I tried to post this earlier but it's gone...

[Blue Dan]

Great piece Liam. It was indeed a crazy year. At the AGM in December 2006, City announced they were in takeover talks, which was a complete and utter fiction at that time. So the first few months of 2007 were spent trying to prove it was crap so we (The Supporters Trust) could buy Sky's 10% shareholding.

I missed the goals in the Everton game as I was on holiday between Xmas & New Year so didn't see a home goal for the rest of that season. The Blackburn cup game was indeed one of the worst moments of my whole City supporting life. As you say, the hatred that poured out from long-suffering fans that day was incredible. We also lost to Wigan at home the week before and MOTD2 did a feature on us and how bad things were. I was involved in that and the producer quite openly said he wanted to see people tearing up their season tickets. My information was that the board wanted to sack Pearce after that game but Wardle refused.

I went down to the Watford game and heard about the Joey Barton rant after that while waiting for the train back. At the time I wondered how he had been allowed to get away with it but later found out it was a 'put-up job' by Mackintosh & Tyrrell in order to put pressure on Wardle to sack Pearce. The real fear was that we were going to be relegated but those wins at Newcastle, Boro and Fulham saved us in the end. If we'd lost one and drawn one of those, we'd have been down.

Then the takeover, which divided opinion somewhat, at that amazing first game at West Ham. MOTD2 were there again and I was interviewed. It was supposed to be a before-and-after piece, with me saying what I thought about the new players and what the result would be, then a reaction afterwards but they didn't get there in time so had to do both interviews after the game. It was quite hard to talk about how it would take time to gel and a draw would be a good result, when you knew we'd won 2-0 and had a stormer. Then after Xmas it all started to fall apart.

Does anyone have the Joey Barton rant online anywhere? I remember listening to it live on GMR at that time and, depressingly, agreeing with every word he said. I'd quite like to hear it again if possible.

It's astonishing how far we've come as a club in the past 5 or 6 years. I can smile about it now but at the time it was terrible.

 

[Josh Blue]

Sven's last game to what was a pretty decent season.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGOZgELbK_c[/youtube]

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Great piece Liam. It was indeed a crazy year. At the AGM in December 2006, City announced they were in takeover talks, which was a complete and utter fiction at that time. So the first few months of 2007 were spent trying to prove it was crap so we (The Supporters Trust) could buy Sky's 10% shareholding.

I missed the goals in the Everton game as I was on holiday between Xmas & New Year so didn't see a home goal for the rest of that season. The Blackburn cup game was indeed one of the worst moments of my whole City supporting life. As you say, the hatred that poured out from long-suffering fans that day was incredible. We also lost to Wigan at home the week before and MOTD2 did a feature on us and how bad things were. I was involved in that and the producer quite openly said he wanted to see people tearing up their season tickets. My information was that the board wanted to sack Pearce after that game but Wardle refused.

I went down to the Watford game and heard about the Joey Barton rant after that while waiting for the train back. At the time I wondered how he had been allowed to get away with it but later found out it was a 'put-up job' by Mackintosh & Tyrrell in order to put pressure on Wardle to sack Pearce. The real fear was that we were going to be relegated but those wins at Newcastle, Boro and Fulham saved us in the end. If we'd lost one and drawn one of those, we'd have been down.

Then the takeover, which divided opinion somewhat, at that amazing first game at West Ham. MOTD2 were there again and I was interviewed. It was supposed to be a before-and-after piece, with me saying what I thought about the new players and what the result would be, then a reaction afterwards but they didn't get there in time so had to do both interviews after the game. It was quite hard to talk about how it would take time to gel and a draw would be a good result, when you knew we'd won 2-0 and had a stormer. Then after Xmas it all started to fall apart.

Does anyone have the Joey Barton rant online anywhere? I remember listening to it live on GMR at that time and, depressingly, agreeing with every word he said. I'd quite like to hear it again if possible.

Here you go.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFEOYhlVyfM[/youtube]

 

[Corky]

Great piece Liam. It was indeed a crazy year. At the AGM in December 2006, City announced they were in takeover talks, which was a complete and utter fiction at that time. So the first few months of 2007 were spent trying to prove it was crap so we (The Supporters Trust) could buy Sky's 10% shareholding.

I missed the goals in the Everton game as I was on holiday between Xmas & New Year so didn't see a home goal for the rest of that season. The Blackburn cup game was indeed one of the worst moments of my whole City supporting life. As you say, the hatred that poured out from long-suffering fans that day was incredible. We also lost to Wigan at home the week before and MOTD2 did a feature on us and how bad things were. I was involved in that and the producer quite openly said he wanted to see people tearing up their season tickets. My information was that the board wanted to sack Pearce after that game but Wardle refused.

I went down to the Watford game and heard about the Joey Barton rant after that while waiting for the train back. At the time I wondered how he had been allowed to get away with it but later found out it was a 'put-up job' by Mackintosh & Tyrrell in order to put pressure on Wardle to sack Pearce. The real fear was that we were going to be relegated but those wins at Newcastle, Boro and Fulham saved us in the end. If we'd lost one and drawn one of those, we'd have been down.

Then the takeover, which divided opinion somewhat, at that amazing first game at West Ham. MOTD2 were there again and I was interviewed. It was supposed to be a before-and-after piece, with me saying what I thought about the new players and what the result would be, then a reaction afterwards but they didn't get there in time so had to do both interviews after the game. It was quite hard to talk about how it would take time to gel and a draw would be a good result, when you knew we'd won 2-0 and had a stormer. Then after Xmas it all started to fall apart.

We were safe long before the Watford game. After the Fulham game no one feared relegation and there were 6 matches left. The Watford one was a no pressure game for us that sent the hosts down.

The penalty miss v Villa could suggest a different theory.

 

[Mr Partridge]

One of the memories I have is of the last game of 2007 against Liverpool. I can remember getting on the train at Ashburys after that game, the guy sat behind me was talking to another guy about the game(one had obviously been to the game, the other hadn't) was telling him about it, how average we looked, defended well but didn't cause much of a threat and he was also surprised how average Liverpool were.

It was at this point the excitement from Sven and the new signings started to wear off and I began to realise that we were not as good as I'd thought and the new signings were a big improvement on what we'd had previously, but were still a million miles away from being able to stand toe to toe with the likes of Liverpool, even on a bad day.

Think that was the season Liverpool came close to winning the title, would never in a million years have believed it if you'd told me on that day that we'd win the thing before they would!

 

[LoveCity]

Was in Australia during Pearce and glad of it - may have slit my wrists if I had to endure it live at the ground. No wonder the attendances dropped, insipid stuff that I'm sure tested some of the most loyal blues. The year after Dr. Frank took over is remembered fondly by me, compared to now we were still quite poor but after Pearce's tripe, Sven's brand of football and signings (Elano!) was a breath of fresh air. Not by coincidence attendances started to recover with a jump to around 43,000 average that year. With a deeper squad I wonder what we might have done that season, for the first half or so we were close to top four if memory serves me right.

 

[big malc]

in august 2008 at the being olympics at a dinner party ,the second richest man in china asked thaksin how much he wanted for the club.thaksin replied you cannot afford it.3 weeks later thaksin sold the club. source the bangkok post.

 

[Citizen52]

Ha-ha. I can laugh about that feeling after the Blackburn game in the cup now as I also had it. Just wanted to spew venom anywhere and everywhere, we were absolutely diabolical at that time, carried hardly anything going forward. Funny thing was I had a similar feeling after leaving there in the final game of the 2005/6 season.

 

[gordondaviesmoustache]

Like a lot of City fans (and supporters in general) my love for my club has had a degree of ebb and flow to it.

Girls, geography, family have all served to deliver periods where it's less a part of my life. 1984 and 1995 both spring to mind.

However 2007, or at least part of it, marked the lowpoint of my relationship with City. I had followed the club since 1977 and been a season ticket holder for various periods including 1996 through to 2005 and seen plenty of away games in that time too, but as the noughties wore on, a new stadium which seemed to take an age to get away from after games compared to Maine Road, the increasingly turgid football, and the realisation that in spite of the journey we'd been on we were still a million miles away from united, all conspired to make me care a little less about City. I gave up my season ticket and limited myself to around ten games a season, home and away, league and cup.

When Sven came in I got my mojo back. My first game that season was the Derby and I sat with my rag supporting dad in the East Stand and felt my love for the club re-awaken. It wasn't that we were all of a sudden a threat to united, that came later, but there was an optimism around the cub which had been missing pretty much since we moved to Eastlands.

I know it all ended pretty dismally that season, but I will forever be grateful to Sven for giving me that feeling back that had died a little.

What has followed since has been like a dream.

 

[BimboBob]

Sven's last game to what was a pretty decent season.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGOZgELbK_c[/youtube]

Did you have to? That was a great weekend totally ruined by what happened on Sunday afternoon. And the bloke next to me threw up. Journey home was miserable.