I went to the game today and we were dire. In fact, we weren't even as good as that... HOWEVER although the lynch mob continues to grow for DM, IMHO, you could sack him and get in any one of the multitude of names that are being bandied about on this site (and others), and I doubt it would make a blind bit of difference as the manager ISN'T THE PROBLEM...! What I saw on the field today from some of our players was quite simply unacceptable. As someone said on another thread, DM looked pretty fed up with being let down on the field, AGAIN...!!!! and for me, there were several out there who have clearly already given up and were just going through the motions. We lacked:- a). a functional midfield b). players taking responsibilty and most importantly, c). professional pride Worthy of special mention were:- Wilson (M) - I hadn't really seen enough before to decide about him but if today is anything to go by, NEVER AGAIN Pearson - clearly a decent player when he puts the effort in so I have to question if he is mentally right as his mind clearly wasn't on the job, he totally abdicated his responsibility as our central midfield driving force today. I do sympathise about the break up but its time to either make the decision to move back home if the marriage is salvagable or, move on and throw yourself into your football, either way, make your mind up NOW please as we can't afford to wait any longer. Fontaine - I found myself feeling a bit sorry for LF today. He was never top drawer material but he used to give his all and be committed to the cause. My guess is that DM tried to boost his confidence by making him captain and show faith but the player I saw today was a pale shadow of his former self and a very poor excuse for a footballer. He looked like a man who has completely lost his way and all confidence with it and I have to wonder if there is something off pitch behind this. The best thing for all concerned would be for LF to go out somewhere on loan (Yeovil?) and try and rebuild his career as currently, I never want to see him in a red shirt again. The final nail in that particular coffin had to be when the referee was walking towards him with his hand reaching in his pocket for a card, our own supporters were shouting "off, off, off" Play him again Derek and it will probably cost you your job as even I will lose patience. For the first time today, I saw some players on the pitch who were beaten before the game even started and that is completely unacceptable. We had NO ONE in midfield prepared to accept the responsibility for driving our attack resulting in the ball going:- Forwards, hold, backwards, sideways, sideways, backwards, sideways, backwards, pass back to keeper, whoosh, lose ball for 1-2 minutes, get it back, sideways, forward, backwards, sideways, backwards, sideways, sideways, backwards, etc, etc, etc. We even turned our own corner into a backpass to Heaton...!!!!! James Wilson did his best as did Louis who put in several crucial challenges. Ryan Taylor did a solid job again and you never know, if he ever got to face the right way, he might score us a lot of goals. Cole, Bobby Reid and Anderson worked hard however Greg Cunningham was left hopelessly exposed, 2 or even 3 on 1 time after time and consequently didn't have a prayer. The rest were pretty much anonymous. The message to Steve Lansdown is that some of the players have to go. We have to pay their wages to the summer whatever but we need to effectively fire those who look like they have given up and get them away from the club NOW We do not need or indeed, cannot afford their negativity and defeatist attitude wearing off on those left who are still bothering to put the effort in... Whether you decide to change the manager or not, if you want to make this a BIG club, you cannot afford to wait for the summer. You need to get your cheque book out one last time and let the manager get his summer targets in now as some of our players are past their sell by date and we need players who are prepared to take on the responsibility of dragging us out of the mire....
everything relates back to the manager.. And if you think Pearsons a good player then there's just no hope.
Have to totaly agree with POB.................good comments well put with passion something some of OUR players in OUR club just don't have. ship out if you are not committed to the common cause!
Sorry who picks the team. Who gives them the tactics. Who trains them. Prem you have to wake up and realise yes the players aren't very good but the manager is even worse. The manager is responsible for 9/10 results. Theres a reason why we're where we are. Is because we are a very poor/crap team/club. In fact as its stand we are the 2nd from worse club in our league. That's means everything from the players to the manager. None of them are any good. Like I said earlier in the season. A good manager wouldn't let his team lose 7 in a row. It just doesn't happen. I would rather we get someone new in and let him have a go than see the rest of the season out with del because as it is, We are RELEGATED.
But Shiny, we all know who picks the team etc, but if he does not have enough quality with the ones we have, then no manager on earth will be able to do anything with them. As I said elsewhere, I think several were left out today to ensure they are fit for the League next week. I wish the 8 to 12 DROSS would just leave us. Even if we put out only 7 or 8 experienced players plus Academy boys making up the numbers, we would have more passion than that lot today. POB; superb comments on today's non-performance.
Well written thread POB but I think the time for epithets and excuses has long since disappeared. The leader of the pathetic players on the pitch is Derek McInnes, no ifs ands or buts, and it is that simple. I listened intently to the game on Radio Bristol and it's become more evident by the game that 20man is becoming embarrased to be associated with this lot. The usual after match phone-ins that I heard were not done with venom, as you would expect, but rather with sombre resignation that we are definite candidates for relegation. Steve Lansdowne needs to look in the mirror and take a step back and say to himself that releasing Derek McInnes has to be done because under his stewardship we have reached the lowest point since returning to the Championship. No matter how much I despise certain players for their lack of commitment when the ball stops rolling it's always the manger who gets rolled over. Derek McInnes came from a team that, by it's very definition, had players who were out to prove that they were worthy of bigger things and by showing up for every game had chance of doing better. The situation at Ashton Gate is whole different scenario where we have too many underperforming players who clearly don't give a rat's ass about their employer and the supporters. Different horses for different courses and I regret to say that Derek McInnes has fallen at too many fences to be considered for the rest of this race. Time for him to move on because his race has been run and he's lost any support from me and a lot of others. Sorry Prem.
If Del only has sh1t to pick, he can only pick sh1t...........simples. The problem is where can we off load them? Who wants them?......we don't thats for sure.
Prem good script,however DM has to take responcibility for crazy formations,players in wrong positions,wrong substitutions that is his doing. Also there is a strong chance he has lost the dressing room. This guy has a worse record than any previous manager in the last 15 years or so. Any other championship club he would be long gone.
Mcinnes will be sacked, just not soon enough. As they say in cricket - 'look in the book'. The player's performances are lamentable. Decisive leadership and inspiration at AG is a real problem. Listening to McInnes and Skuse post Blackburn made me ill. The club is in freefall and action needs to be taken, not the end of January. Will the dithering Board act soon enough - of course not. They are just part of the malaise. The Board's useless. The Manager is worse than useless. And so are the players. McInnes and staff will win the lottery. The players will carry on driving 'Supercars'. All we'll get is a guts ache.
Everything you say redprintt is spot on the mark but it seems that certain people just cannot face those facts. As Prem so eloquently stated the pride has long since disappeared from anything Bristol City, and it hurts even more when you consider that there doesn't seem to be anyone at Ashton Gate prepared to accept the realities. Top of the list of disinterested people must be the board who seem to sit on their backsides and just hope that some miracle is about to appear out of nowhere. The players are so wrapped up in their cotton wool egoes and clearly don't give a hoot about the welfare, or future, of the club. A total bunch of money grabbing wastes of space and as you say when you see their interviews you suddenly want to wring their selfish necks. As for Derek McInnes, my patience ran out some time ago and when I saw the photo of him screaming in the air after the win over 10 man Posh my belief totally vanished. You didn't win the Champions League Derek you just won a game which is what you have been paid for all along and, just in case you haven't looked at the Championship table recently is indeed a very rare occasion. All guilty as charged. Time to say goodbye.
Nicely written Prem. None of us really know whats going on behind the scenes. Maybe Fontaine plays a blinder in training every week and forces his way into contention and then turns into rubbish when the whistle blows. Maybe Davies is the other way round - rubbish in training and so he always ends up on the bench. We would have known that Blackburn would have played their 1st XI as they also wanted to win, so why not try out a few of the youngsters, including that new startlet from Guernsey and a few of the other lads. Who knows. We might have lost by a cricket score, but we would have maybe found someone who we could say was the next Adomah or Maynard or Carey. And the lads would have given 100% for sure, rather than the usual laboured stuff we are being served up right now. An opportunity lost. And now we will never know.
Watching Cole Skuse interview and watching his body language, he scratched both ears for about 20/30 seconds at the beginning of the interview. "The Ear Rub - This is, in effect, an attempt by the listener to 'hear no evil' in trying to block the words by putting the hand around or over the ear. This is the sophisticated adult version of the handsover-both-ears gesture used by the young child who wants to block out his parent's reprimands. Other variations of the ear rub gesture include rubbing the back of the ear, the finger drill (where the fingertip is screwed back and forth inside the ear), pulling at the earlobe or bending the entire ear forward to cover the earhole. This last gesture is a signal that the person is trying to not hear the subject." It's very obvious that the subject was very upsetting to him. I think from this that he really does care about the situation City are in.
Some of the players we have do have very limited ability but the good and great managers (like Cloughie) won European Cups with a bunch of has-beens (or never were's) so do we have a motivation issue ???
I believe we do, would you ever see a Warnock team, ferguson team, even a gary Johnson team strolling like a bunch of hasbeens. Mciness clearly couldn't gee up his players to play in an fa cup infront of 5,000 people. and considering he's statued numerous times he wanted a good cup run it's quite clear there's a motivation issue
To be fair, we've not had a manager that said that we didn't want to do well in the cup. That being said, McInnes should have left the cup as a chance for the fringe players to have a crack. If they were better than the current first team I'd be happy to drop the lot.
That's hardly one to throw at McInnes. We haven't won an FA or League Cup tie for six years so that monkey is not of DMc's making!
Supporters only want to see players try hard.. and not one of them can say that they gave it their 100% against blackburn
Agree Lan but I'm fast moving to the opinion that the Club speaks with forked tongue about Cup matches. Before every cup match for the last six years, the current manager has stated "We will play our strongest team as we (the club) want a cup run" Yet we all know that for six years, we have not "turned up" for the match so does the Club have two policies? One for the public - we want a cup run, and another for the playing staff - no cup runs wanted here so don't put in a good shift and make sure you lose! Or am I just getting more cynical the older I get?
