Just under 12 months ago I witnessed a travesty of a
performance by Bristol City at Milwall, in a
game that, had we won, would have sealed our promotion to the Championship.
After that shambles, the thought of finishing in the Championship play-offs,
with the Premiership prize still on offer well into May 2008, would have seemed
a million miles away - had I even contemplated being there.
Even in early August,
a canvassing of City fans would have shown merely a blissful contentment to consolidate
in the Championship and in 2, maybe 3 seasons time, be in a position to assert
a real assault on the top 6.
Not so this morning. Sitting fourth in the league, ahead of
the 3 relegated Premiership clubs, the prestigious names and illustrious histories
of Ipswich, Wolves, and Preston, and the team who pipped us to the League 1
title last season, the feeling of satisfaction at being almost assured of a top
6 finish with 2 games to go is overshadowed horribly by one of despair,
disappointment and hurt.
It was only 270 minutes of football ago that we jumped to the top of the Championship,
completing what seemed a fairytale ending to a home match against Norwich, with
Steve Brooker, playing his first game at Ashton Gate for almost a year having
been dogged with injury, sealing a last minute victory with a header. The guy I
sit with, Matt, cut both his legs falling over the seat behind during our mad
celebrations, but he didn’t care as we trooped out of the ground shouting “WE
ARE TOP OF THE LEAGUE!” 3 games later, 1 draw and 2 defeats, the automatic
promotion shout is all but ended and the only route to the Promised Land is to
win the play-offs, for the first time in our history.
Even if we don’t go up, it’s still been a fantastic season
on the whole, but it’s very difficult and perhaps wrong to look at it that way,
in retrospect. We were in the top 2 at the end of October, December, January
and February and numerous games in between, and after 41 games we were ahead of
everyone else in the charge for Promotion. With the third worst form in the
division, we’ve been masters of our own downfall and not for the first time,
we’ve bottled it. In 2003/4 we hit the top of the league in mid-January after a
win on a cold, wet Tuesday night at Grimsby (1-0
in February at Scunthorpe, anyone?) but after
some poor form in the last 5 games we finished third and lost out to Brighton
in the play-off final. Déjà vu? Perhaps. It’s clear by the fact we’re 6 places
ahead of Plymouth, 10 of QPR and 27 of Brighton, the 3 teams who went up that season,
that we’re punching above our weight but having got so close from working so
hard, it was ours for the taking, and we’ve potentially thrown the opportunity
of a lifetime in our recent performances, culminating in a debacle of a first
half at Stoke yesterday. Should we miss out, our terrible last 8 games will
completely overshadow the other 38, unfortunately.
Ron
Bristol City Fans' Online
A good start about a bad end, a very well written piece.
Posted by: Dave | April 24, 2008 at 08:33 PM