Lee Johnson Gives an Insight # 2

Have you seen us play since the end of the season then to say we look a very poor side? When the season ended we were one of most in form sides in the division managing to beat two of the promoted sides and drawing with the other. Most of those players are still here. I don't believe we will storm to promotion but I think we are a tad better than a very poor side

 

Agreed. Can't see us going down realistically put it that way.

 

In the unpredictable hotpot that is the Championship, any team can be sucked into a relegation battle if they're careless.

I don't expect miracles from City, but I do expect improvement. With regards to those that are particularly downbeat, I would only ask, where do you think City ought to be? If it's challenging for the playoffs, then go ahead and name the twenty or so teams in this division that we ought to have greater ambitions than.

I was worried that the job came too early for LJ, almost more in regards to the reception he'd get from the fans than his own actual ability. Being a manager at any club at any time is always difficult, but the only way LJ could be accepted would be to significantly over-achieve, which is unlikely.

If he does manage to achieve unlikely success (such as promotion through the playoffs) then there'd be a fair bit of humble pie being eaten and it would really fly in the face of the now common practise of firing managers willy-nilly. Unfortunately, I think said pie will remain uneaten however.

 

Nick i'm waiting on the full squad with hopefully reinforcements arriving,before i make my prediction.
As we stand today bottom six.

 

There are a lot of strong teams in the championship and its going to be a very competitive league- On our day, we can be as good as anyone but over a season, I do feel it could be a similar finish to last. Some improvement maybe but not a lot- Another season of consolidation

 

Lets all give up then, accept mediocrity and bow down to the big boy teams shall we..

Pointless existing without ambition.. this is the epitome of our club.. "we're only small, lets all thanks our lucky stars we can beat a few teams now and again"

 

What positions are you hoping for reinforcements in?

 

It's difficult and there is no magic correct answer. Nobody is proved right or wrong until the season ends. It's football not maths or science.
Lee wasn't most people's choice and he wasn't mine either. During our mid-season nightmare I was calling for him to be replaced. Well, he wasn't - and we pulled ourselves clear. It's possible that a new manager might have taken us down and Lee would have taken the blame. Was that turnaround due to LJ learning on the job, lady luck or the stars being in alignment? Who knows.
Should we replace LJ now? Maybe and maybe not. I will tell you at the end of the season!
What I do know is that we have a dire record of choosing crap managers who have taken us down to L1. LJ for all his (many) faults isn't one of those - yet.

 

There's a difference between accepting mediocrity and expecting the unrealistic. All I'm saying is, if you DEMAND that City challenge for promotion and anything less is failure and heads deserve to roll then I think that's unreasonable. Promotion should be the long term aim, but that's the case for almost every team in the division.

 

The advantage fans have is they can say in hindsight what ought to have been done in terms of managers, players, formations... you name it and they can never be proven wrong. Like you say, there's no magic correct answer - there are so many different factors in football that being able to determine what actions are definitely right or wrong is often close to impossible and people can be guilty of specious reasoning. Claudio Ranieri was apparently a good enough manager to take Leicester to possibly Sports most unlikely triumph, but then had much the same team sliding towards relegation. Was he suddenly crap, or was N'Golo just THAT good, or were they just figured out?

 

You could also point to Pulis - probably hated even more than LJ by some of our fans, yet is now an established and respected premiership manager. Should we have stuck with him for longer? Maybe - we could have been where Stoke is now if we had(?) who knows. I certainly don't

 

We could have been where Stoke are now if we would have beaten them at their place in 2008.

Oh yea,, thats right GJ dropped Nick Carle who was playing well For guess who!

 

I can't speak for NickH but for me personally I see us as potentially a similar 'size' club to Forest, Borough, Birmingham, Crystal Palace or QPR - and bigger than Watford, Bournemouth or Burnley (with no disrespect intended to those teams).
It's our pedigree which lets us down. One season in the Prem and we would find ourselves on the footballing map again.

 

I agree.. Swansea wouldn't have been considered bigger team than us as little as 10 years ago.. or Hull, certainly Bournemouth. and plenty of others who have graced the Premiership

Supporting City is like groundhog day.. Same old ****e coming out of the club on a daily basis, same old complaints about Home shirts not being in stock or season cards not sent out yet.. then we have SL telling us all we are ambitious and will be going for promotion before the season tickets are on sale.. then the manager telling us "We cant afford to compete at this level" When the deadline has passed, We need to be patient!

We look as far away as we ever have for me at the moment..

I'll happily eat my humble pie if I am wrong

 

Why don't you freeze the humble pie banksy as I can't see it hitting your table any time soon.

 

Nick

A quality goalkeeper a must

A quality left back

A quality central midfield kingpin

A right winger

Then we should be good to go.
We are well short in those positions.

20 million would get the quality required,please don't tell me where are the funds going to come from.

We have a owner that can pull that out of his back pocket.

 

I think the key word there is 'potentially'. On the basis that Bristol is a large city and a comparatively nice place to live, and the club has decent resources, it should be able to sustain a Premier League side.

That said, all of the clubs you've named have been in the top flight in recent years and almost all have historically been placed higher more often than not (even Watford and Burnley, with the exception being Bournemouth).

I agree that we should aspire to reach the top obviously, but perhaps my expectation of how we do so is different to others. I think for City to rise above other clubs with similar/slightly greater resources/prestige, then they need to do things out of the norm in order to create a squad greater than the sum of its parts, with a view to the medium and long terms (though not completely neglecting the short term). Many will want us to spend vast amounts on 'proven' (i.e. often unobtainable, overpriced or old) players, sack any manager that hits a bad enough patch to warrant it and bring in someone new who will want to rip things up and bring in their own ideas and players.

I'm behind the general ideology City seem to have imposed since dropping to League One, in trying to identify young talent on the up, and sprinkling in just a handful of experienced heads. That said, I am concerned that LJ has a mountain to climb if he's to prove that he's worth standing by for the long-term. It seems like we want our own Eddie Howe, but unfortunately it's not as simple as backing someone just because of their association with the club.