The idea that the club are not ready for promotion this season

[Jack Dawe]

This has circled since January, and our least active transfer window under LJ/MA, and Mark Ashton's interview in the Post in February, in which they reported that MA confirmed that we were set up for the long term and "not specifically targetting promotion this season."

It's not that long ago that we arrived back in the Championship and had a nightmare summer trying to recruit and rocked up at Sheffield Wednesday wholly unprepared with Wes Burns coming on to replace an injured Joe Bryan. We weren't ready, we were still a bit "L1." Shambles.

Since then, our recruitment has been mixed, at best. We have fired Des whatsisname and not sure we have replaced him permanently? We have had the Engvall carry on and recruitment continues to be challenging, the loans particularly this season have been abysmal. Weakened us, if anything.

I'm not sure we are ready to recruit successfully for the PL and with the summer of 2015 fresh in the club's memory, perhaps there is something in this? 

Do we want to find ourselves in the PL about as ready for it as we were the Championship in 2015, where the level of exposure and media interest would be somewhat embarrassing for the "high ups" were we a little bit undercooked, on and off the pitch? 

I believe that the club are more than satisfied with this season already, and not fussed about the play offs this time. I think this is evident now in the standard of the first team for a few weeks now. I wonder if they feel there is more to do yet before we are ready to go for it in this league, and that another year in the Championship will allow us to improve our "set up" and be better in the long run.

Looking at our hit and miss recruitment, I'd tend to agree with them. We don't need it just yet. And we don't need to be on MOTD every Saturday night getting embarrassed, like Cardiff next season.

 

 

[BobBobSuperBob]

2 minutes ago, Jack Dawe said:

This has circled since January, and our least active transfer window under LJ/MA, and Mark Ashton's interview in the Post in February, in which they reported that MA confirmed that we were set up for the long term and "not specifically targetting promotion this season."

It's not that long ago that we arrived back in the Championship and had a nightmare summer trying to recruit and rocked up at Sheffield Wednesday wholly unprepared with Wes Burns coming on to replace an injured Joe Bryan. We weren't ready, we were still a bit "L1." Shambles.

Since then, our recruitment has been mixed, at best. We have fired Des whatsisname and not sure we have replaced him permanently? We have had the Engvall carry on and recruitment continues to be challenging, the loans particularly this season have been abysmal. Weakened us, if anything.

I'm not sure we are ready to recruit successfully for the PL and with the summer of 2015 fresh in the club's memory, perhaps there is something in this? 

Do we want to find ourselves in the PL about as ready for it as we were the Championship in 2015, where the level of exposure and media interest would be somewhat embarrassing for the "high ups" were we a little bit undercooked, on and off the pitch? 

I believe that the club are more than satisfied with this season already, and not fussed about the play offs this time. I think this is evident now in the standard of the first team for a few weeks now. I wonder if they feel there is more to do yet before we are ready to go for it in this league, and that another year in the Championship will allow us to improve our "set up" and be better in the long run.

Looking at our hit and miss recruitment, I'd tend to agree with them. We don't need it just yet. And we don't need to be on MOTD every Saturday night getting embarrassed, like Cardiff next season.

 

 

Problem is Jack - If we don’t get our recruitment right (And IMHO improve it significantly) it won’t be the Prem we will be worrying about if we find our way out the Championship

[Robbored]

That's an excellent post Jack. 

Well though out and 85% spot on.

[Jack Dawe]

1 minute ago, Robbored said:

That's an excellent post Jack. 

Well though out and 85% spot on.

Thank you, old chap. I'll set to work on that missing 15% right away....

[ScottishRed]

With all due respect you completely and utterly miss the point.

IF, there is a deliberate plan by the club to ensure we don't get promoted that is beyond naive.

There is absolutely no,repeat NO guarantee that the opportuntity will present itself again next season.

Witness Reading and Sheffield Wed - play - off places last year - this year miles off it, and neither made any changes that weakened them.

The attitude of some on here that next year we will be stronger and be in a better position to get auto promotion boils my pixx.

This season 2 of the relegated teams have never even flirted with the top 6, regardless of who comes down there is a good chance that 2 at least, will be contenders. Add those to the ones that miss out this time round and you have a good few in the mix.

You can also add to that a 'surprise package.

I could of course be totally wrong - I hope I am.

We had a real chance this year and we fxxked it up.

A key point of getting promoted is the £120m + - get promoted and maybe get relegated BUT that money really helps to build the club and move towards self sustainability.

[JoeAman08]

Think we recruit well in the summer. Awful in january when we need a boost. They have brought in too many players though. This in turn means some of the expensive young players bought don’t get a look in. I am sure out of Engvall, Walsh, Eliasson and Moore along with Kelly, Vyner, Morrell and a few others there are a couple duds and a couple stars but we will never know because there are too many fringe players in their mid 20s and older taking a spot. 

As far as what MA said in Feb about not specifically targeting promotion, I know what he meant but it didn’t need to be said at all. 

[The Bard]

Put simply the message Mark Ashton conveyed is that those in the key positions are not up to it.  Does anyone think Huddersfield were ready last season after we stuck 4 past them?  Were Stoke ready in 2008?  Burnley the first time around.  I could go on.  They weren't ready but had strong leadership.  They stayed up and adapted and grew.  We look like we don't want it because we're scared of it. 

The point is, a club our size gets the opportunity to get promoted to the Premiership every now and then.  It seems to me those in decision making positions at the club (and Bristol Sport) have bottled it. The January business made no sense in the short, medium or long term.  I'd happily get promoted and come down again as long as we don't live beyond our means. We have shown that we can compete with Premiership sides. 
 

[Big C]

Five years ago we left this division with barely a whimper, four years ago we were struggling at the foot of League One, waiting till the end of October for our first win league and considering a 2-2 home draw with Leyton Orient as a good result. We have made massive strides in a short space of time. There are teams who have been in this division longer with Premier League experience who are further away than what we are. We were never a top two side, no matter how good our performances were before Christmas. There are 46 games in a League season, you play each team home and away and so only where you are at the end of the season counts   We are where we should be (maybe even higher than we should be) challenging for a play off spot. We've improved each of the last 4 seasons, we are going in the right direction,

[cidered abroad]

Big C. If you call yesterday's performance as "challenging for a play off spot", you are sadly mistaken. The only challenge all afternoon was the toss up to choose ends. 

[Kid in the Riot]

If Steve Lansdown (and that's who we're talking about here, not MA or LJ) doesn't think we're ready for promotion to the Premier League this season, after pumping in £150m ish over the past 17 years in which he has been in charge, then one has to seriously question if he thinks we will ever be ready for Premier League football under his stewardship.

[Robbored]

27 minutes ago, Jack Dawe said:

Thank you, old chap. I'll set to work on that missing 15% right away....

Start with recruitment - that's the 15% I don't agree with. 

[Big C]

30 minutes ago, cidered abroad said:

Big C. If you call yesterday's performance as "challenging for a play off spot", you are sadly mistaken. The only challenge all afternoon was the toss up to choose ends. 

Well unlike some I don't judge a season on the performance in one game

[RedNight]

All the good things the club is doing off the pitch (infrastructure, academy etc.) could all be blown up the wall if we get promoted. The vision to have a core group of Bristolians playing in the 1st XI would simply not be sustainable if we were promoted this year. 

Staying down and continuing to build things off the pitch would seriously pay off in the long run.

This might seem ridiculous to some people, but I'm just seeing a bigger picture, as much as I would love to be promoted this year. 

City have had a good year this year. No matter what happens. It's disappointing that we haven't continued our superb form that we had at the start. But I remember quite a few questioning whether or not they style of play was sustainable. It clearly hasn't been. 

But those slagging the players off and manager off are absolutely ridiculous. The ones venting frustration on form is justified. Those questioning whether or not Johnson is the right man, do the players care etc. are just simply ******* retarded. 

I can't quite believe how quickly quite a few fans have turned. Completely ignoring the fact we are 7th after nearly getting relegated last year, and only being whiny about the fact we were 2nd 4 months ago. 

The problem is, so many went hard and personal at Johnson, that they are now revelling in the fact hes "failing" (in their eyes). 

If this was another club of our size (let's say Ipswich), booing off a team that's in 7th. We would be on here slagging them off in disbelief.

Monday, half the ground cheered off Bailey Wright, who has been playing through injections for 2 months and out of position for the majority of season. Disgraceful and embarrassing. 

Respect to the fans who have perspective, and are appreciative of our season, players and manager!

[Gert Mare]

No club is READY for promotion to the Premier League. 

You need to be better than the teams near the bottom.....Stoke (check), Crystal Palace (check), Watford (check), Brighton (check), Huddersfield (check) and you need a bit of luck with injuries.

The key is not to waste money on players who don’t really want to join you for a likely relegation dog fight (which is basically anyone who is any good) and the rest want extortionate money and a release clause as soon as you go back down again so that they can take the money and run.

So you go up, and you try your best, and you go down with £200 Million in the bank and 3 years of parachute payments worth millions and millions.

Then you yo-yo for a bit to build up the cash reserves so you can start to compete and buy a few better players.

So what’s the problem?

[ScottishRed]

7 minutes ago, RedNight said:

All the good things the club is doing off the pitch (infrastructure, academy etc.) could all be blown up the wall if we get promoted. The vision to have a core group of Bristolians playing in the 1st XI would simply not be sustainable if we were promoted this year. 

Staying down and continuing to build things off the pitch would seriously pay off in the long run.

This might seem ridiculous to some people, but I'm just seeing a bigger picture, as much as I would love to be promoted this year. 

City have had a good year this year. No matter what happens. It's disappointing that we haven't continued our superb form that we had at the start. But I remember quite a few questioning whether or not they style of play was sustainable. It clearly hasn't been. 

But those slagging the players off and manager off are absolutely ridiculous. The ones venting frustration on form is justified. Those questioning whether or not Johnson is the right man, do the players care etc. are just simply ******* retarded. 

I can't quite believe how quickly quite a few fans have turned. Completely ignoring the fact we are 7th after nearly getting relegated last year, and only being whiny about the fact we were 2nd 4 months ago. 

The problem is, so many went hard and personal at Johnson, that they are now revelling in the fact hes "failing" (in their eyes). 

If this was another club of our size (let's say Ipswich), booing off a team that's in 7th. We would be on here slagging them off in disbelief.

Monday, half the ground cheered off Bailey Wright, who has been playing through injections for 2 months and out of position for the majority of season. Disgraceful and embarrassing. 

Respect to the fans who have perspective, and are appreciative of our season, players and manager!

Congratulations on "seeing the bigger picture" .

The plan as it stands, will not work.

Why? Because every year 3 teams come down from the PL with £120m in their pocket plus of course parachute payments, they are not always replaced by the 3 that got relegated the year before = more teams in this league with ££££.

Answer - get up asap, accept you might get relegated, but you too have the £££ - therefore you can compete to get back there.

We are not too many seasons away from it being almost, not completely, but almost impossible to get promoted, unless you have already been there.

This ridiculous romantics notion that we will get promoted with a squad of Bristolians that have come through they Academy is beyond farce.

[Chicken George]

Agreed that most of us never expected to be up there, but once we were, we should be trying to stay there and go up, not give in cuz it’s not in the long term plan. 

This is one BIG opportunity missed. Ashton talks rollox at the best of times but his comments on this were pure bile. 

The Jan window was the chance to build on a great first half season. Instead. It was impotent. Flaccid. A drunken willy of a window. We were in a bar, chatting up a hot and sexy blonde, she was in the palm of our hand, loving the attention we were giving her, all we had to do was buy her a couple of drinks and drop a viagra to keep our staying power strong. Instead, we nipped to the slashers and by the time we got back she was chatting to a burly Welsh nob-ed and we ended up with the fat scouser on a fat hen weekend (and we didn’t even get a blower down the back alley). 

[RedNight]

1 minute ago, ScottishRed said:

Congratulations on "seeing the bigger picture" .

The plan as it stands, will not work.

Why? Because every year 3 teams come down from the PL with £120m in their pocket plus of course parachute payments, they are not always replaced by the 3 that got relegated the year before = more teams in this league with ££££.

Answer - get up asap, accept you might get relegated, but you too have the £££ - therefore you can compete to get back there.

We are not too many seasons away from it being almost, not completely, but almost impossible to get promoted, unless you have already been there.

This ridiculous romantics notion that we will get promoted with a squad of Bristolians that have come through they Academy is beyond farce.

The thing is mate, that is currently the clubs philosophy and you have to respect that. 

If Lansdown said to LJ, "here's £50mill, go get players". Johnson would bite his hand off. But that's not going to happen. And if that is your main bugbear, then thst lies with SL, not LJ.

Johnson has been brilliant for SL's philosophy. Because he's nurtured so many of our young lads into solid, and in some cases, excellent championship footballers. 

I think Johnson, with the resources is doing a good job. No way have we got anywhere near the best squad in the league, but we're 7th. And we've done that by squeezing everyone out of these lads, to a point I think we've ran out of steam.

Because of this, people question Jan business, but that's not a problem of LJ's. 

[RedNight]

@Bob Bob Super Bob fancy commenting? Rather than reacting with shite emoji's

You don't think Johnson is doing a good job with the squad we've got? 

[Frenchay Red]

You should grab the opportunity with both hands when it becomes a realistic target. As it was in our case a few months ago.

IMO it is totally ridiculous, in the context of the position we were in a while back, to even hint that we might not be quite ready, or are not going to go chasing it. What sort of ambition is that?

I find it beyond belief that those running things seriously think that they can and will decide just when we are ready to seriously go for it. 

They had better let all the other clubs know in advance, so as to not hinder our unerring progress then. 

.

 

[windmillhillred]

39 minutes ago, RedNight said:

All the good things the club is doing off the pitch (infrastructure, academy etc.) could all be blown up the wall if we get promoted. The vision to have a core group of Bristolians playing in the 1st XI would simply not be sustainable if we were promoted this year. 

Staying down and continuing to build things off the pitch would seriously pay off in the long run.

This might seem ridiculous to some people, but I'm just seeing a bigger picture, as much as I would love to be promoted this year. 

City have had a good year this year. No matter what happens. It's disappointing that we haven't continued our superb form that we had at the start. But I remember quite a few questioning whether or not they style of play was sustainable. It clearly hasn't been. 

But those slagging the players off and manager off are absolutely ridiculous. The ones venting frustration on form is justified. Those questioning whether or not Johnson is the right man, do the players care etc. are just simply ******* retarded. 

I can't quite believe how quickly quite a few fans have turned. Completely ignoring the fact we are 7th after nearly getting relegated last year, and only being whiny about the fact we were 2nd 4 months ago. 

The problem is, so many went hard and personal at Johnson, that they are now revelling in the fact hes "failing" (in their eyes). 

If this was another club of our size (let's say Ipswich), booing off a team that's in 7th. We would be on here slagging them off in disbelief.

Monday, half the ground cheered off Bailey Wright, who has been playing through injections for 2 months and out of position for the majority of season. Disgraceful and embarrassing. 

Respect to the fans who have perspective, and are appreciative of our season, players and manager!

Agree with almost all of this. However I think the full time booing on Monday was completely justified. I genuinely don't think I've ever seen such an inept performance on and off the pitch. It was so bad it was bizarre.

[spudski]

Why people keep banging on about the Jan transfer window beats me. We have no idea what budget was available and who wanted to come here. We also don't know what has been planned for the summer.

Also regarding teams coming down from the Prem with money...it doesn't make any sense either. The same players have to be motivated and managed. Look at Sunderland and Hull.

Fans bang on about how poor things are at the moment, but they are for other teams with far more resources and experience.

We've done remarkably well this season considering.

Unfortunately disappointment leads to dissecting every part of the club when things aren't going our way.

It's all a bit silly really.

[The Bard]

6 minutes ago, spudski said:

Why people keep banging on about the Jan transfer window beats me. We have no idea what budget was available and who wanted to come here. We also don't know what has been planned for the summer.

Also regarding teams coming down from the Prem with money...it doesn't make any sense either. The same players have to be motivated and managed. Look at Sunderland and Hull.

Fans bang on about how poor things are at the moment, but they are for other teams with far more resources and experience.

We've done remarkably well this season considering.

Unfortunately disappointment leads to dissecting every part of the club when things aren't going our way.

It's all a bit silly really.

No it's not. It's entirely logical and understandable. 

To be clear, we did remarkably well in the first half of the season.  So well that we found ourselves challenging for automatic promotion despite having a realistic squad of 14 at the time due to a number of injuries.  We could have decided to spend a little more on specific areas where we were lacking options but instead did what we did.  We have got worse despite the manager having more players at his disposal.  What does that tell you?

[BTRFTG]

25 minutes ago, ScottishRed said:

Answer - get up asap, accept you might get relegated, but you too have the £££ - therefore you can compete to get back there.

Spot on and any credible director should know that ( if not, get rid pronto.)

It's not what fans necessarily want to hear but go up, take the cash, invest in a few 'second string' Premier players and accept you'll be relegated but with a significantly stronger squad than you went up with. Avoid at all costs the 's*** or bust' option. Repeat one or two times and you'll have assembled a squad capable of surviving at the top level (though won't ever be competitive.)

Lately it's been called the Burnley Model; no wasted and expensive overseas showboats, just what would once have been half tidy 'First Division' pros. Dull maybe, but that's modern football. There's greater profit in an empty Premier stadium than a full Championship one so the extra fans and crowd argument (they'll only watch a winning side) doesn't hold water.

 

[Mr Popodopolous]

Watford are showing another way of establishing though. Wolves with their contacts have the potential and a mix of increased PL cash, Mendes and Nuno may well push them on.

Would suggest those 2 are probably outliers though, tbh. More PL sides in terms of newly promoted seem to be surviving than in the past though.

[Curr Avon]

2 hours ago, Jack Dawe said:

This has circled since January, and our least active transfer window under LJ/MA, and Mark Ashton's interview in the Post in February, in which they reported that MA confirmed that we were set up for the long term and "not specifically targetting promotion this season."

It's not that long ago that we arrived back in the Championship and had a nightmare summer trying to recruit and rocked up at Sheffield Wednesday wholly unprepared with Wes Burns coming on to replace an injured Joe Bryan. We weren't ready, we were still a bit "L1." Shambles.

Since then, our recruitment has been mixed, at best. We have fired Des whatsisname and not sure we have replaced him permanently? We have had the Engvall carry on and recruitment continues to be challenging, the loans particularly this season have been abysmal. Weakened us, if anything.

I'm not sure we are ready to recruit successfully for the PL and with the summer of 2015 fresh in the club's memory, perhaps there is something in this? 

Do we want to find ourselves in the PL about as ready for it as we were the Championship in 2015, where the level of exposure and media interest would be somewhat embarrassing for the "high ups" were we a little bit undercooked, on and off the pitch? 

I believe that the club are more than satisfied with this season already, and not fussed about the play offs this time. I think this is evident now in the standard of the first team for a few weeks now. I wonder if they feel there is more to do yet before we are ready to go for it in this league, and that another year in the Championship will allow us to improve our "set up" and be better in the long run.

Looking at our hit and miss recruitment, I'd tend to agree with them. We don't need it just yet. And we don't need to be on MOTD every Saturday night getting embarrassed, like Cardiff next season.

 

 

That's a good post JD, but Huddersfield seized their chance last season and have a decent chance of staying in the Premier League beyond May. 

We've only had two terms in the top flight. With our best days prior to the launch of the Titanic.

I'm sure that our wonderful fans of all ages would be delighted to see their club perform in the Premier League.

Who wouldn't?

[Chairman Mao]

If, in the same season we beat Watford, Palace, Man Utd and Stoke we aren't ready for the Premiership then what season will we be ready?! 

[spudski]

15 minutes ago, The Bard said:

No it's not. It's entirely logical and understandable. 

To be clear, we did remarkably well in the first half of the season.  So well that we found ourselves challenging for automatic promotion despite having a realistic squad of 14 at the time due to a number of injuries.  We could have decided to spend a little more on specific areas where we were lacking options but instead did what we did.  We have got worse despite the manager having more players at his disposal.  What does that tell you?

How do you know that we didn't try?

No one knows what the budgets are, whether we are going to be within FFP over 3 years, who's leaving, who we've targeted, when they will be available. etc, etc

We are planning long term now...there is now way in hell, even if money was available, that we'd just buy up who was available in January to 'give it a go'.

We may have more players...but the majority are knackered, some are coming back from injury, and others brought in haven't delivered or settled so well.

It's not numbers, it's human beings we are dealing with.

After all these things we still sit 7th.

How bad a season must others be having if our form is so bad, that we can still sit 7th.

As for logical and understandable....half the things written on here are neither of those. They are mainly reactionary and illogical...because fans don't have the knowledge of what's happening behind the scenes. It's all guess work and supposition...hence when results don't go to plan people dissect every part of the club to try and find a reason.

It really is laughable tbh.

 

 

[pillred]

3 hours ago, ScottishRed said:

With all due respect you completely and utterly miss the point.

IF, there is a deliberate plan by the club to ensure we don't get promoted that is beyond naive.

There is absolutely no,repeat NO guarantee that the opportuntity will present itself again next season.

Witness Reading and Sheffield Wed - play - off places last year - this year miles off it, and neither made any changes that weakened them.

The attitude of some on here that next year we will be stronger and be in a better position to get auto promotion boils my pixx.

This season 2 of the relegated teams have never even flirted with the top 6, regardless of who comes down there is a good chance that 2 at least, will be contenders. Add those to the ones that miss out this time round and you have a good few in the mix.

You can also add to that a 'surprise package.

I could of course be totally wrong - I hope I am.

We had a real chance this year and we fxxked it up.

A key point of getting promoted is the £120m + - get promoted and maybe get relegated BUT that money really helps to build the club and move towards self sustainability.

how many teams are really ready for the step up, it's nearly always a struggle for the teams that get promoted, using the were not ready excuse wears a bit thin yes we might get dicked most weeks but we would only need to be better than three other teams, if we could do that who knows what may happen in the future. 

[Dr Balls]

There is a huge amount of frustration among most fans at how a season which promised so much is likely to end with nothing more than a sad little whimper as per our frankly pathetic performance on Monday.

Whether there is a larger ulterior motive amongst those in charge of the club, I have no idea, but from the outside, to have slipped from second halfway through the season to potentially not even making the playoffs looks like a golden opportunity that may not come around for another 10 years having been wasted. Remember we took 28 years from relegation from the top flight to having a chance to go back there, and since then we haven't even had anything close to a sniff of anything similar until this season. 

There is only so much planning that you can do in football, because you can't control what other clubs do. Just like the small print on SL's financial products, past performance is no guarantee of future returns. Who would have guessed after Liverpool last won the league in 1990 after years of domination that they wouldn't win it again in the subsequent 28 years?

In the parlance of a terrace chant, "Second place & we fu**ed it up, even the playoffs, we fu**ed it up".

Start next season like we have finished this one, and there won't just be disappointment there will be outright anger. It will not be pretty, and then all the talk of "building for the future" will seem like even more of a fantasy.

[KevP]

8 hours ago, cidered abroad said:

Big C. If you call yesterday's performance as "challenging for a play off spot", you are sadly mistaken. The only challenge all afternoon was the toss up to choose ends. 

.......and we probably lost that too