Nigel, starting with team news, how’s the team looking for the weekend?
Yeah fine. The players have recovered pretty well. We had a number of them playing for the under 23s yesterday to try and get some more extensive gametime for them which was a decent exercise for them.
We’ve trained this afternoon [Thursday] to allow a bit of recovery from yesterday. George Tanner played 60 minutes and he’s trained us today so he’s making good progress with us.
But not enough to be considered for the Easter weekend?
Probably not for this weekend. Maybe once the Easter programme out of the way he’ll be in a position when we can start to consider him a bit more seriously. He’s working hard and he’s made some decent progress.
Yesterday, as opposed to his other appearances for the 23s, was more in control and more confident which is good. We don’t want the players going into the game and having question marks over whether they are quite right or robust enough. He’s done okay.
Tomas [Kalas] had a procedure the other day which is probably three or four weeks so that probably takes care of the rest of the season for him but you never know, you might see him back on the pitch, but probably not.
Given the amount of football he’s played over the past couple of years and the Euros, there’s no real surprise that this has caught up with him?
Yeah and mentally as well. The way Tomas plays, he throws himself around the place and he’s a committed lad.
It’s more about him getting this recovery right, it’s one of those things.
With Joe Williams, you said that if he plays a weekend match he won’t play the midweek one, with it being a slightly shorter week, how does that relate to being available for Friday and Monday?
Well, if he plays on Friday he won’t play on Monday basically. To go from Friday is an extra day, but the thought process is to try and allow him to have similar distances between games, that’s the best way to look at it. He’ll be playing in one but not the other.
He’s had such a stop start season and couple of seasons, is it more difficult to keep dipping in and out of matches to play the way that we know he’s capable of?
Yeah but I thought he did alright at the weekend, it was always the plan to do 55-60 minutes for him for the first game back, he got through it no problem and he’s trained really well this week. It’s not just about trying to negotiate the rest of the season, it’s about making sure he has a strong foundation for next season too. That’s really important for him.
You mentioned the U23s campaign, they’ve had a really good season like they did last year and we’ve seen the fruits of that already in the first team, are there any more players that you’d like to see in the first team environment between now and the end of the season?
Two of the lads, Sam Bell and Tommy Conway, are members of the first team squad and they’ve not been a million miles away. We as staff regard them as first team members. Some of the other players that you might mention or other people will discuss will be looked at slightly differently.
The most important thing is that they can come in and focus on their own game without worrying too much about other factors. I’m not going to play with the idea of it, but if we believe that players are capable of stepping up then there may be one of two opportunities.
With what happened at the weekend, do you give some of those players a chance to prove that they have what it takes?
The players that we have in the first team squad are going to be required for the rest of the season. They’re as disappointed as I am and as our fans were, they weren’t particularly happy on the day and it’s fair to say that they are very much entitled to their opinion.
It’s not exactly what we want but Peterborough needed to win the game and they didn’t so that’s just the way it is.
This Friday is a trip to Stoke, one of the season’s best defensive performances was in the reverse fixture, I’m sure something similar would be nice…
It was a decent all round performance, we really struggled with our home form for quite a while and that was a very stern test on the night. I think Tyreeq Bakinson scored the goal from a set play and I think we had to see out nine or 10 minutes of injury time at the end of the game and there might have been a bit of tension throughout the team and the stadium.
On that night we did pretty well but they’ve had a mixed campaign themselves and for them in many ways it’s not gone the way they would have liked but they’ve got some very good players and it will be a stern test. As I point out on many occasions it’s about our own players taking the opportunities that they have and that’s what I’m looking for.
I’ve been asked a number of times over the past couple of weeks about players that are out of contract and if players still get opportunities to play and perform then they have to make the most of those opportunities, that’s really what it’s about.
When you raise the topic of deep-rooted issues within the club like you did on Saturday, is making it so public the first step of making changes going forward?
Time will tell. I can’t give you the definitive answer on that.
Sometimes there is a need for a bit of conflict and I am no different to anybody else, I get emotional about the game and it’s always frustrating and I can feel it in the stadium where we don’t quite deliver at the level that we know we can do and there are a number of reasons for that.
Saturday was a frustrating day of course it was, they [Peterborough] weren’t a very good side in many ways but they showed a lot of character and they needed to win the game, as they need to win every game but for us it was more about not taking the opportunities that presented themselves.
I don’t just mean chances in the game, I mean our broader levels. It was a disappointing day, let’s put it like that.
When you mention the passiveness around the club, how important is it that supporters are made aware of and reminded of the situation going forward, to manage expectations?
In what way do you mean reminded of the situation?
By managing expectations?
Okay, managing expectations is always going to be an important part of it but we have to go out there and perform and we have to put on a level of performance which our own fans are happy with and my thoughts on it, sometimes I will mention it publicly maybe that’s not always the best thing to do, but it’s life.
Sometimes I might feel the need to do that and that’s not to do anything other than try and evoke a response, we need to make sure we finish the season as well as we can for our own reasons. Whether that means individuals of the squad or collectively as a football club we want to continue to build our opportunities to be a biter side and be a better Championship output because we’ve shown real promise at times and at others we’ve disappointed and that’s the stage that we’re at.
To do that is either the players being able to develop within the framework of the team or sometimes it’s about making changes. That’s just a natural way of teams evolving and sometimes we need a shakeup. I don’t think there’s anything I say there that’s anything other than it should be. You can give people opportunities, but then it’s over to them to take it.
People find it very refreshing that you can speak so candidly and openly about the situation…
Yeah, but look, sometimes as a manager I’ll say things in the public domain that I probably shouldn’t do but I’m like anybody else. We all want us to improve, I accept in the type of job that I have that it’s never going to be a smooth journey and you have to come out of the difficult times with a clarity of thought and that is like anything in life, you learn more from the bad times than you do from the good ones.
When you’re trying to build, and I’m part of a team trying to build an effective squad, there are going to be days when things are a bit gloomy and last Saturday was a bit gloomy I’m afraid.
There’s no quick fix is there for changing a culture and a mentality that’s built over a number of years, it doesn’t happen overnight so how long does it take to change that and where does it begin?
I can’t give you a definitive answer on that because wherever you are the circumstances are always going to be different. The rate of change is sometimes dictated to by other circumstances and we have to be very, very sensible as a football club with how we address improving the squad.
There maybe some money but we have to be prepared, it depends on how things go with the financial fair play situation and there are lots of factors which can determine the rate of change but we are preparing behind the scenes and all I can say is that what’s important is that we have a positive shift during the summer.
There are some really good things that have happened this year, there are still some areas that are frustrating and disappointing, I’m aware of that.
One of the standout comments from the weekend was you referencing whether it was you or somebody else in charge in the summer.
That’s just a fact isn’t it, it’s just a fact.
Is that just a flippant remark?
If you want to call it flippant then you can say whatever you want but what I’m saying is, whoever runs the football side of the team or the dynamics of how it works, changing people doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re going to get rid of the problem. What I’m saying is that it doesn’t matter.
What’s really important, and we do it anyway is that we don’t just debrief the season, but we evaluate all the time and you have to evaluate where the changes are needed and how you can make those changes.
Even if there was an absolute pot of gold to spend it doesn’t mean that you can necessarily get the players that you want. I’m not a believer in spending money for spending money’s sake, that’s not what it’s about. It’s about making the changes that are required to continually improve the opportunity for us to develop as a football club because whenever I leave the club, at whatever point, whether it be one year, two years or ten years time, it’s important that there is a difference in terms of where the club is on the journey.
The aims of the club are still very, very clear and that is that we want to be a Premier League club. Where we sit where we actually are at the moment in terms of getting to that end point, and that end point is the start of a different challenge as well. We’re a long way from it and the timescale from when I joined last year, we spoke about it being a three-year plan or maybe I won’t see the realisation of that dream at the end of my tenure but that’s not going to stop me working towards it.
This is the point with principles and philosophies of management, I’m not a short term fixer, I’ve been in clubs where I’ve done that but that’s because I’ve taken on a job knowing the parameters of what’s required. I don’t feel the need to pigeonhole myself but this job is going to require not just patience but a bit of ingenuity and it’s going to continue to present challenges that me, along with everybody else, needs to be prepared to find solutions to. That’s life.
When you play one week and you’re pretty crap, or not very good, or underachieve, or disappoint, you’ve got to put that and keep that in the context of what it is and what the reasons are for it but that doesn’t get in the way of where we are and what we’re trying to do.
That’s just how I see it. We have to live in the present and we have to try and find daily and weekly solutions to any problems that come up but let’s not get away from where we’re trying to get to. The decisions that we make now, even if they don’t feel very important, are fundamental to if we’ll be able to achieve that at some point.
This is as a club, not me as a manager or the players, but we as a football club. That’s part of my job.
Has the job brought more challenges than you expected when you took it in the first place?
I can’t say that I’m somebody who expects things to go along a set pathway, no. Are they more difficult or different in certain areas, I tend not to think too much of that because otherwise, I don’t know if you get bored of people making comparisons, but for me to say clubs by name that have worked out in the past, you can’t live in the past.
You can reference the past and you can use your experiences to help negotiate your way through what the problems are but the bottom line is that every job has it’s own individual challenges. I try not to get bogged down with that to be honest with you.
How are Callum O’Dowda and Andy King?
They both trained fully with us, Andy maybe in contention for next week but to put a definitive time on that is hard.
Callum is getting closer, hopefully over the next week or 10 days they will be available for selection again.
Is it important for them to be back in terms of their contracts as they play for their futures?
Everyday that you play you’re playing for your future, it doesn’t matter if you’ve got a three-year deal or five weeks left or two months, everybody’s playing for their future, of course they are.
They will be aware of their current situations and it’s important for them to look at the remaining games and their involvement as opportunities to play as well as they can, outside of that it’s not something we get to talk about too much today.
They’re aware of the situation and the players will be the first to hear what the outcome is at the end of the season.
You’ve said that you’re not someone who wants to look back at the past, but Kasper Schmeichel spoke highly of you this week and said Leicester are still reaping the rewards that you put in there. What tools do you need here to create your ideal Bristol City?
That’s a good question, not necessarily the same as what happened there [at Leicester], when I mentioned a few minutes ago the decisions that we make now being fundamental to how the club runs in the future, I am just a part of that, I along with many other people here have a responsibility to try and shift the club into the right direction.
There’s a part of that that is micromanaging and there’s some very important aspects in terms of the feel of the place. It changes and evolves with time and it changes and evolves because of who’s in the building and who works at the place, we’re all judged and are judging the development of where we are as a football club by what the first team does and because the results aren’t what we want them to be there’s always the temptation to say that there’s no progress, but there’s massive progress, in lots of different ways.
When that bears fruit, I can’t tell you. Hopefully, we will be able to do a bit of pruning and do some work with the squad whether that’s with money or without money, there will be some changes and then it’s how we function on the pitch.
I remember quite a long way back in the season where people were talking about if games lasted 85 minutes we’d be in the playoffs. The shifts aren’t always massive and we know that we’ve thrown away far too many points this season but we’ve also got ourselves into decent positions too.
Whether that’s a mixture of experience and know-how and whether it’s having too many players where the Championship is proving to be too tough a nut to crack for themselves as a performer.
It can be any number of those things, but what I’ve been reminded of by a couple of members of my staff this week, it’s always good to have staff members that challenge you when you’re in a managerial position and say we need to persevere, and we aren’t that far away, it doesn’t always feel like that and it won’t do for fans and when you get the reaction after the game like we did last week, that’s where the realism kicks in and whether you’re a player or a manager or a coach, you’ve got to deal with it because that’s what it’s all about.
Will we see Kasey Palmer between now and the end of the season?
He’s another one, he’s making progress so possibly. I don’t see the need to rule it in or out. Kasey has had a frustrating season from different perspectives, either being not selected or on the bench because of injury, that’s a part of being a professional footballer so he’ll have to find his own way of dealing with that scenario.
It’s good to have him back out on the pitch doing some modified training which he’s been doing, and he seems to be in a pretty positive mood as well.
How is the morale in the team, so close to the end of the season?
A damn sight better than last year, for a start. Morale, I don’t know whether I can really answer that in terms of how the players are feeling themselves. If I could judge it by what I see on a daily basis in terms of how they train, their mood around the place, it seems really positive.
I don’t really have too much of a concern about that, they are a group of players who seem to be able to deal with the disappointment and we’ve had a bit of that this year. Maybe at times we’ve taken the disappointment too easily, that’s another story.
I don’t see them being a group of players who were like last year. Last year was like purgatory towards the end of the season and even worse because there were no crowds there, and I’ve said this before this season, it’s probably a good job because we would have had the reactions that we don’t want then. We’ve not had too many bad reactions from our fans this year, but it’s up to them. They will tell you what they think, and they’re entitled to do that.
Have you seen the reaction you wanted from your players in training this week?
I expect players to train at their maximum every time they train, a reaction is what you get on the pitch on matchdays. I would expect players to play properly every day, if they don’t then they wouldn’t get selected anyway. It’s not about that. The reaction that we want is on a matchday.
Have you been pleased by the reaction then on a matchday and the right understanding of them fixing the problems?
I think they understand it but it’s whether they’re able to perform on a matchday and I’ve been saying this on so many occasions this year that we have a group of players where our expectations in them can sometimes be too much. There’s some really inexperienced players and players who this is their first year in the Championship.
I know how tough it is to play in this division as well as manage in it. It’s been a bit of an eye opener for some of the players themselves but we’ll get through it.
In these last weeks of the season have you been seeing that growth in the direction that you want the club to go forward with?
Not necessarily on the pitch or in terms of results, not being particular but with performances we’ve built a side that is certainly a lot more dangerous in terms of attacking and creating more opportunities. There are steps forward but there are other steps that it’s a stair that’s been sawed halfway through a lot of the time.
There’s been some encouraging signs but it’s going to be an important summer for us.
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