Johnsons Record

[Bristol Boy]

P11 W3 D0 L8 F15 A24

Comments please.

[Guest harveythompson]

P11 W3 D0 L8 F15 A24

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Been done to many times :@

[Guest roejowland]

well what do you think

[Guest Harry Dolman]

P11 W3 D0 L8 F15 A24

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Johnson took over a poor side - 2nd from bottom.

His 1st 3 games were our best peformances of the season (even though we lost v H'pool). 2 things then happened & its hard to say which had the biggest impact:

1) We had a 2 week break - just when we didn't want one as we were in form & confident.

2) 3 of our players were involved in "that" incident.

Even though we won the following game v Tranny we didn't really deserve to & it seems to me that our downfall is linked to the above.

To me, regularly changing the manager is senseless (see Rovers or Soton for details). My biggest gripe with Tinnion was that after 18 months I couldn't see what he was trying to acheive, he initially promised fast attacking football - this never happened, we then went long ball even though we don't have the personnel, follow the 5-0 drubbing @ Luton we were told the team would be playing at a much higher tempo.

Again this didn't happen.

At least I can see what Johnson wants to achieve. No, I don't ever think he will make us rock solid at the back as he is more in the "Keegan" mould, but frankly if we were regularly winning 4-2 there would be few complaints.

From his 1st 3 games you could see that GJ wanted us playing good attacking footy with players encouraged to pass & move (even the full backs). Despite the abysmal current run, we have actually started a lot of games reasonably well (Chesterfield away, Southend & Notts Co at home & Swindon away). On Sat we could have been 3 up (the goal plus Murrays 1 on 1 & Brookers chance from the good free kick move) before Chesterfield had attacked.

The problem is a collective lack of heart/spirit/confidence. When Chesterfield equalised on Sat we had no reason to panic - 20 mins gone we've played well & its 1-1 - no real problem. But as with every other game recently we capitualted I am not really sure what Johnson can do about that, other than big changes in personnel.

I certainly don't agree with everything he's done (Woodman has been our best left back for me) but i say give Johnson time (even if we go down) & he will get it right.

[Bristol Boy]

well what do you think

If you see Harry Dolmans well thought out comments, you'll get the general idea about posts like this.

They start a debate without the poster "spinning" the comments.

Simple fact.

What do you think?

[A Horse With No Name]

If you see Harry Dolmans well thought out comments, you'll get the general idea about posts like this.

They start a debate without the poster "spinning" the comments.

Simple fact.

What do you think?

It might be well thought out, but what he never took time to consider when he said we should have been three nil up, was that if the second chance had gone in, the ball would have been returned to the centre spot and a totally different phase of play would have began. Therefore the third chance wouldn't have happened. It annoys me when people say so and so should have had a hat trick, for exactly the same reasons.

[Red Skin]

P11 W3 D0 L8 F15 A24

Comments please.

Harry Dolman has summarised things pretty well for me but here's some more thoughts.

Bristol City have no pre-ordained right to be in the Championship (or the Premiership for that matter!). Hull, Luton, Swansea, Crewe, Southend, Brighton and others have shown the way forward. It is about building a team that is hard working, fit, organised and that hopefully plays some decent football. The most important thing is the team. This comes before any individual player. You can achieve a lot in the short term with a star player like Lita, but ultimately star players get poached by other clubs so the ideal to have a team that is better than the individuals that make it up i.e. everyone is replacable.

Personnally I believe the best way to ensure the right attitude amongst the players is to mould the team around youth developed from within, with a sprinkling of good experienced professionals brought in from elsewhere. These purchases should be strategic rather than reactionary. We have wasted too much money already trying to buy our way out of this division, and I for one hated being labelled as the Chelsea of Div 1 due to the money we threw about. (If any player had a half decent game against all of sudden we wanted to buy them!) We need to cut our cloth according to what we can afford.

I reckon the opportunity to make fundamental changes and have control over the whole infrastructure of the club was key to securing GJ as manager and will ultimately see GJ succeed if he's given time. We may need to take a step backwards to realise this though. Hopefully not relegation, but a season or two more where we don't get promoted and perhaps don't even threaten the play-offs. I'm willing to accept this as I believe GJ has a vision of where he wants to go and knows how to get us there.

[Chivs]

We may need to take a step backwards to realise this though. Hopefully not relegation, but a season or two more where we don't get promoted and perhaps don't even threaten the play-offs. I'm willing to accept this as I believe GJ has a vision of where he wants to go and knows how to get us there.

I just can't understand what hold GJ has on people like you.

Did he hypnotise you during one of the games I didn't attend? GJ has a vision? Where is all of this coming from?

If we get relegated he should be sacked. End of. I believe he should be given more than 10 or so games. That's only fair. But if the result of almost a whole season is relegation then he clearly isn't good enough.

[Portland Bill]

P11 W3 D0 L8 F15 A24

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His defensive record at Yeovil was APALLING, looks like hes carrying it on. Whats the betting we concede 100 ( yes one hundred ) goals this season ?

[Red Skin]

Did he hypnotise you during one of the games I didn't attend? GJ has a vision? Where is all of this coming from?

He got Yeovil into our Division by scouting good players or developing his own. He has proved his coaching credentials and from what I've heard from him IMHO he has a good understanding of what's needed to progress at this level - organisation, work ethic, professionalism and goals. That what's got other teams promoted. To progress as a club you can't keep changing the manager as this inevitably means the new manager will want to bring in their own players and we can't afford that. GJ obviously convinced the board of his credentials and his vision so they need to stick with him.

[Guest stackpoolred]

One team left out of this debate is Plymouth Argyle. They were relegated to the bottom flight and promoted within a season. This was achieved by a 'scrooge' Chairman who eventually sold the Club to a new regime.The rest is history. They and QPR pipped us under Danny Wilson to eventual promotion to the Championship. However Plymouth's success was not achieved on a 'big spend basis' but under the shrewed Managership of Paul Sturrock, (who also took Sheffield Wednesday up last season) after his face didn't fit at Southampton,a tough scot who signed the right players, mostly on free transfers to produce a well disciplined and hard working outfit. Ironically in Plymouth's promotion season the City achieved a double over them but failed to beat the lower oppostion on a number of occasions that season.

It is no good bringing up the past mistakes now but I still feel that the four year stability under Danny Wilson could have been given one more season and would probably have kept 'his' team in tact(the best of which are now playing for other clubs) to make it third time lucky. The year Wigan were promoted our defence was the meanest in the Division. What's happened since? That said, under the circumstances which evolved I still believe that GJ has been the best signing this season although even he could not possible have foreseen the current crisis. Time is surely running out now and our fortunes must change to avoid the drop with nearly half the seaon over and the gap in points widening at the lower half of the table.We aren't even drawing matches so our failure has meant losing three not two points each game. The goals against could also prove our downfall if goal difference eventually decides our fate!!We could have done worse than to have kept Mickey Bell one more season. He is now playing for a club much higher in the League than us with an outside chance of the payoffs!!

As supporters we must keep with GJ and the Team to encourage this turn around and the Chairman above all must give him the support they need.

D.Hill & Family,Exeter.

One team left out of this debate is Plymouth Argyle. They were relegated to the bottom flight and promoted within a season. This was achieved by a 'scrooge' Chairman who eventually sold the Club to a new regime.The rest is history. They and QPR pipped us under Danny Wilson to eventual promotion to the Championship. However Plymouth's success was not achieved on a 'big spend basis' but under the shrewed Managership of Paul Sturrock, (who also took Sheffield Wednesday up last season) after his face didn't fit at Southampton,a tough scot who signed the right players, mostly on free transfers to produce a well disciplined and hard working outfit. Ironically in Plymouth's promotion season the City achieved a double over them but failed to beat the lower oppostion on a number of occasions that season.

It is no good bringing up the past mistakes now but I still feel that the four year stability under Danny Wilson could have been given one more season and would probably have kept 'his' team in tact(the best of which are now playing for other clubs) to make it third time lucky. The year Wigan were promoted our defence was the meanest in the Division. What's happened since? That said, under the circumstances which evolved I still believe that GJ has been the best signing this season although even he could not possible have foreseen the current crisis. Time is surely running out now and our fortunes must change to avoid the drop with nearly half the seaon over and the gap in points widening at the lower half of the table.We aren't even drawing matches so our failure has meant losing three not two points each game. The goals against could also prove our downfall if goal difference eventually decides our fate!!We could have done worse than to have kept Mickey Bell one more season. He is now playing for a club much higher in the League than us with an outside chance of the payoffs!!

As supporters we must keep with GJ and the Team to encourage this turn around and the Chairman above all must give him the support they need.

D.Hill & Family,Exeter.

[Chappers]

Personally, I have not been that impressed, mainly due to some of his madcap comments, and the fact that his loan players have not addressed the weaknesses in the team. Look at the squad now, heaps of centre-backs, but no strikers, regardless of long-term plans and giving the guy a chance, it worries me. Similarly, the night-club fracas keeps cropping up, but if the players involved are badly affected, why not rest them until it is sorted? It's not as if we are short of players. His proven record was achieved at just one Club, and at a lower level, and as has been discussed, I have read some very contradictory reports of his Latvian experience.

Obviously, I really want him to succeed, as we all do, but some of what I have seen does worry me. Comparisons with other Managers are meaningless as you can find Managers with bad starts who came good, ones that never recovered and can just 'prove' anything. Clough was no success at Leeds or Brighton, so I have just 'proved' that even the best can fail in the wrong surroundings.

Truth is, only time will tell. If things carry on like they are, even his most ardent fans will give up on him, and accept it as a wrong appointment. If he turns things around, I will just dismiss this as a 'blip' and a learning experience on his part.

[SimplyRed]

P11 W3 D0 L8 F15 A24

Comments please.

I am VERY concerned and think that had he been the manager he was 'hyped up' to be, he would have been getting better performances/results from his players by now.

I don't subscribe to the "wait till I get my own players" excuse. Too many managers these days seem to swan into clubs and prat about, dribbling on about getting their own players in.

A good manager can work with ANY player and should be able to get the best of what he's got, by recognising their limitations and playing to their strengths. Tinnion wasn't good at that, and neither it seems, is Johnson.

[SydneyCider]

I don't subscribe to the "wait till I get my own players" excuse. Too many managers these days seem to swan into clubs and prat about, dribbling on about getting their own players in.

A good manager can work with ANY player and should be able to get the best of what he's got, by recognising their limitations and playing to their strengths. Tinnion wasn't good at that, and neither it seems, is Johnson.

This is exactly what bothers me too. A decent manager should be able to play to the strengths of the squad available, usinig a formation that accomodates them.

To be fair, after 3-4 losses even the best manager would struggle to get the team out of their rut. We'll just have to wait and see if it turns around when (if?) the first win comes along.

[RedTop]

Johnson took over a poor side - 2nd from bottom.

His 1st 3 games were our best peformances of the season (even though we lost v H'pool). 2 things then happened & its hard to say which had the biggest impact:

1) We had a 2 week break - just when we didn't want one as we were in form & confident.

2) 3 of our players were involved in "that" incident.

Even though we won the following game v Tranny we didn't really deserve to & it seems to me that our downfall is linked to the above.

To me, regularly changing the manager is senseless (see Rovers or Soton for details). My biggest gripe with Tinnion was that after 18 months I couldn't see what he was trying to acheive, he initially promised fast attacking football - this never happened, we then went long ball even though we don't have the personnel, follow the 5-0 drubbing @ Luton we were told the team would be playing at a much higher tempo.

Again this didn't happen.

At least I can see what Johnson wants to achieve. No, I don't ever think he will make us rock solid at the back as he is more in the "Keegan" mould, but frankly if we were regularly winning 4-2 there would be few complaints.

From his 1st 3 games you could see that GJ wanted us playing good attacking footy with players encouraged to pass & move (even the full backs). Despite the abysmal current run, we have actually started a lot of games reasonably well (Chesterfield away, Southend & Notts Co at home & Swindon away). On Sat we could have been 3 up (the goal plus Murrays 1 on 1 & Brookers chance from the good free kick move) before Chesterfield had attacked.

The problem is a collective lack of heart/spirit/confidence. When Chesterfield equalised on Sat we had no reason to panic - 20 mins gone we've played well & its 1-1 - no real problem. But as with every other game recently we capitualted I am not really sure what Johnson can do about that, other than big changes in personnel.

I certainly don't agree with everything he's done (Woodman has been our best left back for me) but i say give Johnson time (even if we go down) & he will get it right.

One of the best posts on here for a long time. You've summed it up for me.

[Guest Harry Dolman]

One of the best posts on here for a long time. You've summed it up for me.

Many thanks to all the posters who have praised my response to the original question. Remember kids, you don't get a stand named after you for nothing

It might be well thought out, but what he never took time to consider when he said we should have been three nil up, was that if the second chance had gone in, the ball would have been returned to the centre spot and a totally different phase of play would have began. Therefore the third chance wouldn't have happened. It annoys me when people say so and so should have had a hat trick, for exactly the same reasons.

Fair point but really I was making the more general point that we started the game well, could have been comfortably ahead before they scored, & a 1-1 there was no need to panic.

Now I think about it, the "panic" mode has been prevalent all season - we must be the only team to fo 4 up in 20 mins but have the entire fan base collectively biting their nails for the whole 2nd half (Port Vale at home).

[Guest bristolbred]

P11 W3 D0 L8 F15 A24

Comments please.

D. 0.

No boring draws then!!