These Arent Concrete Facts,

[Jimmy]

from what I've seen of Johnson so far his very basic managerial skills leave much to be desired.Like all City fans I hope he takes City into the Championship but at the moment I can't see it.

One thing is for sure - if he does lead City into the next division,he'll be another John Ward and his weaknesses will be exposed.From what I've seen so far Johnson lacks the sophistication to lead a side into the Premiership.

Congratulations Robbored, you've just won the prize for 'Post that has (I said a naughty word) me off the most on this forum.'

We are all entitled to our opinions, If there were no conflicting opinions on this forum it would be a very mundane place. I welcome everyones thoughts, this is a public forum and we are all entitled to put forward whatever it is we see fit.

However;

You talk about balanced opinions and being 'The voice of reason' - in the light of your latest post thats one of the funniest things ive seen on this board all season.

Totally pathetic, if you would take this opportunity to scroll back up the page and examine 10(ish) posts back you may see this quote;

No its not fair to make assumptions

now take the liberty of examining the following sentence of your newest balanced opinion;

One thing is for sure - if he does lead City into the next division,he'll be another John Ward and his weaknesses will be exposed

I'm sorry, I'm certainly not one for personal attacks on posters and I would hate for this to be interpreted as such, merely see it as someone highlighting the hysterical value of a man labeling himself 'The Voice of Reason' and then posting such hypocritcal garbage.

[Port Said Red]

Is the source of Robbored's constant criticism of Johnson, less the fact he replaced Tinnion but more that he wasn't his choice to replace him?

Perhaps he is upset that the club didn't take his sage like advice when appointing the new manager and would be upset if Johnson was successful proving him wrong.......

[Guest Ron]

All quiet on the Robbo side...

[Robbored]

now take the liberty of examining the following sentence of your newest balanced opinion;

I'm sorry, I'm certainly not one for personal attacks on posters and I would hate for this to be interpreted as such, merely see it as someone highlighting the hysterical value of a man labeling himself 'The Voice of Reason' and then posting such hypocritcal garbage.

Thats not an assumption its an opinion or prediction if you like.I simply haven't yet seen anything in Johnson that leads me to believe that he has the managerial ability to be effective at a higher level.He seems very limited and one dimensional to me.

Who would have predicted that John Ward would have floundered in a higher division as he did? especially after he had produced one of the best attacking teams seem at AG for years.Many thought that Ward was our Messiah but his limitations got desperately exposed in the what is now the Championship.

Like Ward,many managers are destined to spend thier careers in lower leagues and from what I've seen of Johnson so far he's another of them.

Is this not a balanced and clearly explained view? whats hyocritical about it?

[Guest Ron]

Thats not an assumption its an opinion or prediction if you like.

Ok...

I simply haven't yet seen anything in Johnson that leads me to believe that he has the managerial ability to be effective at a higher level.He seems very limited and one dimensional to me.

You were saying?

[red as fcuk]

Thats not an assumption its an opinion or prediction if you like.I simply haven't yet seen anything in Johnson that leads me to believe that he has the managerial ability to be effective at a higher level.He seems very limited and one dimensional to me.

Who would have predicted that John Ward would have floundered in a higher division as he did? especially after he had produced one of the best attacking teams seem at AG for years.Many thought that Ward was our Messiah but his limitations got desperately exposed in the what is now the Championship.

Like Ward,many managers are destined to spend thier careers in lower leagues and from what I've seen of Johnson so far he's another of them.

Is this not a balanced and clearly explained view? whats hyocritical about it?

What are your "predictions" for Tinnions managerial career?

[rumbellow]

Just a balanced view - voice of reason.

Utter crap once more - You tried to be balanced and the 'voice of reason' when Tinnion was in charge, I seem to recall something to the effect of 'let's get this into perspective' after the 7-1 defeat at Swansea, But, Every single opportunity you get you put the boot into Johnson.

The problem is our overpaid, under acheiving, party animals, Threw all of their teddies out after they were grounded by the manager.

With pub windows being smashed, Night club brawls and damage and fights amongst players on nights out becoming a regular occurence, Something had to be done or are you on the side of 'just young men blowing off steam', Face it the dog has wagged the tail at AG for far too long and even under Wilson, I for one have maintained that the player were grossly unfit, They acted like kids and were treated like kids.

I along with most I saw Johnson appointment as hopefully saving us from relegation or at best scraping into the play offs, I am just happy that the damage done by the former manager has been turned around and we can start next season off with our usual hope.

I do however agree with one of your points, Let's judge Johnson over next season, But, Please just stop putting the boot in at every opportunity and look at the players, They were responsible for Tinnions demise.

[Colemanballs]

What I meant was that the stance you are taking is creating a feeling amongst forumites that "if you wanted Tinnion to succeed you must hate Johnson".

I don't think it's anything to do with Robbored's stance. It is more to do with the fact that his perceived support for Tinnion is being used by many in an attempt to discredit Robbored. These constant cheap shots are a smokescreen to hide the fact that the posters are too lazy or stupid to address his genuine concerns about Johnson.

Whether you meant this or not I am unable to say (not being you!) but as you are seen by many on this forum as Tinnion's greatest supporter I wanted to clear up that impression.

Once again, Robbored's perceived support for Tinnion is irrelevant with regards to Johnson's ability unless you wish to attack Robbored rather than his points and opinions.

I am however saddened that you have now decided to give yourself proviso to criticise Johnson/not give him credit should he actually get promoted from this division in your final paragraph.

Could you clear up now what exactly Johnson will have to do to win you over as you have now made it clear that promotion through one division won't cut it for you. Would reaching the Premiership do or would he have to lead us to that title as well before you would begrudgingly accept he might have a smidgeon of ability?

I apologise if the above appears crass but given that none of our managers since '98 have managed to get us a promotion, I find it incredulous that you appear to be making a case to criticise the current one should he be the first to achieve it!

I'm not sure about crass but it does seem a little trite. Promotion and immediate relegation is not what this club needs. We need a manager who is not only capable of taking the club to the next level but consolidating (at the least) when there. Robbored is not the only person to have genuine concerns about Johnson's ability to do this.

[SE23Red]

It doesn't mater how its dressed up Johnson blew this season - end of.He took over with 37 games to go,plenty of time to turn things around.He is now using pretty much the same players that he inherited and therefore the arguement about having a weak squad is not valid.

So is the following contribution also not valid?

http://www.otib.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=54091

Just to be clear do you think the squad of players we have are capable of promotion or do we need seven new signings?

[Roger Red Hat]

I'm not sure about crass but it does seem a little trite. Promotion and immediate relegation is not what this club needs. We need a manager who is not only capable of taking the club to the next level but consolidating (at the least) when there. Robbored is not the only person to have genuine concerns about Johnson's ability to do this.

As a matter of interest, what manager that BCFC could appoint, would be guaranteed to not only gain promotion but keep us there?

[red man dan]

Ohh ohh ohh, i just have to get in on this thread its a good en!

Right where to start!

It seems to me that this robbered situation (constant picking of his posts/disecting of previous ones) has arisen from his infamous "conference manager" thread. Whilst it was a rather foolish title, it was not that uncalled for in my opinion. Gary Johnson HAS NOT achieved what he should have this season. I remember many posters on this site suggesting that "any manager" with a brain could guide this team and these players to the play offs or promotion, towards the end of the tinnion reign. I can not be arsed to go through old posts and find such examples, but it did seem to be a common belief that the team tinnion had assembled was more than capable of gaining promotion.

Therefore i ask you why, after just 7 games did that belief change so drastically and the expectation on GJ change SO much? We had many many points to play for, and 85% of the season left to play.

At that time there was no "serious" belief that we might be in a relegation battle, i doubt it was even mentioned, the theme was more, now we have got rid of tinnion we can aim to push up the table and go for the play-offs. This HAD to be GJ,s aim surely, we STILL had a team who were amougst the favourites to gain promotion. GJ himself even stated we had "the players in place at the club to take BCFC where it wants to go".......surely that did not mean to the bottom of the table and with a record 9 match losing streak on the way?

OK there were problems, we had recently lost 7-1, and there was the famous "town incedent", but come on the 7-1 defeat was a freak result with a depleted side. The players at the club at that time were experienced players all of whom i am sure had suffered such defeats in their careers, and in any account many of the players in the actual starting 11 that day were not regular starters before or after that game, indeed many of them had not been regular players in the team before or since, Keogh, Fortune, Smith,Brown, golbourne, gillespie, with bridges moving on and philips being outcast. I fail to beleive that one freak defeat is responcible (amougst an experienced club and players) for a hidous run of results that did not even begin untill 7 games later, they were not straight after.....you can not blame lack of confidence or the fall out from this one game as a reason for the run that folowed later or as evidence of the scale of the job that GJ had on his hands, as in between we beat, brentford,barnsley and tranmere.

The "town" icendent though unfortunate, again in my belief, should not effect how the team play on the field. What they do off the pitch although they must be held responcible for has nothing to do with how the other players or indeed the players themselves perform in thier jobs. Many clubs have had discipline issues with players during seasons and still been succesful, Cantona,Bowyer,woodgate, all much higher profile players and teams, if i remember correctly the bowyer woodagte saga was on going during leeds uts,s dream encounter in the champions league (i may be wrong). However my point is, that the above two scenarios have been touted many times as excuses or reasons for the bad run or as proof of how deep the problems at the club were, and as reasons for why GJ had such a hard job at the start.....I disagree, they needed dealing with but did NOT warrant an awfull period of play and results that jeopadised the club and ruined any chance of the play-offs which i honestly believe most people felt GJ was bought into achieve, and most people felt he could achieve.

In my opinion the reasons are as followed.

GJ,s approach to the City players at first was to praise them publicly and suggest he felt he already had a team that could achieve (his own words), he stated that all that needed to be done was a little tinkering here and there, a bit of direction and a bit of structure. This however soon turned in to an unbelievable attack on the players and a questioning of thier future at the club, he almost insisted that many of them would not be at the club in the future.It was at this time, after a number of games where GJ slammed the players, that we went on this awfull run. It appeared to me that many of the players recented the public slamming (more so the questioning of their futures), and it would have seemed more appropriate to discuss players careers and futures in private. How would you feel if your job was questioned publicly? This all got out of hand, and the "hand grenade" was the tip of this approach, which then seemed to die away quite quickly. The public slamming dissapeared and the constant reference to the future of players stopped. After this things seemed to start turning around, at about the same time the loan players who in the main were awfull, started to dissapear and the players we already had at the club started to return. The handling of the players at the club when he arrived imo led to the poor performances and the loan players that were bought in were no good to replace them, this effectively ruined the season.

However it has not all been bad, the current run is good, and you can not argue with 3rd in the table in the form guide. However the MS situation and letting go of MB still really annoy me, and leaves me with questions about GJ,s managment. Stewart has it would seem never had an attitude problem at any of his previous clubs or with any of his previous managers, indeed it would seem he has been a very good pro all his career. So it worries me that a player with this type of history feels it nessasary to have confronted GJ in the way we are led to believe he did. What is it that an experienced PRO has seen or not seen in GJ that warrants such an attack? As for the MB well it is plain to see that GJ has unfortunatley let go of a striker that could well have been one of the best players we have had at the club for some time. Again it scares and worries me that GJ did not see the extreme talent that MB possessed and has now gone on to express at an other club. His replacement if you will, Bas Savage has unfortunatley been one of the poorest players at Ashton Gate for some time, and i cant for the life of me see how GJ has stuck with him.

But credit where its due, we are performing well at the moment but it is not all rosey there have been some extemely questionable desicions made by GJ this year, that is why i believe Robbered has every right to question the manager, and i don't see why he is recieving such a thrashing from so many posters. Ok so he has it would appear contradicted himslef here and there, but I'm sure if so many people disected each and every one of other peoples posts form the past, we would probably all have some contradictions now and then.

My overiding opinion is similar to Robbered's, that being that GJ has got my full support for next season as he should do, mainly because of late he has turned things around rather well and got the team playing well and getting results. However that does not mean i don't think he blew this season, he did. It also does not mean i don't have reservations, i do. I hope he does not ever let a player of MB,s quality ever leave the club again, unless he simly cant help it, i also hope any striker he brings to the club in the future is of a far better quality than the one here at presant, Bas. I hope he does not continue to have confrontations with players, MS and SP, this cannot be good for the club or morale. Hopefully next season this forum will spend most of the time talking about only the positives of GJ and his management and he does not give us any reason to do otherwise, as for me this season he has given us reason to be wary.

[Robbored]

Very well summarised RMD.

I'm glad some forum users have the intellect to appreciate my point of view - even if they don't agree with it.

[Ian M]

Very well summarised RMD.

I'm glad some forum users have the intellect to appreciate my point of view - even if they don't agree with it.

Actually, I think you are doing BCFC and GJ a huge favour.

By posting as you do, people are galvanising behind Johnson, such is the unfairness of your ranting. Sometimes it needs people to be extremely anti to remind everyone else what a good job GJ is actually doing nd to get them to come out and say so.

So thanks, Robbored, you're doing a fantastic job. Keep it up.

[Guest Ron]

I'm glad some forum users have the intellect to appreciate my point of view - even if they don't agree with it.

Or you don't ignore them

[Robbored]

By posting as you do, people are galvanising behind Johnson, such is the unfairness of your ranting. Sometimes it needs people to be extremely anti to remind everyone else what a good job GJ is actually doing nd to get them to come out and say so.

Madger, if you read through the various threads to which I have contributed my views about Johnson you will see that I am not a lone voice as your post implies.In a minority for sure but not a minority of one.

Many of the more open minded forum users who have the same ability as me to see beyond the superficial agree with me.

[Guest Ron]

Many of the more open minded forum users who have the same ability as me to see beyond the superficial agree with me.

There are very few on this forum who think that Gary Johnson has made no mistakes in his first season as Bristol City manager. BUT you ARE in a minority of 1 by saying you will not be convinced unless he takes us to the premiership.

[bucksred]

Much as I HATE agreeing wi Robbored.......

9 match losing streaks, what the longest in thirty years, don't exactly mean we have turned any corners. Lets see October time and see if GJ, is in fact the messiah. The loan players aint been up to much either- Fontaine excepted. Jury is out on MCCammon, and Noble too. I still remain to be convinced he IS the man, although he has kept us up (And I thought we were doomed in January, I relally did-as did the Swindlers). We can be deeply unconvincing at times now, as well as extremely competant at others. I'm fed up of yet more sleeping giant/false dawn/we're going up cr@p. No pyssing about, get up, out and stay out.

On the positive side, the underacheivers either errrr are, shipping/shipped out. And Tinnion is history. And Wilsons shower ARE going down.

[BB.]

THE PREMIERSHIP???? Robbored - if thats what it takes for you to be happy with the manager of BCFC, then you're in for a long rough ride in my opinion.

If Johnson can take us up, then he would of done something that no ones done for us in a long time.

I would be greatful if he could just take us up, staying there would be the next aim.

Which manager do you think has the ability to take us to the premiership then Robbored?

[red man dan]

Rather than quote all of your post, suffice to say that I agree with all of it.

In essence, Johnson screwed up, fixed it, now back to where we should be.

So there you have it, i need not have spent half an hour typing when i could have summed it up in one sentance.

Johnson came, broke, fixed, and has hopefully re-built something better for the future. We shall see next season.

The breaking in my view, ruined this season but if the fixing has created something better then i shall be more than willing to accept it was worth breaking. I have my doubts but i hope i,m wrong and that GJ gets us promotion next season or at least has a damm good go at it. My verdict awaits next seasons evidence.

[Colemanballs]

As a matter of interest, what manager that BCFC could appoint, would be guaranteed to not only gain promotion but keep us there?

None. What's your point?

[Guest Ron]

In essence, Johnson screwed up, fixed it, now back to where we should be....

...12 places and 100x better performances than we were when he arrived.

[SE23Red]

Gary Johnson HAS NOT achieved what he should have this season. I remember many posters on this site suggesting that "any manager" with a brain could guide this team and these players to the play offs or promotion, towards the end of the tinnion reign. I can not be arsed to go through old posts and find such examples, but it did seem to be a common belief that the team tinnion had assembled was more than capable of gaining promotion.

Therefore i ask you why, after just 7 games did that belief change so drastically and the expectation on GJ change SO much?

I was excited about the squad in pre-season but my expectations were lowered very quickly when it became obvious that we had a bunch of players with high reputations but no team. I was unsure when Tinnion left how bad it really was, and hoped that all it would take was a new manager.

This HAD to be GJ,s aim surely, we STILL had a team who were amougst the favourites to gain promotion. GJ himself even stated we had "the players in place at the club to take BCFC where it wants to go".......surely that did not mean to the bottom of the table and with a record 9 match losing streak on the way?

Again the realisation that all was not rosy was slow in coming forward. I challenge anyone now to identify any stage in the season when we've had a squad of players at the club capable of promotion.

OK there were problems, we had recently lost 7-1, and there was the famous "town incedent", but come on the 7-1 defeat was a freak result with a depleted side.

I've made this point before but the Swansea result was anything but a freak. We'd lost our first two away games already and went on to lose another 5 out of 6. The freak result was Brentford away. We conceded 26 goals in our first 9 away games, seven of those at Swansea but even without that game we were conceding on average 2-3 goals a game away from home. No team can do that and challenge for promotion.

In my opinion the reasons are as followed.

GJ,s approach to the City players at first was to praise them publicly and suggest he felt he already had a team that could achieve (his own words), he stated that all that needed to be done was a little tinkering here and there, a bit of direction and a bit of structure.

This however soon turned in to an unbelievable attack on the players and a questioning of thier future at the club, he almost insisted that many of them would not be at the club in the future.

Yes he did give the squad his backing on day one but also pointed out that (a) he had already heard of the City squad's liking for a beer or two and (b) that he was going to focus on building a squad full of fit, focused professional athletes.

I don't think it is any coincidence that the grenade came after the town incident and not before. I'm sure he initially thought that just drip feeding the message would be enough to turn the squad around but four arrests and four consecutive defeats later I'm guessing that his view on how to approach the task in hand changed. Everything before and since suggests that he is a very loyal manager so I'm happy to give him the benefit of the doubt and accept that the way he handled the players at that time was calculated to get an important message over a lot more quickly.

Edit: One final point is that Tinnion screwed this season up in the summer, a chance that Johnson has not yet had. With the transfer windows now in place a new manager has less chance to reverse a decline than in previous years.

[Colemanballs]

There are very few on this forum who think that Gary Johnson has made no mistakes in his first season as Bristol City manager. BUT you ARE in a minority of 1 by saying you will not be convinced unless he takes us to the premiership.

Ron, humour me and provide me the link to the post where Robbored has said this.

[Ian M]

Madger, if you read through the various threads to which I have contributed my views about Johnson you will see that I am not a lone voice as your post implies.In a minority for sure but not a minority of one.

Where have I claimed you to be a lone voice?

Many of the more open minded forum users who have the same ability as me to see beyond the superficial agree with me.

Well, historically I have been open minded. I was generally supportive of DW for 3.5 years, I was generally supportive of Tinnion and now I'm generally supportive of GJ.

My case against DW was his lack of commitment to the club, my criticism of Tinnion was his naievety in some of his decision making and now, in my opinion, GJ has taken one step back to take two steps forward.

Whilst I could be critical of the one backward step taken, I am supportive of the two forward.

So, on 'BALANCE', he is doing a good job and deserves support. He will have that support up until the moment I feel it would be best if he left.

I am supportive, because I believe that is best for the club.

If a point comes where I feel it is best he goes, I will say so. What I won't do is guess what might be beyond his ability and criticise him for it as if it had already been proven. That would be narrow minded.

[BB.]

Ron, humour me and provide me the link to the post where Robbored has said this.

Ian, I respect you as a top poster but this is complete tosh.....

To me Bristol City is all that matters.Managers come and go as do players and Chairmen The fans are the one constant thing.I don't know how many managers I've seen since 1967 - I can't be arsed to work it out.

I want every manager to succeed.Sadly mostly all of them have failed and from what I've seen of Johnson so far his very basic managerial skills leave much to be desired.Like all City fans I hope he takes City into the Championship but at the moment I can't see it.

One thing is for sure - if he does lead City into the next division,he'll be another John Ward and his weaknesses will be exposed.From what I've seen so far Johnson lacks the sophistication to lead a side into the Premiership.

If thats not indicating that he wants a manager that will take us to the premiership until he is satisfied with who the manager is, then I don't know what it is. Totally unprovoked comment too.

I know I'm not Ron, but I commented on the premiership manager comment too.

[newboy]

Madger, if you read through the various threads to which I have contributed my views about Johnson you will see that I am not a lone voice as your post implies.In a minority for sure but not a minority of one.

Many of the more open minded forum users who have the same ability as me to see beyond the superficial agree with me.

I really hope you're joking. Only open-minded forum users agree with you.

Sanctimonious patronising condescending idiot.

Ahhh. That feels better.

Ok. Now we've traded some insults, because as much as you dress it up you were being massively insulting right there, can we get back to 'reasoned' argument?

If you're concerned about Johnson's limitations in the upper echelons a.k.a Sturrock and his inability to deal with superstars, may I remind you where we are?

How could we, with a reduced budget and a pitiful record of underachievement hope to attract a manager of Premiership standard?

Why should we, with a reduced budget, spend all that money on a manager with a huge pedigree when we're still in Division 3?

Why should we, having spent a fortune on players and ex-premiership managers in the past, spend that much more on that failed model at this level?

Johnson seems to have the ethos that team work is all important and that the team is more important than the individual. If that means that primadonnas have no room in the squad then fair enough.

Recent results show that despite having only a fraction of the stars/budget that DW had at his disposal, Johnson's emphasis on team spirit is paying dividends at this level.

And it should work in the championship - after all Plymouth are doing well enough without having to make so many changes. And to me AJ seems to come from the Sturrock mold.

I agree that team vs talent won't work in the premiership, but let's not run before we can walk eh?

Let's accept that City aren't Arsenal, and for now, the ability to manage highly paid sensitive premiership stars is not exactly at the top of pre-requisites for managing City right now....

And given that *assumption* that AJ would be crap at managing in the premiership or higher echelons on the Championship, let's be happy with what we've got: a manager well suited to getting us out of this poxy league.

[Colemanballs]

If thats not indicating that he wants a manager that will take us to the premiership until he is satisfied with who the manager is, then I don't know what it is. Totally unprovoked comment too.

I know I'm not Ron, but I commented on the premiership manager comment too.

Thank you. I missed that comment originally. I'm not sure that Ron could rightfully say that Robbored said that he 'will not be convinced unless he takes us to the premiership' but I can see how it might be possible to infer that was Robbored's opinion from what he wrote.

[Guest Ron]

Thank you. I missed that comment originally. I'm not sure that Ron could rightfully say that Robbored said that he 'will not be convinced unless he takes us to the premiership' but I can see how it might be possible to infer that was Robbored's opinion from what he wrote.

Sorry, I didn't re-read Robbored's post when I wrote the post in question, but as you say from my point of view it implies that this side should be in the Premiership, that Robbored thinks Johnson can't lead us there and that he will only be impressed if he does, as he has said he won't be if Johnson merely gets us promoted once.

[SE23Red]

I'm glad some forum users have the intellect to appreciate my point of view - even if they don't agree with it.

Many of the more open minded forum users who have the same ability as me to see beyond the superficial agree with me.

Being both intellectual and open minded help me in identifying a blustering, hypocritical, cantankerous old fool full of vitriol and bitterness when I see one.

Anyway back to the point. How good is the squad, promotion material or seven players short?

[Guest Ron]

Anyway back to the point. How good is the squad, promotion material or seven players short?

By the looks of it, we are 2 players short of promotion. The back 5 are certainly capable of big things when needed, the weak links in the team are a striker for Brooker, I was so happy to see McCammon start yesterday but it is true what people say, he is not good enough for any higher than this league - and when faced with a small, not incredibly fast defence he is not going to be half as useful as that of the small, pacey Leroy Lita last year.

Aswell as this, we looked like we only had 1 wing against Yeovil, Scott Brown was awful. Scott Murray's game has been worked out by defenders, Cotterill is more erratic than Phillips, we need a new winger, beit left or right sided, as Wilkshire (and cover Cotterill) can play both.