‘Treat homophobic at City chants like racism’

So, we lost. Tuesday night saw our recent upward trend in fortunes come to a very abrupt end. In truth, Brighton were good; clinical. We were OK, but only OK, and when you catch a top-four team on a good day you need to be better than OK.

We had two of our first choice back four out which could go some way to explaining our defensive errors, but, anyhow, we lost. And, oddly, as me and my friends walked away from Ashton Gate on Tuesday night, admittedly a little early, we didn’t seem like a group that had just seen their team tanked four nil.

Given our excellent form leading up to the Brighton game, including two away wins at relegation rivals Charlton and MK Dons, I guess we thought we can afford the odd slip up against a quality side, but, let us not get into the habit.

A couple of other things of note from the Brighton game. It was good to see Zak Vyner make his home debut and although he struggled a little he was certainly not the only one.

His presence in the side also leads me to question something though: why were we not filling the bench in various matches under Cotteril when we had the likes of Vyner waiting in the wings?

I would guess this was his way of trying to show the board that the squad was a little thin on the ground, but surely that was to the detriment of the young players that missed out on the chance of being involved on a match day?

It was also very disappointing to me, as it often is, to see former City captain Sam Baldock getting booed by the home fans. He was a good player for us and left to further his career at a bigger club who at the time were the division above us. I stood and applauded him off when he was substituted but unfortunately was in the minority.

It was also very sad to hear the limited, but still present, homophobic chanting that I’m sure the Brighton fans are used to. As I say, it was limited to small sections of the crowd and wasn’t really sung with much gusto. I personally would like to see the authorities deal with such incidents in the same way as racism (i.e. zero tolerance).

So – changing the subject – what on earth has gone on at Rovers this last week? The so-called local club appear to not be so local anymore after the take over by the super-rich Jordanian family. I am, much to the bemusement of some of my friends, something of a fan of our sister club from the North side of the river. 

I say fan, that is probably an over statement, but I see Rovers as a kind of little brother that I would like to see do well. Do well, that is, but never better than City. Ideally, in my mind, we would both be competing in the upper echelons of English football genuinely competing for major honours.

I know this is a long way off, but who knows what the future holds. I genuinely hope the new owners have the best interests of the club at heart and we don’t see another Portsmouth type situation.