Johnnyrotten

Happy for him to stay, would have been happy if IE replaced him with better, no strong feelings either way. Reward for playing just well enough to earn a contract and not quite well enough to get us past Barnsley, if we'd gone up I suspect he'd be looking for a new club.

Yeah I watched some of that, crazy game. First Partick goal was class to be fair. And great atmosphere from Thistle fans, something about their colours I'm drawn to. The pen for the first Ross goal was a travesty and basically cost them promotion.

For some balance, I've got some cracking mates I've met mainly through work that are City fans. Friends for life I keep in touch with and chat about all things football with, salt of the earth types. Yes they were there in the York/Gillingham days and I know that's become a cliche as Marc505 references, but when I talk to them about the thrill of seeing us win at Lincoln or drawing at Sheff Wed, etc, they totally get it. I couldn't have that conversation with a Utd or Liverpool fan. We all have different experiences of fans of other clubs, mine are mostly positive, they're just football fans like us. Anyway on topic, I would feel uneasy, I take pride in the way the club is run, its almost perfect and nobody has to justify supporting us, we are the real deal as a club. Newcastle and City have an asterisk next to them, nothing they ever achieve will feel pure for me, and I'll stick with what we've got, winning stuff is absolutely not the be all and end all for me. I also don't want our games to be switched for live TV every other week, Saturday 3pm's most weeks is how it should be.

They must have been impressed when he played their in the Pizza Cup

Very very sad to read this, thoughts mainly with his kids and family. Far too young, RIP.

That'll never catch on!

Or put another way, 4 games, 2 of which were against the top 4, and they only scored 1 less than they conceded in those. 2 defeats v Spurs and West Ham is basically the size of his "failure"! Not defending him as such, but its Leeds that got relegated not Allardyce.

It'll be Leeds, Leicester or Southampton this year, whoever's away. One plus point about staying in L1 is fairly sure there's no live games on 1st weekend of season.

Well remembered! Dutch midfielder, played at Burnden for Millwall and looked like a cross between Kluivert & Rijkarrd 😁 I was buzzing at the prospect of signing him but he hardly played after he left Millwall.

DM'd instead 😄

And if we season ticket holders upgrade to corporate for a match, do we get counted twice?!

To be clear I'm no apologist for Brighton 😁 But since you ask.... Left Goldstone Ground in 1997, so their last 10 or so years were poor crowds - along with most teams not in the top flight in that era. Then 2 years playing at Gillingham - which explains their 2k crowds - and moved to Withdean in 1999 for 12 years. Between 1986 and 92 every season had an average of 8 or 9k at 2nd tier level, well above us at the time but we were generally a division below, they sank to Div 4 a few years after that and came within 1 game of going out of the league.

Strange how Carabao cup round one is a "key date", and so is the final, but none in between! And to say the EFL Trophy round one is a key date is stretching it a bit. I can't think of an occasion that will be less key all season. As long as we're playing Saturday 3pm, I don't mind who we play - but to be picky, avoid promoted teams, and we always beat Charlton so them please.

Agree with your general point but perspective on their 6,848, that was basically the capacity of their temporary stadium, which was an athletics track. It didn't even have permanent stands, just temporary seating around the athletics track. Initial capacity 6k, gradually increased over a few years and they got a high of 8,700 for a cup game v City. To be fair they should get good crowds, there's no other clubs near them.

I remember that well, exciting times! Came to nought as usual. But I remember the first time I thought we were back on the football map. Reading in the Mirror that Bruce Rioch was interested in signing 2 players from Millwall. One was Alex Rae - a decent player I'd actually heard of linked with us, and even reported in a national paper not just the BEN/MEN! That was the first time I'd even seen Bolton mentioned in a transfer gossip column, we'd just been promoted to the championship. After that I was looking for snippets most days to see who we were linked with and another time I was in Scotland and read we were signing Owen Coyle for actual money. This was a whole new world! Nowadays I've virtually no interest in the "gossip" stuff because the first we tend to hear of a signing is when its announced and scarf is in hand, I've learned that everything else is mostly nonsense, nobody has a clue except IE etc.