Not sure if this is the right place to post this but, anyway, Colwill not in Bellers' Wales squad. No surprise there. A couple of ex-City players feature. Mark Harris and Tom Lawrence. Is he impressing at Rangers who have had a crap last few weeks. He never impressed me when with us a few years back.
Some crucial games tonight including Pompey v Plymouth and Hull v Oxford. Stoke at home to Blackburn who we play on Saturday.
Every result this mid week round has gone the wrong way - especially ours onTuesday. Over the last 48 hours, Luton, Derby, Plymouth, Hull and Stoke all won their games and took the 3 points whilst we just pathetically crumbled. Although we lost our previous 2 games against top 4 sides Burnley and Sunderland, we played reasonably well. I had a degree of confidence we could do this. Now that's evaporated within the space of 2 days such was our abject performance against Luton - a game we just had to win. That points buffer we had has now gone and we're truly in for a rough ride.
Currently as it stands it is just about in City’s hands but if results go against us on Saturday it won’t be.
Blackburn, QPR, Preston, Sheffield Utd and Norwich away. Wednesday, Stoke, Oxford and WBA home. So how many points will we get in the run in? Before that abysmal performance on Tuesday I would have expected maybe 6. Now we could possibly get none. All the teams around us are getting their act together. We are floundering. So unless we get a couple of ‘surprise’ results we’re off to Division One. If we do somehow manage to stay up there has to be wholesale changes at our club, from top to bottom. Yes I know we’ve been saying this for years now but we really are in the last chance saloon should we survive.
We keep banging on about home games being crucial and obviously they are, but the odd point (or 3) on the road is going to be key. With 27 points still available, 9 should do it. The question is can we even get that amount from whichever games they come? I can't see 22nd place getting more than 45 points this season, though Brum were unlucky last season going down in 22nd with 50. EDIT - on second thoughts given our crappy goal difference - make that 10 more points.
After Tuesdsy night I don’t think we can have great expectations about collecting many points from our home games. Maybe there will be less pressure away from the CCS. If we can nick a win at Blackburn, QPR or Preston it will help. We also can’t be reliant on getting a result at Norwich in our last match even if they are not in the play off hunt. One thing is for certain. We need to secure some points sooner, rather than later, as it’s costing me a fortune on Gaviscon.
I think your point about away games is on the money. Understandably, CCS has been a miserable place and I'm thinking the board would do well to offer deals to get more fans in. If course, as soon as I wrote "board" I realised the error of my ways. We need POSITIVE action.
That epitomises a major difference between last season and this. Last season we ‘nicked’ (to use IB’s verb) a number of away wins - I remember the likes of Sheff Wed, PNE, QPR, Sunderland and possibly others but not this season; well not yet so it would be ideal to nick one on Saturday as our home form cannot be taken for granted either.
I honestly don't think it's about the admission money/deals Cling - nor the cost of refreshments/food etc. This is about paying to enjoy something rather than endure it. I've payed my season whack and can't change that now, but I've chosen not to go quite a number of times this season through pure choice - stuff the outlay. I accept I might not be the norm, but there must be more than a few others like me. The way to get fans/supporters back into the ground is to entertain and win - it's a simple (complicated?) as that.
I hear you loud and clear Sparkey and agree that getting results would encourage bigger attendances. However, being realistic (unlike me) I can't see that happening without some sort of action. I think it's unlikely that we can find a saviour to take over at the helm and Riza certainly appears to struggle to fire up the squad for a number of reasons. But the squad showed that they can perform with a large, loud crowd behind them. I think also that in the local catchment area, there's a huge number of potential Bluebirds that aren't as jaded as us. If course, I'm sure we can expect little action of any kind from owner and board.
Sadly you are one of many Sparks - I've had chances to go on a few occasions this season (I gave up my season ticket a few years back now) but have decided that other pursuits have needed to take precedence instead - not because there was a pressing urgency with any of these things but just because I wanted to get them done or decided that it would be time better spent than lugging my backside to the CCS. I often feel guilty about it (not going) but even when I do go there has been minimal enjoyment (even when we've won games) - partially because some of the football on offer has been rather 'mediocre', partially because the atmosphere within the stadium has been pants (hardly any singing any more at home games & even when we do very little variety in the songs etc.), partially because I get frustrated with fans attitudes nowadays too (can't be doing with booing your own team or really getting on players backs) and I also think I'm slowly losing faith in football in general as a sport - we get inundated with live games on Sky, hours upon hours of mindless drivel and analysis from so called pundits and journos etc., way too much hype and way too much criticism when things do go wrong. It's also horrid to say it, but we, along with just about every other team in the league are just slight variations on each other now - all clamouring to get to the Premier League (which I despise in so many ways) and out to make money rather than achieve real sporting success. Finding something 'special' or unique about your club apart from some distant faded memories/history and our own sense of loyalty is a very hard thing to do..... Ugh, I even shudder at myself for feeling like this but alas to me modern football is now rubbish and our club is just a small cog in the big money making machine... Case in point, Man Utd's bigwigs coming out and stating how they aim to make Man Utd the most profitable club in the world (or words to that effect)... not the greatest sporting club, not the most successful sporting club but the richest/wealthiest/most profitable... Sadly we, like all the rest are chasing that same crock of gold at the end of the rainbow.
One game gone our way today Not sure what’s the best result between Derby & Plymouth; a draw probably.
