Just read this on your Beeb page. "Bristol City manager Sean O'Driscoll says he is more concerned by the way his side is performing than whether they are getting points on the board. Following Saturday's 0-0 draw at Blackpool, O'Driscoll's side lie bottom of the Championship, two points away from safety with a game in hand. {BBC again? - I thought you had a game less} But the 55-year-old is concentrating on improving his side's displays, rather than the points they take from games. "It's about performances, not about points," he told BBC Radio Bristol." Given the situation you're in, that's a glaringly naive statement to come out with. You can perform well over the next 11 games and pat yourselves on the back, but that won't keep you up. Surely this next two months is all about survival. Appreciate he's got to start somewhere, and instilling organisation into the side is the way to go, but reality is table position. You need points - skilfull points, ugly points, lucky points - no matter what, only they will get you out of the bottom 3. No points are awarded for improved displays, only results. Mind you, I don't think the guy has ever "interviewed" well from memory, even when he was at Bournemouth before his Doncaster years, he often seemed uncomfortable under the lights. Hopefully, he's just said the first thing that came into his head when asked, otherwise he'll have all the time in the world to get the performances right next season in League One. A couple of tough home games for you now against good sides in Brighton and Middlesbrough could test that philosophy to the limit. If his "improved performances" gets you beating one or both of them (4 points would be brilliant), I'll be the first to come on here and say you'll stay up comfortably. Otherwise you'll be relying on the head to heads with others around you like Wolves and Huddersfield - that could be dangerous.
All right Sparks? I have said for the last few months and I will stick with it (for the time being at least).......we will not get out of this mess and are looking at L1 football next term. SOD has indeed got us playing better, of that there can be no arguement, but I still feel we are too lightweight in the middle of the park and still have an alarmingly suspect defence. There are a few teams currently on a bad run, Hudders and Wolves for example, but there are a few teams who keep getting results, Posh for one. As you said, two wins at home and it may be a different story, lose one of these at home and others pick up points, then its all doom and gloom and I am affraid we don't have then strength to pull out of the mix.
O'driscoll interviews very well. Don't get giddy after a result. Look at the performance, and performances with a cool head. Play like they did without the ball v Barnsley and it is inevitable relegation. City could have lost 5-6, v a team at the top that could be 3/4 down before half time. Mcinnes = chopping and changing game to game, and got nowhere fast. On current form, and level of performance it looks promising.
Hi Caldicot - how you keeping over here on the sunny side of the Bridge pal. I'll say right now, despite the forum jibes between us, I think you can do it but will need to grind out the points from the likes of Brighton, Middlesbrough and not rely on your head to heads with others in the same boat as you. As far as interviewing well is concerned, that remains a matter of opinion. Malky would knock spots off Sean, but it's results on the pitch that matter. Dave Jones was hopeless at handling the media, and always came across as a moaner. I'm not saying that O'Driscoll is in the same mould - just that he doesn't seek the media attention, and it often shows.
Despite the competition most fans feel the same about their own team and I hope you get the results you need as well as hoping Cardiff get the points we need. I have not seen a lot of difference when we play top half to playing bottom half of the division so a lot must be down to how much luck you get in a season. jck
Over the years I've listened to numerous interviews with managers from all levels of the game. I realise his 'style' doesn't do it for everyone. However I prefer SOD to the lot of them. He's just so down to Earth - I love it.
When SOD first joined us and I listened or read his interviews I must admit I thought his interviews and answers were as boring as hell, I now think I understand what his approach is, organise, work hard and cover for each other, stick to the team plan, no glory boys, round pegs in round holes, work hard for 90 plus minutes, create and take advantage of our opportunities, blend all of this mix together and you will get your points. He says it how it is, he doesn't try to impress the media, I like and prefer it, keep it up SOD and as you say, "Support your local football team"...
Some City fans went radio after Palace, and giddy after cardiff. If they had seen the performance away at Barnsley around the same time where the score line did not show up the performance they would have understood what was coming later. Johnson in a different way used to talk about blocks of ten. Play crap you might get a draw/win play crap for ten and it is division one.
Contribute to the thread Dodger, instead of trying to pull it down. There's no inter-club issue trying to be got across here guys. You are where you are with 11 games to go. I was trying to say that it's far better to come off the pitch saying we were poor today but we ground out the win/draw, rather than trot out that it was an improved performance today but we got **** all out of it. Improved team performances are a longer term issue, and to say that was the important thing right now and that points don't matter is a bloody farce. Build next year - the next two months is about getting stuck in and taking points from the games you wouldn't be expected to. I like the bloke, always have done but I'm sorry, that quote from him on your BBC page is an absolute joke.
Its not a joke, Results will come if you play well. Its no good us playing **** and hoping for results. He knows a lot more than you or any of us so I will trust what he says. He doesn't like the media as he has openly said, He is a very intelligent man
Shiney - I admire your loyalty mate, but there's a difference between playing **** hoping for results, and playing **** and getting points. If you think this game is about only getting results through playing well, you're mistaken. Wigan and Southampton are playing some lovely stuff in the Prem but can't grind out the results they need - both could go down. On the other hand, Villa are playing **** and deserve to go down. Norwich are doing it right and deserve to stay up. They can play some good football as well, but Hughton has got them picking up points by countering the opposition home and away. You've got 11 games left this season - plenty of time next year to worry about the niceties.
True sparky but if you play **** you might get a result ON THE DAY play **** for 11 games well, You wont get many points, If we play well for 11 games we have more of a chance of survival. If we go down we can hold our heads high and say we went down fighting and playing well, Better than going down and playing **** football. I personally think its to little to late for SOD, Derek McInnes should of been kicked out before January so SOD would of had about 25 games left and a full transfer window. We will fight until the end but I think we will be one of the 3 to go down I fully believe though that if we go down we can finish top 3 in league 1 under SOD. All though I would rather stay up and build on and try for a mid table finish to get a bit of stability back.
Sparkey and anyone else with interest; Don't be fooled by Sean O'Driscoll's apparently laid back attitude to the results we are getting since he arrived. What he is obviously doing is to try and relax the players because if you're all strung out about "MUST WIN THIS ONE" the tension caused in your own body and brain will beat you rather than the other side doing it. I'll give you an example; I played league table tennis for about 15 years when I was younger. In some games however hard I tried, the other guy just kept winning points that I could have won. When the score got to 10-19 (first to 21 with a lead of 2 points) it was often a reaction to say to oneself "OK so I've lost this game but let's try to get a good start in the next one". And what usually happened was that I would win the next 7 points to get to 18-19. What happens then is that the other player suddenly starts to relax and I tightened up because now I was back in with a shout. So lost the game 18-21! There is very little difference in quality between any of the sides in the Championship apart from nerves, tension and either confidence or lack of it. If there was any real difference in quality of Championship sides, then games between top and bottom would end up with the sort of scores you get in kids under 9's - 31-2 which was the worst defeat I ever suffered in junior football and I scored the "2" So O'Driscoll is actually relaxing the players so that they concentrate on the job - keeping the shape, sticking to the tactics and organisation like marking at set pieces, and in this way is actually getting better results with the same squad of players as his predecessor did. He claims he does not look at other results and the league table. He might think he's kidding the public but if you sit back and really give it some thought, he knows everything there is to know about every club and player in Championship squads.
Impressed with SOD but I'm with Wiz in that I was slightly underwhelmed listening to him when he first came in. If the worst happens and we go down then at least I think we have a fighting chance of coming back reasonably quickly under O'Driscoll.
The difference is simple Sean O'Driscoll wants his players to do the talking on the pitch he has always as far as I could tell(and I have wanted him as manager at the gate for years) Made the teams he has managed into a more organised setup and gets the players playing for each other. His most memorable quotes are 'I want my players to think for themselves on the pitch if they try and make a pass and fail thats OK it just means they need more training on making passes if they don't try and make those passes then I can't teach them anything'. And 'I want my players to go out and do one and a half jobs on the pitch theirs and to look and see if they can help a teammate' He does not know if he can save us from the drop but what he is trying to do is build a team spirit that will give us the best chance of staying up or if we fail the best chance of bouncing straight back. His opinion is that the only way he will manage a premiership team is to take a team there himself or as he puts it you rarely get the manager of a local veg shop becomming the manager of a Tesco Hypermarket. He isn't one of these really happy clappy people with the media giving out lots of sound bytes he says what he means and he sees that unless the team pulls together in the same direction they will go down the only chance we had from where we were was the way he is trying to take us had we still being managed by DM we would have probably got slaughtered by you and Palace as it was we got outplayed in both games but not out fought this is the only way we have a chance at the moment. He is trying to instill his values into the team which is what he has always done with every team he has managed and when you consider what he achieved with Doncaster and Bournemouth with no money at all and how he changed Forest's season around (and what happened to them once they got rid of him for a more media friendly higher profile manager) then a it gives us hope for the rest of this year and for the future regardless of how this season eventually pans out. Dave Jones might have been a miserable bugger but he built the basics of a good side for you and Malky inherited a much better squad than what he was working with before. S O'D arrived at AG to a squad completely disorganised and looking like they had never played together before(which they probably hadn't with all the changes of personel and positional that went on before What he is trying to do is play people as much as he can in the positions they are most comfortable in as they have to scrap for their position in the championship this year next year I expect there will be quite a few changes regardless of which division we are playing in.
Some good points guys, and the only one I would take contention with you Hawky, is your point about Malky inheriting a good squad from Dave Jones. It was absolutely decimated when Dave left with 10 leaving that summer en masse. Malky arrived and he has now brought in 21 new players to add to the quality of Marshall, Hudson and Whitts who were probably the only ones left from that era.
So Bellamy and Whittingham for example never played for you proir to Malky arriving thats funny because I thought of those two off the top of my head without even looking at your squad?
