1. Log in now to remove adverts - no adverts at all to registered members!

Lee Johnson Anyone?

Discussion in 'Bristol City' started by wizered, Oct 16, 2020.

  1. wizered

    wizered Ol' Mucker
    Staff Member

    Joined:
    Jan 25, 2011
    Messages:
    33,401
    Likes Received:
    5,983
    Former Bristol City manager Lee Johnson: ‘One-on-one, Guardiola and Mourinho both showed humility’
    Johnson is searching for the perfect new job after four years at Aston Gate which brought him up against some of the best in the business

    When, in the 2017-18 season, a run to the semi-finals of the EFL Cup pitted his side against Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United and Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City, Bristol City manager Lee Johnson spared no effort or expense – a £450 bottle of wine was purchased to lure the former – in securing one-on-one post-match sit-downs with two of football’s greatest minds.

    Johnson welcomed Mourinho into his office at Ashton Gate following a shock 2-1 victory over United in the quarters, and he sat opposite Guardiola at the Etihad after the Robins’ cup streak was ended one step short of the final.

    He was searching for advice, pointers, any kind of golden nugget of information that he could glean from the pair who, between them, have won 16 league titles and four Champions Leagues. In the end, Johnson found the two men, who have feuded bitterly in the past, share a common trait each might not recognise in the other.

    “It was about the tactical ideas,” Johnson remembers of his meetings with the rival managerial megastars. “It was interesting because it wasn’t just me firing questions. That’s what impressed me with Guardiola and Mourinho. I don’t think you can be as successful as they are without being top humans, top people. Obviously they’ve got very different media styles, but, in a one-to-one, you can sense they’ve both got a humility.”

    In his four years in charge of Bristol City, between his 2016 appointment and his departure in July, Johnson strived to mine every possible resource in an effort to broaden his managerial skillset and improve his team. No potential gain was too marginal.

    He spent time shadowing NHS doctors and nurses and studied how the SAS and the Red Arrows operate under pressure. He invited a wide range guest speakers, from Ian Wright to members of Rudemental, to share their experiences with his players.

    “When I go on my case studies, it’s not always necessarily built around football,” Johnson explains. “It can be built around a theme or a philosophy that builds into football. When I went to the NHS, that was more about decision-making under pressure, and the SAS was more about communication, particularly when you’re in high-pressure environments. And also the Red Arrows, which was very interesting, was more based on critique and feedback in a post-mortem of a football match.

    “Those communication techniques become really important. It’s all building this toolbox to be able to deal with what can be a very complex set of circumstances in a football dressing room.


    “I’m always conscious to call them marginal gains, but it’s ways to implement your thought processes, your philosophy and get [the players] to buy into it. And, more importantly, to retain the information. In this era, it’s really important that we find that route in as quickly as possible.”

    Even dating back to his early days as a 33-year-old manager in charge of Oldham, Johnson has sought to broaden his skillset by studying other coaches, clubs and cultures. He has spent time observing the methods of Barcelona and Real Madrid, watched how his dad – Torquay manager Gary Johnson – coached a low-on-confidence Latvian national team, and spent extended time with the City Football Group’s various clubs and RB Leipzig.

    “I thought I’d pull back maybe four or five nuggets of gold to share with Bristol City,” he says of his time with Leipzig, and I remember writing down 47 things in a three- or four-day spell.

    In his time at Ashton gate, Johnson’s borderline-obsessive attention to detail (he would, for example, measure the length of the grass at away grounds) drove a slew of technical innovations, from using drones to record training sessions to installing pitchside screens to deliver instant feedback.

    “I’ve always loved a gadget,” he admits. “You have to apportion a certain amount of time to make sure the world-class basics are there, the fundamentals of your game and your culture, but at the same time spend that proportion of time finding those marginal gains or one per cent or technological advances you can improve with. It’s trying to find those minute moments you can influence.”

    He also adopted the principles of tactical periodisation, a training methodology developed by Vitor Frade, a Portuguese academic at the University of Porto, and espoused, in particular, by Mourinho and a string of his compatriots. The premise is most simply explained as ensuring a team or manager’s tactical and philosophical aims are worked towards in every aspect of the players’ work, with each training drill, for instance, replicating some aspect of a match situation.

    “First and foremost, it’s to simplify the complexity,” Johnson says, “to be able to relate your ideas and game models to make sure everybody understands. From that, the football club and the team gains an identity but also a structure. It’s a really good organisational tool.”

    But Johnson extended this approach beyond the confines of Bristol City’s training ground. “Part of that tactical periodisation piece was to move all the way down to wives and social,” he continues, “that they’ve got an understanding of how the team is picked, how the manager thinks, how the players are going to respond, and how they can reframe the player to get back to that fighter mentality.

    “I know that sounds a long way from the football pitch but, as we know, when players are happy, when their families are happy, they play their best football.”

    Obsessed as he is with chasing advantages and improvements for his team, Johnson insists he applies the same honest scrutiny and desire to get better to himself, his successes and failures, methods and motivation.

    “You’ve got to understand that you don’t know everything,” he concedes. “You can’t be the Mecca of all knowledge when it comes to football. You’ve got to get good staff around you, you’ve got to trust the staff and you’ve got to strive to improve. That’s what gets me up in the morning, that constant strive to improve.

    “You’re never going to reach perfection, and sometimes being a perfectionist can be a problem – that’s something I’m studying at the moment; it’s the perfectionist in me that needs to taper down. But that thirst for knowledge, that’s what I enjoy. That’s just built into my personality.”

    Johnson may have fallen short of his ultimate aim of getting Bristol City promoted to the Premier League, but prior to his sacking in July after a run of nine leagues games without a win, he’d delivered year-on-year improvement at Ashton Gate and was, at the time, the Championship’s longest-serving manager.

    He looks back on the last four years with “a warm glow”, but the last few months have given him time also to analyse, to scrutinise, to obsesses. He’s turned down a couple of job offers he felt weren’t quite right for his next step. But, still only 39, he won't stand still for long.

    “I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on every decision that’s been made,” he says, “and take all the successes and the failures and try and redefine and improve.

    “You’ve got to keep learning in this game. You’ve got to keep adapting.”
    https://www.independent.co.uk/sport...-guardiola-manager-bristol-city-b1073104.html


     
    #1
  2. wizered

    wizered Ol' Mucker
    Staff Member

    Joined:
    Jan 25, 2011
    Messages:
    33,401
    Likes Received:
    5,983
    A little trip down memory lane.
     
    #2
  3. AshtonRed

    AshtonRed Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Feb 14, 2017
    Messages:
    8,784
    Likes Received:
    3,246
    I don’t dislike him , but he does talk nonsense at times <laugh><laugh>
     
    #3
    bcfcredandwhite likes this.
  4. wizered

    wizered Ol' Mucker
    Staff Member

    Joined:
    Jan 25, 2011
    Messages:
    33,401
    Likes Received:
    5,983
    Gis a job...
    please log in to view this image
     
    #4
  5. Supcon72

    Supcon72 Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jun 13, 2012
    Messages:
    8,310
    Likes Received:
    2,611
    I still think he was a bit harshly treated to be sacked, considering how he had established us as a top 10 team in this league, but the team was in freefall again from Feb last season.

    He does overthink and over waffle at times though....
     
    #5
  6. Redprintt

    Redprintt Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2011
    Messages:
    6,760
    Likes Received:
    3,436
    He's looked at everything to improve his management.
    He hasn't looked at himself, it's his personality that will always be his undoing.
    Junior's been spoilt all his football career, playing and managing.
    Suck it up my dear friend.
     
    #6
  7. Jiffie

    Jiffie Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Apr 6, 2020
    Messages:
    3,675
    Likes Received:
    1,275
    Not harshly treated at all, 3 seasons of groundhog day, (to paraphrase mad Mick Mcarthy, world beaters until December, panel beaters until May.

    Became more and more careful in his approach, making the matchday experience almost unwatchable, kept tinkering, kept picking badly performing players, never took responsibility, started to publicly criticise players and crucially never built a capable midfield.

    I will always be grateful for the positives that he brought to the club and the fact that he left Holden with a great base to work from in the same way that Cotterill left him with a great base, which is evidence that over the past 5 years or so the club has been going in the right direction, where root and branch surgery was not needed after every new manager is appointed, just a fresh vision.

    I will be very interested to see where his next job will be, I suspect it won't be a club as big as us.
     
    #7
  8. Jiffie

    Jiffie Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Apr 6, 2020
    Messages:
    3,675
    Likes Received:
    1,275
    And going forward, the football club could do worse than take a leaf out of the rugby clubs book, their media department is awesome, the fans are made to feel fully involved even during lockdown, there is IMHO too much secrecy within the football side of BristolSport and the fans kept at arms length.
     
    #8
  9. oneforthebristolcity

    oneforthebristolcity Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 26, 2011
    Messages:
    8,360
    Likes Received:
    2,788
    Nothing to do with his personality RP...You just hated him for whom he was.....always seemed a level headed decent guy to me....still learning his trade.....he will do ok within football..
     
    #9
    realred1952, Supcon72 and manxrobin like this.
  10. AshtonRed

    AshtonRed Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Feb 14, 2017
    Messages:
    8,784
    Likes Received:
    3,246
    I don’t disagree, his tendency to over complicate things, and publicly criticising individual players, did annoy me though.
     
    #10
    Jiffie likes this.

  11. Jiffie

    Jiffie Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Apr 6, 2020
    Messages:
    3,675
    Likes Received:
    1,275
    On the subject of over complication. I sometimes watch substitutes being given instructions from an ipad and I think I have been to catholic weddings and funerals that never lasted that long. They are footballers FFS, most of them need somebody to change a fecking light bulb.
     
    #11
  12. wizered

    wizered Ol' Mucker
    Staff Member

    Joined:
    Jan 25, 2011
    Messages:
    33,401
    Likes Received:
    5,983
    * “I thought I’d pull back maybe four or five nuggets of gold to share with Bristol City,” he says of his time with Leipzig, and I remember writing down 47 things in a three- or four-day spell.

    * Johnson’s borderline-obsessive attention to detail (he would, for example, measure the length of the grass at away grounds) drove a slew of technical innovations, from using drones to record training sessions to installing pitchside screens to deliver instant feedback.

    * “I’ve always loved a gadget,” he admits. “You have to apportion a certain amount of time to make sure the world-class basics are there, the fundamentals of your game and your culture, but at the same time spend that proportion of time finding those marginal gains or one per cent or technological advances you can improve with.

    * He also adopted the principles of tactical periodisation, a training methodology developed by Vitor Frade, a Portuguese academic at the University of Porto.

    *“First and foremost, it’s to simplify the complexity,” Johnson says, “to be able to relate your ideas and game models to make sure everybody understands.

    *“Part of that tactical periodisation piece was to move all the way down to wives and social,”

    * Johnson insists he applies the same honest scrutiny and desire to get better to himself, his successes and failures, methods and motivation.

    * “You’ve got to understand that you don’t know everything,” he concedes. “You can’t be the Mecca of all knowledge when it comes to football.

    * “You’re never going to reach perfection, and sometimes being a perfectionist can be a problem – that’s something I’m studying at the moment; it’s the perfectionist in me that needs to taper down. But that thirst for knowledge, that’s what I enjoy. That’s just built into my personality.”

    * He looks back on the last four years with “a warm glow”


    10 thoughts from LJ, is it gobbidy or gook, is it jgf2?
     
    #12
    Last edited: Oct 17, 2020
  13. oneforthebristolcity

    oneforthebristolcity Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 26, 2011
    Messages:
    8,360
    Likes Received:
    2,788
    Was watching Wenger on Graham Norton last night....I think he ate, drank and slept football for the last 50 years, everything down to the finest detail...total obsession.....Stuff I think LJ tried to pick up on..(of course doesn't always work)...It's what they enjoy...good luck to them
     
    #13
  14. Jiffie

    Jiffie Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Apr 6, 2020
    Messages:
    3,675
    Likes Received:
    1,275
    The problem is the players have to buy into it and when that doesn't any longer work you have a problem and that is what happened with Wenger at Arsenal and increasingly to Johnson.

    As I said in response to the over complication comment, a lot of footballers are notoriously a little slow and many have a very low concentration threshold, I think sometimes you can overload them with useless information.

    Friday briefing "tomorrow is Saturday we have a game at home (that is Ashton Gate in Bristol) we meet at Failand at 10am (that's when it's light and the big hand is on the 12 and the small hand is on the 10)"

    Tell them what positions that they are playing in and who if anyone they are marking and anyone who is a danger man, make sure they have their kit on the right way round and boots on the correct feet and know which way we are attacking and defending and how to take a knee, job done.

    Oh yes for away games no hookers in the bedroom, there's a pandemic raging at the moment.
     
    #14
    oneforthebristolcity likes this.
  15. oneforthebristolcity

    oneforthebristolcity Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 26, 2011
    Messages:
    8,360
    Likes Received:
    2,788
    Ha Ha and bang goes the science of the game as many mention on here that is so important!!
    Seriously though, I do think, that football has moved on leaps and bounds, but I agree, like anything there is a tendency to go OTT

    Oh yes for away games no hookers in the bedroom, there's a pandemic raging at the moment

    Stop mixing Rugby with football!! <laugh>
     
    #15

Share This Page