Joey, an obvious question but how has the feeling been in the camp. Is it the same as any other week or is it a bit special this week?
The lads have, obviously, bounced in this week after the heroics late doors at Rochdale. They’ve been superb and really focused. We know there is still one more game to go.
We saw the scores on Monday and a four-horse race became a two-horse race. If you offered us in September, October, November and even December, the last game of the season, Scunthorpe at home, and if we win it we have a chance of the automatics, we would have snapped your hands off for that.
This is the position we’re in and we’re looking forward to Saturday in our stadium.
How much attention were you paying to what was happening on Monday and the fact both results went your way?
Lots, yeah. I was in the middle of climbing Snowdon with my lad. We went out walking and halfway up, I stopped. I didn’t have my phone but my brother checked the scores and saw that Salford and Mansfield drew 2-2 so I knew four were down to three.
Back down again, we knew what happened with Newport and Port Vale, so obviously it was then three into two.
I didn’t want to watch the games because then you’re kicking and heading every ball because we were relying on other teams to get results.
It ended up being a good day out. I got to the top of Snowdon and it didn’t rain until we got to the top. Everyone got up and down safely and the results went our way, so yeah, really pleased.
With what happened on Monday and the situation you’re now in, does that change your approach for this game at all as you’re level on points but behind on goal difference with Northampton?
We’ve worked through some things today in terms of getting more aggressive if we decide to go that way, but we know we’ve got a team that’s just lost its league status that has got a lot of young players in it who will be proud and wanting to go out of the Football League putting on a good show and there are a lot of young kids there who are just starting out in their careers.
We expect a physical test and they’ll be wanting to do as well as they can.
For us, it’s about winning the game first and foremost and making sure we get our 23rd win of the season, getting to that 80-point mark and then we’ll be aware, obviously, of what is going on in other games.
But if we’re to give ourselves maximum chance then we must win the game first and foremost. If we get into a position where we can freewheel a bit and then go for it, of course, we will do.
For us, it’s about putting on a good show in front of our fans and giving ourselves the best opportunity we can of clinching that third spot.
Will it be Andy Mangan who has the job of scratching his head and working out what’s going on elsewhere?
I think it will be quite straightforward from there. We know there are five goals between us and Northampton and we know if we can create opportunities, certainly from the game against Scunthorpe at their place, we know we can create chances against them.
For us, if we win 1-0, that gives us the best opportunity because Northampton still have to go to Barrow, which is a tricky place, albeit I think Northampton will win there.
I will be surprised if Northampton don’t win there, but as Salford and Newport showed the other day there are no easy points in this league.
Phil Brown has been a Premier League manager and done really well at lots of clubs. I think he’s figuring out his squad for next year so I imagine Phil will want to give a good performance in their last home game.
You have to expect Northampton to win there, you have to think they’re going to win there, so we need to make sure we win first and foremost, and if we have the opportunity to win and freewheel a little bit, then obviously we’ll go for it because we want to get that last automatic spot.
The most important thing is winning the game, isn’t it, because if you go for it too early and get a little bit antsy, that can get everybody on edge, can’t it?
That’s the thing. For us, the last thing you want to do is give yourself an uphill task. If you go out and you’re gung-ho, every team carries a threat and if we’re to give Scunthorpe a lead or a couple of goals or whatever it is, it will make it a tough afternoon.
We must be thoroughly professional, we’ve got to make sure we do everything right in the way of winning the game as opposed to thinking about what score and how many goals, and then you’re relying on other results.
I would expect Northampton, if you’re wanting to finish third, you’ve got to beat a side that’s fighting for relegation. If they are not able to win there or pick up a point, I’ll be very surprised based on the two teams’ form over the year. I know Barrow is a tough place to go, but Northampton have everything to play for and Barrow have done what they wanted to do, which was stay in the division.
But again, who knows what it brings and if we don’t take maximum points, I will be very surprised should Barrow beat Northampton. If we draw and Barrow draw with Northampton, we wouldn’t be going up, so the priority for us is winning the game, taking maximum points and, as I say, if we’re able to do that with a bit of comfort, then we’ll go for it.
But we also know it will be a tough fixture to win because it’s the last game as a Football League club, it’s full of young kids who will be proud and be desperate to put themselves in the shop window for the manager or for next season.
We’re going to have to be very good to win the game, but also if we want to get the goal difference, which it could come down to, we’re going to have to be almost faultless in our performance on Saturday.
And bearing in mind it is slightly out of your hands in that you can win and still not go up automatically…
If we win 10-0, we’re up, aren’t we? It is in our hands in that way, but Scunthorpe, no matter how young a side or poor a season they’ve had, it’s very rare you do someone by 10 but who knows? You’ve seen Fulham beat Luton, who are fourth or fifth in the table, 7-0 the other day.
Madrid thought they were out of the Champions League they scored two goals in stoppage time. It only takes a second to score a goal, but if we don’t get that first goal…
Once we score that first goal, it will be 0-0 again and we’ve got to push on.
We’ve just got to win the game, first and foremost. That will be 23 wins, 80 points on the board and if Northampton better us, fair play to them, they’ll deserve it. The table doesn’t lie after 46 games.
We’re going to have to dust ourselves and we’ll go and do the play-offs and hopefully take our season from there, but I’m hoping the season is over on Saturday.
We can keep control of our destiny, but we’re going to have to be absolutely faultless in our performance to do that.
Have you spoken to the players at all about the psychological side of it? If you go out and win and do everything you can and it’s still not quite enough, there is still a lot to play for over the following couple of weeks.
You can get the job done at the weekend by winning the game and if the season extends beyond that then we’ll tackle that when that bridge is there to be crossed because we won’t know who is in the play-offs.
There are still three or four teams in with a shout of the play-offs, that’s not set in stone. It is for us and if we don’t get the job done on Saturday, then because of the result last week we get a further chance to get promoted via the lottery of the play-offs.
Hopefully, we can get it done beforehand. I’ve been in the play-offs before and it’s a brilliant way to get promoted but a heart-breaking way for your season to end as well.
For us, the focus is on being as good as we can be on Saturday. We’re in front of our fans at our stadium, there’s a fever pitch atmosphere. I’ve got people coming up to me about tickets for the first time in Bristol. It’s bizarre. It really has taken a grip of the city, which is great.
From where we were last year to where we are now, whatever happens, come what may, we’ve got a fantastic group and the football club is united again and it’s moving in the right direction.
Joey, have you ever encountered a last day like this? There are five clubs who still could get one automatic promotion place.
They will be there, it tends to get tight at the end of seasons. In every division, there are so many permutations.
It was always coming, I think all of us knew. When you saw how tightly contested the table was in February, March and April, you always knew it was going to come down to the last day of the season and a shootout between six or seven clubs for a few different positions in the final table.
For us, all season it was about trying to get in the party, trying to gate-crash it. We were quite late to it, but we’ve been fairly consistent since the turn of the year.
If the league would’ve started in January after we had two recruitment windows and we finally got the balance of the group we wanted, I think would have celebrated being champions. I think we were that strong and it just took a while to get rid of the nonsense we had here last year.
As I said to you in the summer, if I had a billion pounds or two billion or whatever Pep gets, you can change it in a heartbeat, but when you’re wheeling and dealing in free transfers and loans, it’s a bit trickier to do.
It’s taken us two windows, at Fleetwood it took us four. The good thing for me is this group is only going to get stronger, so the club is on the up, finally, whatever happens.
I said to you we might run out of games. If we could’ve started our run earlier, but we didn’t, it started when it started and as I’ve said all along I wouldn’t swap my horse for any in the race. That’s not just this season, that’s into the play-off picture whether we’re successful or not, but even beyond that if we do stay in League Two next year or we manage to get in League One, we can potentially pull 45,000-50,000 fans to Wembley and there’s just no clubs around us that can do that.
The Gas are coming and I’ve been saying that for a while, you can feel that in the ether of the city.
I’ve seen (Jurgen) Klopp’s words this week and they feel like they’re just at the start of a really successful period for the football club and I genuinely believe, relative to the level we’re at, we’re in the same spot and it’s only a matter of time before we’re getting regular seasons chasing promotion.
That’s what I’ve come to be part of and it was tough getting going. There is a reason it wasn’t done here before because it wasn’t straightforward to do it, but we finally turned the ship around and everybody is pulling in the direction.
To see those scenes at Rochdale when we scored the fourth goal, for me that’s just priceless. That’s what you coach for.
You ended up on someone’s shoulders I think, have you got an escape plan for Saturday if it all goes to plan?
Nah, I’ll be right in the midst of it. Six months ago there were V-signs everywhere telling me to get out of town. It’s a funny old game, football, isn’t it? You’re king of the jungle one minute and knocked on your backside the next minute. That’s the game we’re in and when you’re winning it’s the greatest sport on earth and when you’re getting beat it’s very tough.
Luckily for me, I’ve had both sides of the coin here. Last year was as tough a period I’ve had in my professional football journey, but now you come out of it and feel the way we do because we’ve been through the adversity.
We don’t take for granted the support we’ve had because it’s been sensational and without those fans, we’re just another normal, run of the mill third or fourth-tier club, that’s all we would be. But with the Gasheads and the numbers they come in, it does give us that X-factor I think.
Over the coming years, I think the rest of the English pyramid will sit up and take notice. I was intent on getting that inner-city rivalry going again. Bristol City are miles ahead of us but it would be nice to get the derby going in our city. If we can get up this year, it puts us one step away from them.
For me, that was a dream of coming here, igniting the blue half of Bristol. We’ve seen a bit of a spark now and we’re hoping that turns into a big roaring bonfire in the next couple of years.
Afternoon, Joey. With what happened at Rochdale, does that give you more confidence in the group that they can produce something ridiculous, such as scoring four goals in a half? You’ve done it before.
It’s so tough and it would be disrespectful of me. Scunthorpe, I nearly joined them myself on loan as a young player. I was meant to join them when Kevin Keegan was the manager at Manchester City. His first club was Scunthorpe and it was somewhere he sent me on loan.
I went to play in a trial game because they only had one loan left. Brian Laws was the manager there and in the trial game and in the second half I went up for a header and had a clash of heads. I burst the balance mechanism in my eardrum.
It meant I couldn’t work properly for three months so the loan was curtailed and I had to learn to walk. It took me six months to come back from the injury and by that point I was close to City’s first team. Luckily enough for me, I made my debut in the Premier League, not in League One at Scunthorpe.
But I was buzzing for the loan. I went there and spent a bit of time training and it’s a great club. I was gutted to see them lose their league status.
For us, it’s about winning the game and that will be a difficult enough task just to get three points on the board. We haven’t had an easy match in this division all season and I’m not expecting one on Saturday. Even Rochdale, everyone’s saying Rochdale have got nothing to play for and arguably, first half, they were as good a side as we have faced all season and were superb. We had to climb a bit of a mountain in that second period.
For us, it’s making sure we get three points, making sure we win that game, and with the greatest respect in the world to Scunthorpe as a football club, we’re not thinking we’re going to put a cricket score on them or anything like that, but if we score early and we manage to get a bit of momentum from our 12th man, I know our Gasheads are going to be in there going nuts.
And we’re going to need them for 90-plus minutes, not just singing for five minutes, because we’re going to have to keep pushing and pushing and pushing. I’ve said to the lads today, if we’re lucky enough to get one up, we have to reset straight away as if it’s 0-0 and we have to play as if it’s 0-0 again and get the next goal.
Let’s see how far we can go. If it’s only 1-0, then it’s only 1-0 and I’ll take, but if they get in the position where they can get that momentum and the crowd can get with them, we’ve seen with multiple examples like Fulham vs Luton that momentum in our game is special and it can do weird and wonderful things and we’re going to need that if we’re going to get promoted at the weekend.
You’re right in what you say. These games aren’t easy and history shows that. In 2016 when Rovers got promoted out of League Two, they played already relegated Dagenham on the last day and they needed absolute heroics at the end of the game to overcome that. No teams are pushovers, are they?
No and we’ve got to stay patient. If Barrow get a result and Northampton slip up, which I am not expecting, I’m expecting them to win because they’re a good side and they know what they’ve got to do.
But for us it’s about winning the game. If it’s 1-0 or it’s 2-1, that’s good, we’ve won 23 games, it’s another game won and it’s another indication of how good our group are by winning a football match. We’ll see where that takes us.
If we get them early enough, tactically we might be able to do what we did at Rochdale and go for it, take the stabilisers off and push for it. But that will all depend on what’s happening on the day, the state of play.
The old transistor radios will be out, people will be glued to the Barrow game, so we’ll know what we’ve got to do at every junction I imagine. If we can and it’s there for us, we’ll be going for the jugular because we want to get that last automatic spot.
I imagine that Paul Coutts is absolutely devastated after playing such a massive role in your season to not be involved?
It’s a blow, especially when we’ve tried to appeal it and had their lad saying ‘I’ve started it’. He was a great character witness for Couttsy.
Again, it falls on deaf ears. Violent conduct, four games. It’s almost as if you’ve got no soul; they are emotionless bodies who look over these games.
I saw Vinicius Jnr do exactly what Couttsy did last night (Real Madrid vs Manchester City) and he didn’t get booked, they played on. I’ve seen worse of what Couttsy did and they play on, where they have VAR and they’ve gone back to it.
But, again, he’s got to not give the referee the option. He’ll pay the price but he’s been superb all season and he’s absolutely gutted the way his season is going to end but now it’s over to the rest of the lads.
We’ve already spoken about getting here, it will be a group effort. There will be heroes all along the journey at different junctions. The last period in our season is not going to change that. Someone will come in now and add to the story of our season.
Just to clarify, who was the player involved in the incident with Paul?
(Josh) Andrews. He very kindly wrote a statement saying what had gone on. Again, it fell on deaf ears.
I don’t know why you bother appealing it, it’s a fruitless task. Two lots of footage.
We weren’t expecting any favours off them and you were hoping they would show some common sense to end someone’s season for what they did.
But I can’t see the FA helping me out, can you?
The defensive issues you had in the first half at Rochdale, having reflected on them do you think it was just a blip, an off day, or are there things you’ve wanted to address this week on the training ground?
Yeah, and it shows we’ve got a young backline and if they play like young players occasionally do, there are going to be a couple of mistakes. That’s the tariff of going with youngsters because they’re still learning their trade.
They’ve been superb for us all season, got us into this position. We could’ve defended better but there are times where they’ve saved us in games. Young lions at the back have come up with challenges.
We didn’t have our best first period, but I thought in between the mistakes for the goals, they actually played really well again.
It’s part of the journey and part of the learning for them, but luckily for us it’s been one game out of the last 20-odd where that’s happened.
I expect them to get right back on the horse on Saturday and finish the season in the manner they have been before the first period at Rochdale.
Finally, we’ve spoken about how your group is feeling and the mood around the group, but how about yourself? Are there any nerves for you, is it pure excitement or are you trying to stay as level as you can?
Nerves about what? Nerves are if you haven’t got enough money in your bank to pay your direct debits, that’s nerves.
A chance to get promoted on the last game of the season is what we’ve worked tirelessly for since we went to Bisham Abbey on the first day.
For me, it’s lovely because of all the criticism I’ve had over the journey and the periods of self-doubt and the struggle you go through as a coach when you haven’t got your team firing on all cylinders.
To then have the group turn into what it’s turned into and the supporters buy into the team in the level they have, watching young players develop, I’m buzzing.
I can’t wait to get in the stadium on Saturday. I’m excited for it and no matter what happens, we’ve won. We’ve got a great group, a fantastic football team that play football with a bit of a panache and style and the fans have bought into it.
You can’t get a ticket. I had a fella, I had breakfast in Clifton this morning and I’m pretty sure he was faking the phone conversation he was on. I could hear him and he was desperate to make contact with me in some way, but didn’t want to interrupt me so he was on the phone to his mate and was surprised to see me, although I think he did four laps of the road beforehand.
He was just so excited to tell me he’d got two tickets and he pulled them out of his pocket saying ‘I’ve got two tickets!’ For me, that’s job satisfaction. That is what you do it for because you want to please the people whose football club this is.
It’s the fans’ football club and without the fans, we’re just another team. Forest Green promoted, Exeter promoted and we have a chance on Saturday to be in that third spot along with Northampton.
If they manage to get it, fair play to them. I know Col Calderwood there, I think he’s a top fella. Not massively keen on the manager, but Col’s a top fella, and they’ll deserve to get the job done.
They got relegated with us last year, so you have to give them enormous credit for turning their fortunes around.
It might be the play-offs, it might be Swindon, it might be Ben Garner again, who knows? But whoever it is, we fear absolutely nobody. Whoever wants it, we’ll have it.
If we can get it done on Saturday, great. If not, we’ll have a two-legged semi-final and we’ll see where that takes us. If we’re lucky enough to get to Wembley, I’m pretty sure we’ll sell our allocation and we’ll have our army in there. The players will then see how well supported this football club is.
The Gas are coming. I’ve been saying it. It will be nice for me because I’ll not seem like a lunatic after that GIF you lot put out after the Exeter game where I said we’ll get promoted.
In the many conference I’ve had, I don’t know why lads but I was saying to you at my lowest ebb that I feel like we’re going to get promoted. I still don’t feel that our race is run this season, and we’re right on it.
Hi Joey, I don’t know what the ruling is but is Paul Coutts someone you would like to have in and around the dressing room? I know he can’t play but would you like to have him around the group?
Of course, he’s the captain. He’s been the most important signing we’ve made. He’s been absolutely first class, and you don’t see that, you only see on the pitch.
I know he had a few doubters at the start but I think everybody now has bought into the Paul Coutts fan club.
It’s the stuff he does away from there. He’s a leader of men and he’s been incredible as a captain this year. Disappointed the season has ended the way it has, he’s massively disappointed, but he’ll play his part because he’s such a big influencer of the group.
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