SOD - the reappraisal

[italian dave]

48 minutes ago, Selred said:

2 wins in 18 games... 

yes, but both were in the last six of those games….. 

Thats turning things round isn’t it?

(Im only half serious! The penultimate game was that home defeat to Sheff U which I still rate one of the worst games I’ve ever seen)

[SecretSam]

1 hour ago, Ron W said:

The academy is difficult to quantify

It's really not. Reid, Joe B, etc...££££

[MC RISK77]

1 hour ago, CyderInACan said:

Yet this was he bloke who was in charge of a JET-inspired Doncaster that tore us a new one at AG

Yeah I remember that game really well apart from the final score from memory was it 5-3 to them, and wasn’t that the start of our dislike to Billy Sharp?

[GrahamC]

1 hour ago, CyderInACan said:

I remember a midweek home game against, I think, Shrewsbury where we were utterly, utterly, rubbish and ended up drawing 1-1 by the skin of our teeth. Think Nickey Shorey played for us and it was abundantly clear his legs had gone. We were spiralling out of control & relegation was almost a foregone conclusion had SOD stayed. 

But, as the OP correctly says, we cleared the decks a bit and brought in JET, Pack & Fielding and laid the foundations for the renaissance. 

There were loads of them, scraping home draws against the likes of Oldham, Orient, being totally outclassed by Peterborough.. 

You and I were there mate, but not too many others were, we were absolutely dying on our arse.

Interesting to listen to Frankie Fielding talk a few years ago about how SOD destroyed his confidence, how Flint struggled, really great man management to go public & say you wouldn’t have paid the £300k for him, Cotts then turned him into a player we got £8m for, by the way.

But what a great coach, with basically one plan, give the ball to JET..

Edited July 14, 2023 by GrahamC

[Monkeh]

3 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

There were loads of them, scraping home draws against the likes of Oldham, Orient, being totally outclassed by Peterborough.. 

You and I were there mate, but not too many others were, we were absolutely dying on our arse.

Interesting to listen to Frankie Fielding talk a few years ago about how SOD destroyed his confidence, how Flint struggled, really great man management to go public & say you wouldn’t have paid the £300k for him, Cotts then turned him into a player we got £8m for, by the way.

But what a great coach, with basically one plan, give the ball to JET..

Sod is bristol City's worst ever manager, worse then tiny penis 

[And Its Smith]

There were no signs it was going to improve. We were going down under SOD.  Terrible football and awful results. The players we had were not world beaters but were better than he produced.  I remember one game where his tactic was to put Baldock right wing and smash balls to him. Embarrassing.  

[The Gasbuster]

12 minutes ago, MC RISK77 said:

Yeah I remember that game really well apart from the final score from memory was it 5-3 to them, and wasn’t that the start of our dislike to Billy Sharp?

That went back to Sharp's Scunthorpe days. IIRC correctly that was before his stint at Doncaster.

Edited July 14, 2023 by The Gasbuster

[The Gasbuster]

He used the "I don't look at the league table" line a few times that season.

So frustrating to us fans when we were staring down the barrel of relegation to L2.

Edited July 14, 2023 by The Gasbuster

[Davefevs]

2 hours ago, Ron W said:

We have been harsh on some managers in recent history, especially LJ who did have some good times to go alongside the bad, but there's not much about SOD's tenure to make him one of them, imo.

don’t answer this, but why “harsh” and “LJ” in sane breath.  I could see where this post was going before it started!

Putting it simply, he was paid to get results.

that’s incorrect, that’s a fan’s view of his remit, a bit like some fans think a player gets paid £x for 90s minutes a week.  Of course it’s a huge part

Let's not forget, he still had almost half a season in the Champ to save us. We got two points from our final nine games and he didn't win a single away match. In League One we weren't doing a great deal better.

So no reflection on what he took over?

Yes there's a lot under the surface which can go unnoticed, and yes some of the players he played did go on to have success later on. How much credit should he take for Flint's progression? He looked like a rabbit in the headlights when he arrived and SOD's style of coaching probably never suited him. SC came in, put him in the middle of a three where he had to win it, head it and kick it and let others bring the ball out from the back. He looked 10x the player.

nice balance (not), pick one player to prove your opinion!

He has to take full credit for JET's performances because he was really let off the leash and was superb, but that kind of summed up where it went wrong. SOD always said he wanted his players to make their own decisions but that only works in the right environment with the right players, and was letting JET's mercurial talent shine worth it for a lot of underperforming, confused team-mates?

The academy is difficult to quantify - this may be unfair if he did make a significant push for its progression but it would've required the buy-in of the top brass anyway, so do we really know who was the catalyst behind it? If someone is ITK or something has been said publicly then fair enough.

already covered by others.  5 pillars and all that.  SOD, Dawe (not sod’all), Burt, Amy

Ron - you are better than this.  You’re an actual journo……..

[Robbored]

I posted recently that had SoD got along better with SL then he’d had eventually improved the entire club just as Nige is doing.

SoD and SL fell out over the proposed pre season tour to Botswana. SoD refused to put his players at risk of injury by playing against African teams, determined to prove themselves against professional players and would not allow it to happen.

SoD wasn’t any easy person to get along with as we saw in many of his interviews.

However he was/is a skilled coach who certainly has a deep knowledge of the game, just as Nige has.

[And Its Smith]

6 minutes ago, Robbored said:

I posted recently that had SoD got along better with SL then he’d had eventually improved the entire club just as Nige is doing.

I disagree hugely and can’t see what this is based on.  

[Wanderingred]

Starting to turn things around….. Wasn’t his last game in charge, that home defeat to Sheff Utd? Ask any veteran City fan to list our worst ever performances and that game would be in the top five.

[Robbored]

14 minutes ago, And Its Smith said:

I disagree hugely and can’t see what this is based on.  

SoD didn’t have enough time, largely due to his awkward personality.

[TV Tom]

1 hour ago, Monkeh said:

Sod is bristol City's worst ever manager, worse then tiny penis 

I don’t know about that, the Scottish guy (McGuinness ?) before him was pretty bad and don’t get me started on Osman

[GrahamC]

14 minutes ago, Wanderingred said:

Starting to turn things around….. Wasn’t his last game in charge, that home defeat to Sheff Utd? Ask any veteran City fan to list our worst ever performances and that game would be in the top five.

Nope it was a draw at home to Orient, 2-2 I think.

Story went SL couldn’t believe how pleased he was with the result & lost patience.

[SuperDziek]

Interesting topic for debate.

Heres a list of players signed by SOD for us:

Brendan Moloney

Brian Howard

Jordan Wynter

Aden Flint

Derrick Williams

Frank Fielding

JET

Scott Wagstaff

elliott Parrish

Marlon Harewood

Marlon Pack

Nicky Shorey

Proper mixed bag that. Probably a 50/50 split between the good and the bad/ugly.

football under him was dire and we were definitely heading into League 2 under him. 
 

but he inherited a lot of dross from McInnes and had to clear the decks, and SC definitely benefitted from that. 

[BrizzleRed]

1 hour ago, And Its Smith said:

There were no signs it was going to improve. We were going down under SOD.  Terrible football and awful results. The players we had were not world beaters but were better than he produced.  I remember one game where his tactic was to put Baldock right wing and smash balls to him. Embarrassing.  

Horrible memories od those dark times.  Our tactics seemed to have consisted of knocking at least 20 aimless, square passes across our defence, before smashing an aimless ball forward to nobody in particular.  This would usually result in giving possetion to the opposition attack and we’d either be picking the ball out of our net, or rinsing repeating the sad process.

Excitement level was zero, and the only time my arse would leave the seat in the 90 minutes was at half time!

He’s been widely credited for sowing the seeds of our current academy and for that, we can be eternally grateful.  As a Head Coach though, that has to be one of our darkest times as supporters.

[italian dave]

5 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

Nope it was a draw at home to Orient, 2-2 I think.

Story went SL couldn’t believe how pleased he was with the result & lost patience.

We actually played quite well, and it was a decent game, as I recall.

But I think you’re right. Nothing more than a win was going to be good enough. As I mentioned earlier, we’d put together a couple of wins and a draw which probably did just enough to put off his demise after a dreadful start.

But we followed that up with the awful Sheff U game, and I think that at least one win from the Sheff U and Orient games was the absolute bottom line. 

[Monkeh]

11 minutes ago, TV Tom said:

I don’t know about that, the Scottish guy (McGuinness ?) before him was pretty bad and don’t get me started on Osman

Nope I'd take both of them over sod

[Ron W]

50 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Ron - you are better than this.  You’re an actual journo……..

That's a little bit patronising to someone with a different view than you Dave... Frank Lampard put out an interview literally yesterday where he said his primary objective when he went back to Chelsea, and something he admitted he failed in, was to get results.

Flint is one example, but it could be one of a few - JET aside it's not like many of that team were looking up to much before SC came in.

If he has played a major part in the direction the academy has taken leading to what we're seeing now, then great and he deserves the credit for doing that. But suggesting his spell as head coach was anything other than a failure would be something a tabloid journalist would struggle to spin.

Edited July 14, 2023 by Ron W

[italian dave]

1 minute ago, Monkeh said:

Nope I'd take both of them over sod

Something tells me you’d probably take Joey Barton assisted by Ian Holloway over SOD

[italian dave]

3 hours ago, marcofisher said:

I honestly think he was in the wrong role. He would have been far better in a strategic role rather than man management.

Not the first or the last time we’ve done that, is it? 

Benny Lennartson was a decent coach (and in his own way tried to some significant and much needed changes to the clubs culture) … but we stick him in the manager/DoF role. 

I guess the old square pegs round holes adage applies off the pitch as well as on it. 

[Robbored]

14 minutes ago, Wanderingred said:

Starting to turn things around….. Wasn’t his last game in charge, that home defeat to Sheff Utd? Ask any veteran City fan to list our worst ever performances and that game would be in the top five.

How long have you got?

Losing at AG 0-5 to Wolves, losing 0-6 to Cardiff, losing to Leeds 0-2 where City never laid a glove on them. The list of dreadful performances is almost endless.

[Davefevs]

28 minutes ago, Ron W said:

That's a little bit patronising to someone with a different view than you Dave...

Maybe.  Sorry, didn’t mean it to across like that.  Is it a different view to mine?  Bearing in mind it was my first season watching City in donkeys years (taking my son for the first time), and him waiting 4 games to see a shot on target (exaggerated but not far off) I agree with some of it, the football parts…and others recollection is no different too. 

I think most people would summarise as - crap on the pitch (probably / possibly going down again) but sewed the seeds (some of) for what happened next.

Funnily enough, I’ve long been of the opinion that it won’t be Nige taking us up (I hope he does), but the next man (or woman) to reap the benefits.

(edit: I didn’t see Ron’s edits, so changed a few bits above)

Edited July 14, 2023 by Davefevs

[frenchred]

Was a walking disaster for our club no matter what time goes by to sugar coat things

[REDOXO]

49 minutes ago, SuperDziek said:

Interesting topic for debate.

Heres a list of players signed by SOD for us:

Brendan Moloney

Brian Howard

Jordan Wynter

Aden Flint

Derrick Williams

Frank Fielding

JET

Scott Wagstaff

elliott Parrish

Marlon Harewood

Marlon Pack

Nicky Shorey

Proper mixed bag that. Probably a 50/50 split between the good and the bad/ugly.

football under him was dire and we were definitely heading into League 2 under him. 
 

but he inherited a lot of dross from McInnes and had to clear the decks, and SC definitely benefitted from that. 

I will brush over McInnes as the very thought of that bloke makes my blood boil and has got me in countless arguments!

SoD took us down, to quote SL,“without a fight” and we were hurtling toward another relegation. 

I don’t do revisionism. They were both crap appointments that were largely endorsed by posters here! 
 

 

 

[FabledRobin]

1 hour ago, SuperDziek said:

Interesting topic for debate.

Heres a list of players signed by SOD for us:

Brendan Moloney

Brian Howard

Jordan Wynter

Aden Flint

Derrick Williams

Frank Fielding

JET

Scott Wagstaff

elliott Parrish

Marlon Harewood

Marlon Pack

Nicky Shorey

Proper mixed bag that. Probably a 50/50 split between the good and the bad/ugly.

football under him was dire and we were definitely heading into League 2 under him. 
 

but he inherited a lot of dross from McInnes and had to clear the decks, and SC definitely benefitted from that. 

Who the hell is Brian Howard!

[Davefevs]

3 minutes ago, FabledRobin said:

Who the hell is Brian Howard!

He’s an agent now.

Big Rob’s I believe?

[2015]

City were an absolute shambles by the time SOD took over.

We had way overachieved in 2007/08 with the squad we had. It started in January 2008 with the signing of Adebola which effected our style of play to a more direct approach. We then became pragmatic with signings instead of thinking long term - only Maynard was a signing made that was really a thought of the future. We didn't improve on what we had and instead were signing journeymen every season.

When both McInnes and SOD took over we had a hugely bloated squad of players signed by 3 different Managers and with no long term strategy to improve the club SOD was always up against it. Although results in League 1 were poor he did sign most of the squad which got us Promoted. He laid the foundations down for the scouting and academy. Unfortunately many of our 'fans' want a happy go lucky type of Manager to please their minds.

There's so much that goes on behind the scenes than just the results. Football has evolved from the 1980s. City fell behind rivals because of this mindset and now we are reaping the rewards for taking a more long term approach, which SOD had said needed to happen.

[SuperDziek]

37 minutes ago, FabledRobin said:

Who the hell is Brian Howard!

Good midfielder prior to coming to us! Pretty sure that, like Nicky Shorey, his best days were way behind him and he was carrying a bit of timber when we had him for a short while.