Giving our 3 league games a closer look and seeing the panic and frustration from our fans, Might we just be over reacting? I found myself doing this at the beginning of last season and instead of it being a reason it was just an excuse and that being OUR GOALS AGAINST. The ones we have conceded. It's obvious we are going to concede goals this season but some of the ones we have let in have been gifted. Bradford - Frank fielding, If he stayed on his line that day we would have got 3 points ( Reason or Excuse? ) Coventry - Had SOD realised Fontaine shouldn't play we could have got 3 points ( Reason or Excuse? ) Wolves - If the players played like they did in the 2nd half for the full 90 we would have at least walked away with a point (Reason or Excuse ? ) The truth is we would be sitting 3rd with 7 points I believe if SOD had picked the right teams and Fielding stayed on his line. This has been our problem though for far to long. There are always reasons or excuses in nearly every game of why we didn't walk away with 1 or 3 points and im getting fed up of looking at it that way. We knew when the fixtures came out this would be a difficult month but I expected a lot better than what has been served up so far. So do you think there is a reason we are 18th or im finding excuses as to why were not joint 3rd?
Of course I would like to see us in a better league position but it is just way way too early to panick or worry just yet. We have played decent...even good....footy in patches so the signs are there to see an upturn in fortunes. The defence will be sorted (sooner rather than later I hope) then all will be rosy again!
As I've posted elsewhere, we are now 12 games in the league without a win, including the back end of last season. People who predicted we would get 100 points this season and would win our first 10 games are just deluded, but there are still worrying trends here in our performances and results which despite changing nearly the entire team are still to be seen every week. We should have beaten Bradford, and we should probably have beaten Coventry or at least taken a point. The concern is that if we fail to beat MK Dons and then Gillingham half of the first 10 games most of us said we'd give SOD will have gone, and we could still be on 1 point and overtaken by Coventry who started on -10 Yes of course it's early days, and the likes of Orient and Colchester will fade away in time, and there are the usual cliches such as it's a marathon not a sprint, but I remain unconvinced by O'Driscoll, his tactics or team selections. Until we start winning games, keeping clean sheets and proving we are capable of doing much better then my glass is very much half empty. Only 3 games gone, but overall just 3/10 for the manager.
I can't believe people are already talking about sacking SOD, after we've let him build his own team. Thank God most of you aren't in charge at Ashton Gate. I don't give a **** if we're sitting at 18th come January. SOD is a proven manager working on a tiny budget, with a number of players that I'm sure he'd love to offload if he could afford replacements. Sacking him is absolutely the wrong way to go about things.
I haven't even thought about sacking SOD yet. Im giving him the whole season to prove his worth. If we don't finish in the top half then I will question his ability
Given the resources available to him, and the size of the club, there will be major questions asked of his ability if we are not in the top 6 come the end of the season. That for me is the bare minimum we should expect.
Size of the club? Embarrassing. City are a league 1 club, going through a massive transition on and off the field. 12th would be a reasonable finish. Promotion would be a disaster.
'Thank God most of you aren't in charge at Ashton Gate' Yeh, let's realise how lucky we are to have the clowns who recently employed Millen and McClueless. The same clowns who oversaw the complete balls up on Day 1 stopping fans getting in the Stadium. While I'm at it some advice for SOD. You sound totally ridiculous and 'dead pan' when interviewed. eg - about players learning from mistakes and saying 'don't know, ask them'. FFS - don't you know anything about management of young men. And look like somebody who means business. eg - the Wolves manager looked 'dapper' and exuded professionalism when walking out Saturday. SOD - you wandered in looking like you came off your allotment. And we played like you looked. Aimless. Although we played better 2nd half - we had to - we had 11 men. Again down to you picking Kilkenny and setting us up all wrong in the first place. Wake up my friend before it's to late.
SOD - you wandered in looking like you came off your allotment. Love it Redprintt......quite true though, he can be a scruffy looking bugger lol
I do love the illusions of grandeur we see on this and other forums............ We are a L1 club with very little history (of any real note) to talk of. We struggled in the championship for the last 3 seasons so we are probably at our level right now. Yes Bristol is a nice big city but does that mean it will have a nice big successfull football team?.....obviously not. Get with it guys......we are in league 1 where we belong (at the moment I hasten to add!) with no devine right to get out of it.
I truly hope that you meant this in jest or have you no ambition at all ? When there are MANY teams in this league with none, or a fraction of our resources, who simply play for each other and get good results is the difference between the likes of them and us.
Ok so it's slightly exaggerated. .....but I honestly think we'll be in a better posistion for the long term next season. But I do worry the foundations are nowhere near ready
You are the one panicking and getting giddy. Those are not truths they are opinions. My opinion is if the team shape was less narrow points could have been saved. Could not would or a fact. Could get rid of most of the sentences and sack O'driscoll. Same giddiness can't be witnessed over Emmanulle Thomas put his good touches together and it should make a clip of 45 seconds = Superstar on a pedestal already to some fans. It's a team game. A significant part of this team is new. Teams need time to gel and after fifteen games or so fans should start to be able to see what is what and who lines up where.
If we play like we did first half Saturday and defend like we did against Coventry, we will be lucky to stay in league 1- If we play like we did in both 2nd halves, we would win the league by a country mile- It is this inconsistency that will take time to settle and for that reason as much as any, I don't see us either going up or down- A season of consolidation, and then push on is what I expect to see most likely.
Most of us are just frustrated by the poor start, plus the injuries we've already picked up. Things do and will take time, and I dont think anyone really expected us to be top of the league on 30 points after 10 games, but modern football is not a game of patience and things need to improve quickly. Not winning becomes a bad and unwanted habit and I dont think we're out of this bad streak yet. I honestly cant see us getting anything at MK Dons next weekend, and I think Gillingham will have learned their LC lesson by the time we play them too. The longer this run goes on the worse morale will become and the harder it will be to recover. There really is some crap in this division and to say that we will put up with being anything but top 6 come May is selling us short and letting SOD off lightly. We cant change SOD's personality or his dress sense but I really hope he can see where the obvious shortfalls in the squad are and addresses them sooner rather than later. I didn't expect us to beat Wolves in all honesty, but I did expect us to get 4 or 6 points from the first 2 games. We are weak up front, especially with Harewood not 100% fit and Taylor injured and if JET gets injured, suspended or out of form then we'll be in a right mess.
Some are frustrated and want everything today. I didn't expect much from the first two or place much emphasis on them as its hard to know what to expect. Hope to see sensible improvement and that could be tenth, twelth or sixth.. Jordan's rather eye catching 89-90 team didn't happen overnight and during formulative games took a few bad results. Want A-B-C that's always the case at the moment they putting down the framework. Saturday's good 25 minutes didn't reflect the way the team set up in friendlies so the XI formation is still taking shapr
Millen was a cheap option for a club with no money, and he had done very well when handed the reigns after GJ was sacked. McInnes was a gamble, but one a lot of people supported when we trounced Cardiff at home. An absolute farce, but not really a problem at the top, is it? Sounds like you want McInnes back. I couldn't give a **** how the manager sounds. SOD is trying to keep the fans updated at least. It's a lot better than we've had before. Again, SOD could come out butt naked for all I care. Kilkenny suits the way SOD wants to play, and he is a senior member of the club. I can't blame SOD for playing him this season. In fact, if I remember correctly he has had a good game this season. Admittedly, if he continues to play badly then he should be dropped. We'll see what happens, but to be fair to SOD he's not exactly dealing with a full squad of talented players. The academy hasn't brought enough quality through and SOD doesn't have any money.
'An absolute farce, but not really a problem at the top, is it?' - You just don't get it do you. 'Sounds like you want McInnes back' - Are you mad. 'SOD could come out butt naked for all I care' - You are mad. 'I can't blame SOD for playing him this season' - Hook line and sinker - Mad as a hatter.
