BFTG - Coventry (A)

[Zip]

[quote="Hound"]Though Stoke and Preston were pretty good performances tbf

Not sure Bristol was that terrible a Performance overall, just some horrendously inept defending

But is definitely a pattern under Pauno since the turn of the year of losing these fairly close games. Not being able to hang on to leads is especially disappointing

Something seems to be missing mentally. The real belief and desire to go on and win it.[/quote]



Bristol was very much down there in the shocking category performance. Just look at the playing record of our opponents in 2021,going into the game. Yet we started with no intensity and were dominated and two down in the first 15. We pulled a decent goal back before more shambolic defending finished us

We only showed intensity in the final ten minutes and even then they should have scored a fourth following yet more hopeless defending. Right down there with Birmingham, Burton, Swansea etc in unacceptable performances

[Snowflake Royal]

The standout consistent issues are

Disorganised defence
Especially at defensive set pieces
The clear panic at coming under sustained pressure for equalisers or winners

That's been a consistent theme.

Worryingly we also added being really sloppy in possession against Coventry.

We're creating chances, and we're scoring a few, but never putting away the one that gives us breathing room. You can see the team just want to hold on and panic, especially when Cabral starts time wasting after the goal in the FIRST HALF.

[Millsy]

Truly spoken like a man who did not attend either game. We were oxf*rd atrocious in both, results aside these are two of the worst consecutive performances I've seen in many years.

That there makes more sense to me. Result aside it's the performance that should interest us and if we really that poor it's worrying. It's just that our memory of the performance tends to be quite heavily coloured by the final score.

Had Holme's header at the final corner been inches lower and we were 2-1 winners, it'd only be 70s or so of less bad performance but I can guarantee player ratings would have been 1-2points on average higher each for the whole team. You do sometimes hear "we won but our performance wasn't good" but there is lot more forgiveness.

And it goes the other way - were we awful against Stoke? DId we deserve to lose? From what understand we were lucky against Preston and that could have been different.

[Zip]

Stoke decent performance which the home team shaded
Preston decent performance which we shaded
Bristol City. Appalling and the scoreline flattered us
Coventry very poor and they fully deserved the win.

[RoyalBlue]

Puscas 4 - A lot more effort today but just so ineffective. Can’t even blame the system, when he gets the ball you have zero confidence he is going to do anything positive with it.

That would be apart from slipping the pass through to Swift from which he won the penalty?

[RoyalBlue]

What an absolute shit show. For the most part it was a game without any quality between two crappy teams, but second half really was eye-opening, we were torn apart time and time again and were justifiably beaten even if the stoppage time was controversial.

I do think it's time for timekeeping to be taken out of the hands of referees. All too often they give an attacking side one last chance to score, always blowing at a time they deem to be non-controversial, e.g. when the ball has gone out, or an attack cleared.

One time is up (allowing for stoppages) then the game should finish, even if a side is about to take a free kick on the edge of the box.

Agreed. I was pretty sure the only exception meant to be permitted was a penalty kick?

[RoyalBlue]

Someone needs to take a pipe to Gourlet. Incompetent management and spending now haunting us. Can’t really blame the manager for this. Threadbare squad with three starters out and no real LB.

Gourlay has been and gone. Pauno has to stand on his own record. I want to see our side match the intensity of the opposition from the start right through to the end of each match. It ain't happening.

Gourlay has been and gone but has still left the club in the current shyte state it is in, having to lose it's best players, squad decimated (even more so by injuries to key players) and only being permitted to sign relatively low wage loanees and out of contract players. In other words, whoever we have as manager has to deal with that and I doubt there are many available who would join us and do better.

[Zip]

Someone needs to take a pipe to Gourlet. Incompetent management and spending now haunting us. Can’t really blame the manager for this. Threadbare squad with three starters out and no real LB.

Gourlay has been and gone. Pauno has to stand on his own record. I want to see our side match the intensity of the opposition from the start right through to the end of each match. It ain't happening.

Gourlay has been and gone but has still left the club in the current shyte state it is in, having to lose it's best players, squad decimated (even more so by injuries to key players) and only being permitted to sign relatively low wage loanees and out of contract players. In other words, whoever we have as manager has to deal with that and I doubt there are many available who would join us and do better.

We repeated the mistakes Gourlay made in 2017 by overspending in 2019. Lessons were not learnt. We could have sold Moore too but chose not to. Gourlay was a disaster but we have not learnt from his brief time at the club.

[Hound]

The profile of the players signed post gourlay was totally different tbf. Joao was well worth 5m, Puscas prob worth the punt as was ejaria. I expect we’ve had opportunities to sell all three, and at a profit for Joao.

It was the load of old aging players on long expensive contracts with no resell that has killed us

[Snowflake Royal]

I'm with zip, yes those three may have all contributed ok, but they were more spending well beyond our means, at time we knew we'd spent well beyond our means and where we were financially.

We simply did not do enough to fix the problems that were set up under Gourlay. And we're reaping what we've sown. Gourlay went, what? three years ago now?

Continued with signing too may high cost, high wage players and not selling any.

[Hound]

I'm with zip, yes those three may have all contributed ok, but they were more spending well beyond our means, at time we knew we'd spent well beyond our means and where we were financially.

We simply did not do enough to fix the problems that were set up under Gourlay. And we're reaping what we've sown. Gourlay went, what? three years ago now?

Yep and the problem of the wage bill isn’t now so much, it’s been the last three years

[Snowflake Royal]

I'm with zip, yes those three may have all contributed ok, but they were more spending well beyond our means, at time we knew we'd spent well beyond our means and where we were financially.

We simply did not do enough to fix the problems that were set up under Gourlay. And we're reaping what we've sown. Gourlay went, what? three years ago now?

Yep and the problem of the wage bill isn’t now so much, it’s been the last three years

Most of which Gourlay wasn't here.

[Hound]

I'm with zip, yes those three may have all contributed ok, but they were more spending well beyond our means, at time we knew we'd spent well beyond our means and where we were financially.

We simply did not do enough to fix the problems that were set up under Gourlay. And we're reaping what we've sown. Gourlay went, what? three years ago now?

Yep and the problem of the wage bill isn’t now so much, it’s been the last three years

Most of which Gourlay wasn't here.

Yep but he left us with it

My reading was we were very likely to go down before joao, Puscas and Rafael came in. Much more than now. I’d still argue those signings saved us and on top of that have resell value as well. Also have to remember last year was very much down to Joao being so good for a lot of it. Players are worth far more in a successful team. Would Olise have played and bagged us 8m without Joao? Very much doubt it

[tmesis]

What I still find incredible is that we have debts way in excess of £100 million, and that's apparently after selling the stadium to the current owner, and the car park to the Thais.

I'd love to see the breakdown of how much we've lost each season since going down in 2008.

[Snowflake Royal]

Yep and the problem of the wage bill isn’t now so much, it’s been the last three years

Most of which Gourlay wasn't here.

Yep but he left us with it

My reading was we were very likely to go down before joao, Puscas and Rafael came in. Much more than now. I’d still argue those signings saved us and on top of that have resell value as well. Also have to remember last year was very much down to Joao being so good for a lot of it. Players are worth far more in a successful team. Would Olise have played and bagged us 8m without Joao? Very much doubt it

The problems we're currently having could easily have been staved off with more prudent signings and some actual sales. We could easily be something like £10m - £15m better off right now based just on things we could have done differently since Gourlay left. Which would mean if we had gone down it would have been far less financially damaging.

We're just constantly perpetuating the shit show cycle

[Hound]

Who could we have sold post Gourlay who would have got in money? Loader (prob a million max). Maybe Moore but never heard of a solid bid after Brighton.

And yes we could have not spent big money on Joao and Puscas but the chances of them being any good would have been less. We needed good players in and had to spend to get them. Of course we might have scouted a bargain who would score 14 goals/19 goals in the last 2 years but it is very hard to do so

We could have been 10m better off yes, but we could also have gone down and certainly not challenged for promotion last year

[Bigtimmeh]

I feel like a lot of our problems are from spending so much on puscas. Joao and ejaria were good value, scouted by the club and long term targets. From what I understand puscas was a "could be nice to have" but the owner made the deal with Milan not necessarily in sync with the club or in consultation with bowen at the time. We then paid 8m for a striker struggling to score in Italian b league. Once you have done that everyone knows that our club is one to take money from ..

[Lower West]

Had Holme's header at the final corner been inches lower and we were 2-1 winners,

I'd prefer to see a team lose and play well with continual signs of improvement. Than suffer the poor quality football we've endured far too often and scrap together enough points to avoid relegation every season.

[RoyalBlue]

I'm with zip, yes those three may have all contributed ok, but they were more spending well beyond our means, at time we knew we'd spent well beyond our means and where we were financially.

We simply did not do enough to fix the problems that were set up under Gourlay. And we're reaping what we've sown. Gourlay went, what? three years ago now?

Yep and the problem of the wage bill isn’t now so much, it’s been the last three years

Most of which Gourlay wasn't here.

The contracts that he committed us to were not just for the duration of his tenure! What can you do to fix 2-3 year contracts? Yes, sell but only if someone is prepared to pay/take on those contracts.

[Zip]

Yep and the problem of the wage bill isn’t now so much, it’s been the last three years

Most of which Gourlay wasn't here.

The contracts that he committed us to were not just for the duration of his tenure! What can you do to fix 2-3 year contracts? Yes, sell but only if someone is prepared to pay/take on those contracts.

True to an extent especially Moore. However that doesn't really explain the £40 million loss for the 2019/20 season. The sheer extent of that loss is only partly down to Gourlay's work and mostly driven by our signings in 2019 at a time when we knew we were sailing close to the wind.