Yesterdays Game.

[Blue Lion]

First of all i was disappointed when i took my seat at about 10 to 3 to see so the away upper tier barely half full although when i saw some of your fans taking their seats just before half time i guessed what had happened (f'kin Polish coach drivers aint they heard of Tom Tom).

As for the game itself i thought you looked solid at the back but only powderpuff up front and you only really threatend us when we presented you with chances. Once we'd got to grips with the game we played some nice stuff with plenty of posession football although we never really carved out any chances either. I'd been reading all week how glad you were to have your goalkeeper back, i dunno why i thought he looked very 'iffy' i hate to think what your reserve keepers like. IMO our midfielder Dave Brammer was the best player on the pitch by a mile as he has been for most games since we signed him from Stoke in the January window and he controlled the game for large spells. The first half was pretty even and 0 - 0 was about right at half time. I thought the start of the 2nd half was a little flat both in performance and atmosphere but it didn't take us long to pick the pace up and once we had we looked more dangerous than we had in the first forty five. The 'boys' were kicking towards their favourite end so when the goal came it was no surprise, it was well worked and Robinson took it well on the volley, a good finish for a central defender. Although our winger Ryan Smith didn't have his best game i thought his pace gave you problems all afternoon. We were denied a 'certain' penalty when Byfield was brought down in the box before you had two very good chances to equalise near the end, again the attempts were feeble at best.

All in all i was expecting more from your team, whether it was down to missing players, tension or whatever your performance was very average and nowhere near as good as Scunnys who were the best team to visit the Den this season and have been deservedly promoted. I was also disappointed with the volume of noise from the away end, Brighton had half the ammount of supporters there as you but made twice as much noise, maybe the tension was getting to you guys as well.

I think you will be too powerful for Rotherham next week so will still probably get promoted but i'd be interested in how you rated 'us' yesterday, i told you we could be 'dangerous' opponents.

I think you'll go up and i think you will probably hold your own in the Championship but you'll need to add 4/5 players including a couple of strikers because i thought the ones on show in red today were woeful!

[Andy Horsman]

First of all i was disappointed when i took my seat at about 10 to 3 to see so the away upper tier barely half full although when i saw some of your fans taking their seats just before half time i guessed what had happened (f'kin Polish coach drivers aint they heard of Tom Tom).

As for the game itself i thought you looked solid at the back but only powderpuff up front and you only really threatend us when we presented you with chances. Once we'd got to grips with the game we played some nice stuff with plenty of posession football although we never really carved out any chances either. I'd been reading all week how glad you were to have your goalkeeper back, i dunno why i thought he looked very 'iffy' i hate to think what your reserve keepers like. IMO our midfielder Dave Brammer was the best player on the pitch by a mile as he has been for most games since we signed him from Stoke in the January window and he controlled the game for large spells. The first half was pretty even and 0 - 0 was about right at half time. I thought the start of the 2nd half was a little flat both in performance and atmosphere but it didn't take us long to pick the pace up and once we had we looked more dangerous than we had in the first forty five. The 'boys' were kicking towards their favourite end so when the goal came it was no surprise, it was well worked and Robinson took it well on the volley, a good finish for a central defender. Although our winger Ryan Smith didn't have his best game i thought his pace gave you problems all afternoon. We were denied a 'certain' penalty when Byfield was brought down in the box before you had two very good chances to equalise near the end, again the attempts were feeble at best.

All in all i was expecting more from your team, whether it was down to missing players, tension or whatever your performance was very average and nowhere near as good as Scunnys who were the best team to visit the Den this season and have been deservedly promoted. I was also disappointed with the volume of noise from the away end, Brighton had half the ammount of supporters there as you but made twice as much noise, maybe the tension was getting to you guys as well.

I think you will be too powerful for Rotherham next week so will still probably get promoted but i'd be interested in how you rated 'us' yesterday, i told you we could be 'dangerous' opponents.

I think you'll go up and i think you will probably hold your own in the Championship but you'll need to add 4/5 players including a couple of strikers because i thought the ones on show in red today were woeful!

A fair analysis.Our boys froze.Can see why Richard Shaw is your player of the season, composed and class. We let ourselves down, But this division is quite poor and we have done this more than once this season and bounced back.We are dreadful up front at the moment, but we were fairly insipid all over the park.Think you have got the makings of a serious challenge next season. fair play. With our coaches and the fascist Met, not too good a day alround really.

PS Whats with all the lairy pre-pubescent chavs gobbing off in the bottom corner of the stand.Hilarious!!!More like the Tufty Squirrel club spring outing!!

[Avonmouth Docker]

[Dolman Block B]

First of all i was disappointed when i took my seat at about 10 to 3 to see so the away upper tier barely half full although when i saw some of your fans taking their seats just before half time i guessed what had happened (f'kin Polish coach drivers aint they heard of Tom Tom).

As for the game itself i thought you looked solid at the back but only powderpuff up front and you only really threatend us when we presented you with chances. Once we'd got to grips with the game we played some nice stuff with plenty of posession football although we never really carved out any chances either. I'd been reading all week how glad you were to have your goalkeeper back, i dunno why i thought he looked very 'iffy' i hate to think what your reserve keepers like. IMO our midfielder Dave Brammer was the best player on the pitch by a mile as he has been for most games since we signed him from Stoke in the January window and he controlled the game for large spells. The first half was pretty even and 0 - 0 was about right at half time. I thought the start of the 2nd half was a little flat both in performance and atmosphere but it didn't take us long to pick the pace up and once we had we looked more dangerous than we had in the first forty five. The 'boys' were kicking towards their favourite end so when the goal came it was no surprise, it was well worked and Robinson took it well on the volley, a good finish for a central defender. Although our winger Ryan Smith didn't have his best game i thought his pace gave you problems all afternoon. We were denied a 'certain' penalty when Byfield was brought down in the box before you had two very good chances to equalise near the end, again the attempts were feeble at best.

All in all i was expecting more from your team, whether it was down to missing players, tension or whatever your performance was very average and nowhere near as good as Scunnys who were the best team to visit the Den this season and have been deservedly promoted. I was also disappointed with the volume of noise from the away end, Brighton had half the ammount of supporters there as you but made twice as much noise, maybe the tension was getting to you guys as well.

I think you will be too powerful for Rotherham next week so will still probably get promoted but i'd be interested in how you rated 'us' yesterday, i told you we could be 'dangerous' opponents.

I think you'll go up and i think you will probably hold your own in the Championship but you'll need to add 4/5 players including a couple of strikers because i thought the ones on show in red today were woeful!

Good post and you and 20,000 other City fans know our strike force is pants.

Were all concerned and hope we have enough to beat Rotheram next week.

If we got to go through the playoffs, I'm sure u,ll be playing Bristol City again next season!

We ALL don't understand why Johnson didnt bring in a striker in Jan, although quite a few on here stated they thought our fire power was good enough.

Most thought differently.

Good luck to you mucker....Arn

[robins72]

I thought you had a good midfield better than ours on the day. Your final ball was poor in the first half otherwise you could have been 2-0 up. Second half started a bit flat like you said although you had the better chances and you had plenty of time to score the goal. Mccombe should have put away his chance but your keeper made a good save. Jevons had an even better chance but fluffed it up!! Fancy your lot to do well next season. Good luck and all that.

[BS10 RED]

I cant really comment missed most the first half but second half i thought our defence looked strong but once again it came down to our strikers didn't have the fire power like other teams have..I thought millwall looked a good team and I'm sure if they were a little better at the start of the season they would be in the top 3 or 4 with out a doubt.

As for the police what was that all about penning us in like dogs after the game it was stupid what they should of done was kept the wall fans in because they were having that team walk around anyway and cleared us out.

[italian dave]

Good post, Blue Lion. Interesting you saw the game the same way as so many of us. have a word with our manager about the strikers will you!!

As others have said, I thought you looked strong in midfield, and you used the wings well. Hard to make judgements about your strikers and defence because our defence is so strong and our attack so poor!

I think we will beat Rotherham, relying on a goal from the back or mifdield, as we have done most of the season. If we don't we won't get through the play offs, so see you next year!!

I also felt our players and fans were nervous and it showed in bucketloads. Our nightmare trips there didn't help (last week we were all at Carlisle by 2 and the atmosphere really built up well before the game) - see other posts. Does the Met Police know where Bristol is in relation to New Cross and Blackheath??!!

All the best for next season

[Blue Lion]

Fair comments lads fair play to you, with regards the OB they don't care where you live or where you've parked they just want you off their patch so they don't have to handle any trouble you maybe involved in, thats the way of it I'm affraid and it doesn't matter whether you support Bristol City, Millwall or Man Utd as football fans you don't need me to tell you you get treated like shit moreso if your travelling in numbers.

Keep the faith boys I'm sure your team will deliver next week although if its 0 - 0 at half time you'll really find out whether your team has the required character needed to claw its way out of this pisspoor division, good luck.

RESPECT!

[kachina]

We were poor yesterday, Millwall hardly impressive but they aint fighting for Championship football, problem with our club, it seems the passion bottle has run dry,

well done lion on the report, you got when you deserved and credit to yourself for being so open.

[bucksred]

First of all i was disappointed when i took my seat at about 10 to 3 to see so the away upper tier barely half full although when i saw some of your fans taking their seats just before half time i guessed what had happened (f'kin Polish coach drivers aint they heard of Tom Tom).

As for the game itself i thought you looked solid at the back but only powderpuff up front and you only really threatend us when we presented you with chances. Once we'd got to grips with the game we played some nice stuff with plenty of posession football although we never really carved out any chances either. I'd been reading all week how glad you were to have your goalkeeper back, i dunno why i thought he looked very 'iffy' i hate to think what your reserve keepers like. IMO our midfielder Dave Brammer was the best player on the pitch by a mile as he has been for most games since we signed him from Stoke in the January window and he controlled the game for large spells. The first half was pretty even and 0 - 0 was about right at half time. I thought the start of the 2nd half was a little flat both in performance and atmosphere but it didn't take us long to pick the pace up and once we had we looked more dangerous than we had in the first forty five. The 'boys' were kicking towards their favourite end so when the goal came it was no surprise, it was well worked and Robinson took it well on the volley, a good finish for a central defender. Although our winger Ryan Smith didn't have his best game i thought his pace gave you problems all afternoon. We were denied a 'certain' penalty when Byfield was brought down in the box before you had two very good chances to equalise near the end, again the attempts were feeble at best.

All in all i was expecting more from your team, whether it was down to missing players, tension or whatever your performance was very average and nowhere near as good as Scunnys who were the best team to visit the Den this season and have been deservedly promoted. I was also disappointed with the volume of noise from the away end, Brighton had half the ammount of supporters there as you but made twice as much noise, maybe the tension was getting to you guys as well.

I think you will be too powerful for Rotherham next week so will still probably get promoted but i'd be interested in how you rated 'us' yesterday, i told you we could be 'dangerous' opponents.

I think you'll go up and i think you will probably hold your own in the Championship but you'll need to add 4/5 players including a couple of strikers because i thought the ones on show in red today were woeful!

sounds pretty damn accurate a description of most of our season. Fair play, did think you were our toughest game in the last six, and so it proved. you'll not be long in this league, if you spend a bit.

got more respect fer you lot now, than I did before.

[no1cityfan_tucks]

First of all i was disappointed when i took my seat at about 10 to 3 to see so the away upper tier barely half full although when i saw some of your fans taking their seats just before half time i guessed what had happened (f'kin Polish coach drivers aint they heard of Tom Tom).

As for the game itself i thought you looked solid at the back but only powderpuff up front and you only really threatend us when we presented you with chances. Once we'd got to grips with the game we played some nice stuff with plenty of posession football although we never really carved out any chances either. I'd been reading all week how glad you were to have your goalkeeper back, i dunno why i thought he looked very 'iffy' i hate to think what your reserve keepers like. IMO our midfielder Dave Brammer was the best player on the pitch by a mile as he has been for most games since we signed him from Stoke in the January window and he controlled the game for large spells. The first half was pretty even and 0 - 0 was about right at half time. I thought the start of the 2nd half was a little flat both in performance and atmosphere but it didn't take us long to pick the pace up and once we had we looked more dangerous than we had in the first forty five. The 'boys' were kicking towards their favourite end so when the goal came it was no surprise, it was well worked and Robinson took it well on the volley, a good finish for a central defender. Although our winger Ryan Smith didn't have his best game i thought his pace gave you problems all afternoon. We were denied a 'certain' penalty when Byfield was brought down in the box before you had two very good chances to equalise near the end, again the attempts were feeble at best.

All in all i was expecting more from your team, whether it was down to missing players, tension or whatever your performance was very average and nowhere near as good as Scunnys who were the best team to visit the Den this season and have been deservedly promoted. I was also disappointed with the volume of noise from the away end, Brighton had half the ammount of supporters there as you but made twice as much noise, maybe the tension was getting to you guys as well.

I think you will be too powerful for Rotherham next week so will still probably get promoted but i'd be interested in how you rated 'us' yesterday, i told you we could be 'dangerous' opponents.

I think you'll go up and i think you will probably hold your own in the Championship but you'll need to add 4/5 players including a couple of strikers because i thought the ones on show in red today were woeful!

Agree with "most" of what you put mate, but got to disagree on the best player on the park. Today as he has been for a while the best player on the park was David Noble. Althought i do agree he should of taken his chance, he stands out far more than anyone in any team in this league.

[Bristol Boy]

If you look at the highlights, I think you'll see that, despite being crap, we had the better chances and that Pidgey made the better saves by far.

McCombe, Noble & Jevons should have scored and Orr was close from Showunmi's overhead.Noble hit three good efforts narrowly wide and Pidgely saved from Betsys first half header.I can only remember Basso making one good save from Byfield in the first half and, of course the goal.Basso has kept about 21 clean sheets and I wouldn't swap him for a ny keeper in this division and most in the division above, although he was right off his game for the first 15 minutes as I said in the review.

I don't think you'd have scored if GJ hadn't made the substitutions at the same time and chased the game, although I've no complaints in him doing that.

That having been said, we were poor and at least GJ put his hands up and admitted it after the game which I'll tolerate.I can't stand it when they talk about the game like it's different from the one you've seen and he never does that.

Our problem all season has been in the final third and the wide areas since Murrays injury when GJ for reasons best known to himself decided to play him in the hole against the Rovers at home in the JPT.

When you consider the half of our fans didn't arrive until half time I think you can see why the singing was not as great as it could have been although the performance never merited any form of delerium in large part.I travelled in on the train and met our lot in Whitechapel.It took the OB two hours to get us from there to the Ground, numbers were around 500/600!!!

As for the muppet show in the close corner of the right hand enclosure, I pi$$ed myself laughing when they tore that plastic sheet up-What did they think we'd do, jump down on them like some sort of Kamikaze Pilot or that they would levitate towards us in the upper tier.

I thought you played some neat controlled stuff without ever looking like causing us to many problems.

In terms of the atmosphere, it's not an intimidating place like The Old Den and I went there three or four times, once for a night match.It was noisy enough yesterday, but it would have been interesting to see how noisy it was if we'd have scored first.

I think we'll beat Rotherham and if we don't we definetly won't do it through the play offs and we'll see you next season.In the nicest possible way, I hope not.

Be lucky

BB

[Blue Lion]

I understand your pessimism when it comes to promotion given your reputation for choking over recent years but rest assured you will be playing in the Championship next season. You lot need to lighten up and enjoy it otherwise instead of looking forward to lying on a nice beach somewhere in the next month or so i can see a few of yous strapped to a bed in a padded room at the local 'funny farm'!

FFS CHILL OUT!

[Bristol Boy]

I understand your pessimism when it comes to promotion given your reputation for choking over recent years but rest assured you will be playing in the Championship next season. You lot need to lighten up and enjoy it otherwise instead of looking forward to lying on a nice beach somewhere in the next month or so i can see a few of yous strapped to a bed in a padded room at the local 'funny farm'!

FFS CHILL OUT!

Funny thing enjoying games and being a supporter of a particular club. I'll write something about that at the end of the season.

[WTFiGO!?!]

May I say that for a visitor to otib you're a most welcome guest - respectful, honest and true, Blue Lion. You restore faith into my belief that Football is about uniting.... being a post-modenist an all.

Had a cracking day up your way and may I say that the atmoshere (chaffy little #####'s or not) you created is the best I've ever witnessed (being a relative babby an that with the way Football/Society has gone). I only wish City'd take note, but we won't.

Anyway, let's have Rotherham....

[Blue Lion]

May I say that for a visitor to otib you're a most welcome guest - respectful, honest and true, Blue Lion. You restore faith into my belief that Football is about uniting.... being a post-modenist an all.

Had a cracking day up your way and may I say that the atmoshere (chaffy little #####'s or not) you created is the best I've ever witnessed (being a relative babby an that with the way Football/Society has gone). I only wish City'd take note, but we won't.

Anyway, let's have Rotherham....

Cards on the table. We played you lot at Ashton Gate in an opening day fixture in about 1972/73 , it was the 1st time i'd been to an away fixture without my ol' man apart from the local London derbys against the likes of Palace and Charlton, and they were always like home games anyway because our fans were always and always will be the dominant force in that particular triangular contest. I travelled by coach as many of your supporters did yesterday but the particular coach that i was on broke down somewhere along the M4. We were lucky enough to have a couple of reasonably attractive girls on board so decided to get them to hitch a lift while a group of us hid behind a grass verge, as luck would have it a Luton type van with a shuttered back was the 1st vehicle to pull up and after they'd persuaded the driver and his accomplice to drop them in Bristol the girls gave us a wink and a nod which was a signal for us to make a cavalry charge over the grass verge and pile into the back of the van. We'd obviously caught these guys on the hop and by the time they'd worked out what was happening it was too late, they'd ended up with 20 odd Millwall supporters in the back of their van and 2 or 3 in the front. I suppose they must have thought better of trying to persuade us to get out as they eventually agreed to drop us all in Bristol. Now this was August and i was sitting in the back of the van on the shelf just behind the drivers cabin on a sweltering hot summers day, i remember we had to keep raising the shutter to let some air in but we couldn't have it too high in case we were spotted by the OB. Anyway we eventually arrived in Bristol at about twenty to three, nowhere near Ashton Gate, and some of us caught a bus after inquring about how to get to the ground. Now the thing is some of us were wearing silk scarves 'round our necks and wrists and we were kind of isolated from all the other Wall fans who were by now safely inside AG. We got off the bus before the proper stop because it was getting a bit too risky as at every stop more and more City fans boarded the bus from the various pubs enroute so we decided we'd be better off on foot. It probably took us 15/20 mins to run to the ground and when we eventually got inside a cheer went up from the Millwall fans as they had obviously realised that our coach had gone 'wonky' and were pleased to see we'd made it. I can't remember the score but i know we lost the game but it was afterwards that sticks in my mind. It was my first real experience of football hooliganism at its height. Trying to get out of AG that day was a mission in itself, there was none of this holding the away fans back stuff that you get nowadays you were all let out together and it was probably the first time in my life that i'd been apprehesive about leaving a football ground, skirmishes had been gioing on throughout the game along with the banter and what i witnessed that day left a marked impression on me. There was none of this we won't target scarves or shirts nonsense, if you supported the opposing team you were fair game, not only were there supporters fighting each other with anything they could lay there hands on but the police were in the middle taking it from both sides, it was brutal but i made friends that day that would remain friends or at least nodding aquaintances for many a year to come as we watched each others backs as best we could all over the country. I was eventually smuggled onto a coach and back to London but not before i'd caught the bug NOT for the violence but for the buzz it gave me as we went all over the country supporting in our minds the greatest team in the world, a bond had been formed between men and boys that would never be broken, i was 15. I know its laughable now but thats how it was, you've gotta realise that we were in the papers what seemed to us like every other week in those days for one reason or another, if it wasn't for rioting it was for creating the longest unbeaten home record of 59 consecutive home games without defeat (since bettered by Liverpool) or for assaulting referee Norman Burtenshaw with a bottle as he left the pitch or because we were having the Den closed down or we were being threatened with having to play fixtures behind closed doors for one reason or another and to me it seemed the football world revolved around my team, a small team from Bermondsey. They made TV documentarys about us and even now they use our name to help promote their movies, is it any wonder some of our followers to this day still like to perpetuate the myth.

Anyway since those early days i've never had any particular liking for Bristol City and i've been back to Ashton Gate many times , whether or not i subconsciously assosciate you with my darker days or not i don't know but what i've found in the last couple of weeks or so is that the City fans that post on this particular site are nothing like i expected, i fully expected to be c**ted off from day one and at every opportunity but thats not happened, for that you have my utmost respect as fellow football fans as pasionate in your own way about your club as i am about mine, i sincerely wish you all the best in your quest for Championship football, i think you're 90% there you just need to keep the faith, if you fell asleep halfway through this post tough, you should've seen the length of it before you started reading!

[Gotta get rid of the Gas]

yer i reckon we could convert this bloke

cmon son sell up in Landaaaan and get your ass down the M4