now, if he should leave City by his own choice we can assume it will not be due to an impatience to accomplish other items on his bucket list but because he feels let down by a club and owner who were no doubt desperate for him to get City out of the sh*t but once the club's squad and finances were stabilised then refused to back him, making any further progress, and job satisfaction, impossible.

I'm sure the moment he feels that to be undeniably the case he'll be off. 

12 hours ago, Better Red said:

Brownhill, Webster in recent times you could say have been scouted and  been players we have sold on to better things 

Webster's ability and potential was well known in the football world.

The problem was he was always getting injured - hence clubs hesitant to sign him and the reported fee of £3.5m rising to 8m with add-ons.

Very rare add-ons amount to more than the initial fee but it just shows how frail he was thought to be, and how much he had to prove fitness wise.

He was more or less ever present for City, making far more appearances in that season than he has in any other before (or since for that matter), and with fitness apparently proven we got a great fee for him, as did Ipswich with their sell-on.

41 minutes ago, Scrumpys Dietary Advisor.. said:

The atmosphere is just fine, when the football is...

Trouble is, most teams are trying to replicate "Guardiola ball" which, when you don't have a team full of superstars is frankly the dullest, most boring thing ever to watch. We don't need 400 passes before we cross the halfway line.

Atmosphere relies to a degree, on EXCITING FOOTBALL, through balls, wingers taking people on, crosses, things that get fans out of their seats

Very little of this happens when you're probing for space by passing the opposition to death and boring fans stupid then, when there is a chink in the armour, we have no-one to play the ball...!!!

No wonder there's no atmosphere, Pepe ball really should be banned before it kills the game

Yep, very rarely watch the PL but saw the Man.City v Newcastle game last night.

So, so tedious, no excitement and no atmosphere whatsoever.

Foden stood out a mile because he was the only one who actually ran with the ball now and again.

4 hours ago, Davefevs said:

I don’t know if he’s on hols, but Reach has cut resources significantly over the past few years.

Last season there was James as Sports Editor and Rich Forrester for City and another guy for Rovers.  That’s down to James City, new guy Rovers.

Poor old 'new guy (covering) Rovers', hard to imagine there's a more a depressing way for anyone to spend their time.

Presumably he has to constantly somehow try and make out there's something interesting about them. 

Tough job, seemed to turn the last bloke a bit loopy.

33 minutes ago, Oh Louie louie said:

Like a lot here, I'll use twentymen or Latham as a yardstick, ask a honest question with no agenda, people Will respond 

Peter Godsiff was the local City journalist in my youth - can't imagine him going on holiday during the season.

It's very rare that someone can talk almost non stop for 13 minutes and not only hold your attention but make sense all the way through.

Especially with the ever lurking distraction behind him making you regularly think 'what the hell has happened to that tree?'

6 minutes ago, REDOXO said:

It was a surprise to me too when I read the thread. But did the Watney Cup actually count as a full first team fixture. It was always a bit of a preseason excuse of a tournament!

Don't know about it counting as a first team fixture, maybe not

It was a indeed a poor excuse for a preseason tournament, Stoke fans clearly not bothered (applauding Ritchie's goal) and one year Rovers won the bloody thing! I think they only had to win 3 games, but they still go on about it now.

2 minutes ago, REDOXO said:

I was at that one too.  See my comment above!

I wasn't there but I very much remember listening to the match (short update every 15 minutes) on RB.

It's news to me if he'd already played at Stoke in the Watney Cup.

When Herbie Gillam told us the team news for Millwall it was a big surprise Whitehead had been picked and I've always thought it was his first appearance for the club.

Always thought he made his debut at Millwall that October, must have been his League debut.

It's an injury that used to be rare but judging by the last 4 or 5 seasons it looks like we can now almost 'expect' at least one of our players to go down with an ACL injury every season.

Think we had a couple in the U.21/U.18's last season too?

While nothing much can be done to slow down the game, you'd think clubs would be looking as a priority at any other areas they can change to limit the number of these injuries, including the make up of pitches, because this is a serious ongoing problem, with everything pointing to it likely to get even worse.

4 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

A lot of them are rock hard underneath.

As above, the game is so much faster, so twisting at speed is a big reason along with the above.

Sorry, are you agreeing modern pitches may be a factor?

The game may well be much faster and take it's toll, but that wouldn't be a factor in Atkinson's injury, for instance, as far as I can picture it.

3 hours ago, BCFCGav said:

Not City related but horrible ACL epidemic in the early part of this season.

Both Courtois and Militao at Real, Timber at Arsenal and potentially Mings at Villa, thought not sure that one is certain (but it is a bad one). Crap for the players and clubs. 

I heard the other day ACL's are hugely more prevalent than they were 20/30 years ago, 16x more so, or something ridiculous like that anyway. May have been on the Forever Bristol City blog.

I think it was partly put down to Academies and much more football at an early age leading to problems later on, but it's also happening in younger age groups, and notably there a lot amongst top players in women's football too.

Mind you we used to play football down the park all day every day in the holidays when we were young and never had injuries like that.

Not enough give in modern manicured pitches perhaps?

44 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Well, according to my data he doesn’t have a Recall…he has a “Fecall”.  Typo corrected!

Glad it wasn't a case of fecall you could do about it Dave. 

We do have a January recall option with Seb.

See the Squad Updates thread.

Bloody brilliant, well done City.