Give Post A Chance

[City_pete1]

I have read all the posts in this thread with great interest. I stopped buying the post a good few years ago now (although look at the ocasional online article), for many of the reasons brought up in this thread.

Credit to the post for not running away from these issues, and I appreciate it is hard to please everyone, but I have read nothing to change my view - if anything my original views have been enhanced.

[freezer]

It would appear from most replies on this thread that the BEP has not won over many people.

I haven't contacted my local newsagent either and asked them to deliver the rag, so maybe they will have to do better.

On another note. If City did get promoted I would imagine that it would be a bad thing for the BEP as a lot of people would buy national newspapers for the higher quality of reporting.

[RedZepperin]

Next up in its campaign to restore the reputation of controversial West Country institutions, Bristol City's Supporters Trust is set to stage a Q&A session with Jeffrey Archer in which the best-selling author will address the issues of ethics, honesty and quality novel-writing.

[Tunley Legend]

I do have to laugh at some of the content in this article - I am no supporter of the Evening Gas and do not buy it any more myself but even if they have only interviewed one person the message they are putting across is correct in that the football served up by GJ and KM in recent weeks is long ball dross that does not encourage fans to travel 400 miles round trip and fork out 100 sheets. Regardless of what they have achieved in the last two seasons that is all they are managing to achieve at present and some serious work needs to be done on the training ground. Dare I say it but with more and more redundancies occurring by the day and the recession now pretty much upon us the standard of football is going to be looked at by many supporters this season before they make the decision of whether to part with the limited amount of hard earned they may have left by the time season ticket sales commence next season. It would be a shame to break records for the highest amount of season ticket holders lost in a season on the back of people not being bothered due to watching poor quality football.

[Mr Mosquito]

On another note. If City did get promoted I would imagine that it would be a bad thing for the BEP as a lot of people would buy national newspapers for the higher quality of reporting.

I agree, the football reporting and football picture content in newspapers such as The Times and The Guardian etc is often top notch. For some unknown reason, the Western Daily Press often carries better football write ups than the Bristol Evening Post and they're sister newspapers. :noexpression:

[Nogbad the Bad]

b***ocks.

I've spoken to him various times and he says as a London lad he supports Brentford, but when in Bristol, his allegience is with Rov*rs. From his very own mouth. And as I said before, I've seen him dancing around a pub in glee, shouting Gas songs, after their PO Semi Final result at Lincoln.

A very good point that needs answering.

[Nogbad the Bad]

Who happens to write about and support Bristol Rovers. I met him a number of years ago whilst filming a piece about football, and Chris himself told me that he supported them, as well as hating City. I remember, because of the 'banter' we enjoyed.

An interesting point that needs answering.

[Nogbad the Bad]

Spot on.

I find it extremely hard to believe that the Evil Post keep accidentally painting our club in a bad light. It's happened too many times for it to be anything other than bias in my opinion.

As for the whole "it's commercial suicide" bit, yeah, it is, and it's already cost them regular high value adverts from at least two local companies. Perhaps the people writing the headlines and continually making these mistakes are not thinking with their business brains and instead thinking with their football allegiances.

It's also worth pointing out that whatever allegiances are on the sports desk, several of the stories that have pissed me off in their biased manner have been in the front of the paper and nothing to do with them. Does anybody care to post the list of clubs supported by the news editorial staff and management?

Bottom line is, that due to the longstanding unfair treatment of my club it will take an awful lot of unbiased, accurate and interesting reporting for me to consider giving them the benefit of the doubt.

A good post that seems to voice the concerns of many City supporters.

It would be interesting to see a specific answer to the highlighted paragraph.

[Old Dazzler]

Just to few thoughts to add to fuel the theory that the paper is generally a shoddy rag.

First, the thing is basically breaking some kind of trading standards/trafe descriptions act. It should be called the MORNING POST as the last edition now arrives in newsagents at around 5.30am or whatever time they open. This is the 3 star edition, which always gave the impression that it had been updated and printed at lunchtime or mid afternoon. A few weeks ago they decided that instead of an early (2 star) and afternoon (3 star) edition they would just become a morning paper like the Western Daily press (only they didn't tell anyone. So where we used to get a report of, say, a BCFC press conference that took place at 11.00 am, on the same day (if you bought a 3 star) you will now see that report a day later - when you have already read about it on the official site and discussed it on this forum!

So the news of the Elton John concert at GCCC which broke yesterday (Monday) only appeared in today's 3 star - sorry ONLY star) edition. Just to use this article to show that only bringing out one edition has not actually improved the quality I will quote from the said Elton John article: "The flamboyant star is set to sing in front of up to 16,000 SCREAMING fans at the County Ground". What lazy journalism . I went to the EJ concert at AG in 2004 - there were 23,000 fans, but I would be very surprised if any one of them screamed once during the entire show. We are talking about Sir Elton in his 60s with a fan base that spans generations, not the early days of Beatlemania or Take That! I know "screaming" is only one word but whoever wrote that piece of garbage can have no idea about the the subject being reported on.

I also love the stories where they have some sort of sympathetic article for someone who is slagging off their council for something only to realise that the person in question is some scumbag con artist who is actually fiddling the taxpayers money. There was some woman in south glos last year moaning to the EP about the Council not helping her with her housing situation, unable to walk and pictured in a wheelchair with a suitably peed off face. 2 days later and they have to explain that all her neighbours have recognised the con-woman who is perfectly capable of walking around and they have photos of her digging the garden to prove it. In other words they have just taken one woman's word on a story and ended up with egg on their faces because they couldn't be bothered to research the whole story. Again lazy, lazy journalsim and there are so many more examples. Which is why we have to suffer derogatory features about Bradley Orr

Maybe as their so-called reporters have more time on their hands as they only have to knock out one edition of the 3 STAR MORNING POST the quality may improve - but don't hold your breath!

[Rich]

I agree, the football reporting and football picture content in newspapers such as The Times and The Guardian etc is often top notch. For some unknown reason, the Western Daily Press often carries better football write ups than the Bristol Evening Post and they're sister newspapers. :noexpression:

This used to be the case but in recent times the post and press now employ only one set of (sport reporters) and as such the reports and articles are the same.

On another point how can the EP be so called when I have mine delivered sometimes as early as 9.30 am.

I complained to the editor in chief and was told multiple issues were no longer viable, the only thing is I want my news from that day not something I read on the website 2 days ago. At the moment I still buy it as I enjoy some of the contents but I am finding the paper is trying my paitience and it's only a matter of time before I cancel the deliveries.

[Milo]

A good post that seems to voice the concerns of many City supporters.

It would be interesting to see a specific answer to the highlighted paragraph.

There are, of course, Rovers fans in other parts of the paper and I agree that it is the front page reporting that has upset me more in the past than the back page. It's clear, however, that many of the reporters on the paper have no allegiance to either Bristol team, and some who don't follow football at all. I guess it's no different to many other offices in Bristol - if those of us who work in sizable offices think of all the people who we work with, and then think how many of them care passionately about City, Rovers or football, we'd agree there are far more who don't than do. One of the thoughts that struck me in the meeting that I hadn't taken time to think out previously is that an article that I interpret as bias could have been written by someone for whom the very existence of Bristol football rivalries is the last thing on their mind. We'll always read articles from the position of wanting to protect our beloved Club but I felt at the time of the meeting, and still feel, that some of the articles that have caused offense were not intended to do that. Innocent, careless mistakes rather than bias. And the bottom line is that I can't say for sure whether there have been bias motives or not, but I am prepared to give the benefit of doubt for now.

There have been a few comments on this thread that posters haven't felt convinced by the responses given by Steve Mellen. I'd like to explain that the Trust website article was written more from the perspective of letting the reader know that many of the articles that have upset City fans in the past were raised and that there was a proper interrogation discussion. The answers given by Steve Mellen in the meeting were more detailed and reassuring than I have given him credit for in the article. But I guess that's part of the problem with the written word compared with face-to-face communication - it can only ever give a limited amount of information that is open to the interpretation of the reader.

[Tenyards]

In truth we support the City of Bristol's football club - all Bristolians do. If you come to Bristol from another part of the country you won't get much of a welcome at Ashton Gate when you pop in to try out the local football team because we aren't terribly tolerant of strangers.

So then, you might be tempted to try out "Bristol's other team" (fooled by Rovers using the word Bristol in their name when really they are Gloucestershire's second best team after Cheltenham and the fact they have recently moved into the city by stealing the rugby ground). Once there you meet lots of other people who have moved to the area from Birmingham, Ipswich, Liverpool or whatever and who like the idea of having a second team that wear funny shirts and seem to be slightly quaint. You therefore become a Gashead.

The Evening Post (as Mr Mellen has explained) is full of folk who have moved from other parts of the country to work here and who don't understand that phrases like "the blue half of Bristol" are in fact deeply insulting to true Bristolians and so they don't even realise why we think they are biased. Then we give it to them boith barrels and they hate us even more so every time there is any chance to write something negative about Bristol City the opportunity is taken and every time there is a chance to write something nice about Rovers again the chance is taken.

Mr Mellen should ask all his reporters the following questions. If they don't know the answers they shouldn't be reporting on Briostol City.

1. Where is the whitening yard?

2. How long has Hi Ho Silver Lining Been the Club's Song?

3. What honorary title does Geoff Merrick have?

4. Who is Paedo?

5. Where was Nutter's Corner?

6. Why do Dolman Stand people leave early?

7. How many caps did Roy Hodgson throw into the crowd?

8. How far is it from Fire Engine Hill to the Three Lions?

9. What is Al Jolson's best ever song?

10. dust thee know what bist onnabowt or what me babber?