The country’s seventh-biggest city, the largest in the South West by some margin, and towering over its rivals as the most populous place in England which is yet to host a Premier League game.
Bristol is home to many great things. The Clifton Suspension Bridge. Wallace and Gromit. Banksy. it was named among the best places to live in the UK by The Times as recently as 2023.
Another potential attraction, top-flight football, has been absent from the banks of the River Avon since 1980, when Bristol City’s worsening financial situation saw them plummet from the old First Division to the Fourth in consecutive seasons.
Friday 14th March 7:30pm
Kick off 8:00pm
Even then, it was only during four heady years under the management of Alan Dicks that they rubbed shoulders with England’s elite. Prior to that half-decade, you have to go back to before the First World War, when they became the region’s first representative at the top table of domestic football.
A sizeable proportion of the intervening century has been spent outside either of the top two divisions. In the 45 years since the Robins were last in the top flight, you can count on two hands how often they have finished in the top half of the second tier. You’d need only one digit for the number of times that has amounted to reaching the play-offs.
In that same time, Swindon have had time not only to become the South West’s only other top-flight representative, and the only one to play Premier League football, but also to drop right back down to the fourth tier of English football.
Things might be about to change. With nine games to go, Bristol City find themselves with their first realistic play-off shot since before Covid – 2019/20 was the last time they finished even within 10 points of the top six.
The Robins have largely gone under the radar this term, trundling along without much fanfare but slowly cementing their claim with a run of 26 points from their last 14 games. Fifth and sixth spots remain very much up for grabs, and the Robins are only two points off both Coventry and West Brom who currently occupy the final two play-off places.
They would start the weekend inside the top six with a Friday night victory over Norwich, who are one of five other teams still in with a realistic spot of forcing their way into play-off contention, live on Sky Sports.
Liam Manning’s side tick a lot of boxes to suggest they can go the distance. Form is their obvious asset, but even in their weaker moments City have been largely resilient and hard to beat. They have lost only three games more than second-placed Sheffield United. Only Sheffield Wednesday and Sunderland have picked up more points from behind.
“Internally, I think we understand that that’s where we’re aspiring to get to at the end of the season,” veteran striker Nahki Wells, who was promoted to the Premier League with Huddersfield in 2017, told Sky Sports.
“The manager does a very good job of staying mellow, steadying the ship in terms of expectation and almost undermining it from the outside – but within the four walls, we understand that it’s where we want to get to.”
Bristol City striker Nahki Wells tells Sky Sports about his side’s play-off ambitions this season.
Now 16 months into Manning’s tenure at Ashton Gate, he can see for himself the Robins being cast in his image. The same front-foot, possession-based football which won admirers at MK Dons and Oxford is slowly shining through.
City rank third in the Championship for both high turnovers and final-third passes. They play most of their football in the same area of the pitch as the league’s big guns, and have won admiration from opponents for their willingness to take the game to them.
After their point at Bramall Lane on Tuesday night, Sheff Utd manager Chris Wilder admitted: “I don’t think it was anything they didn’t deserve really. They controlled the game against us in the first half.”
It has been a gradual process to get to this point. City were a counter-attacking unit under previous manager Nigel Pearson and with the adaptation to what has been dubbed ‘Manningball’, patterns of play and player roles were not always clear in the early days.
Now, City are a match for most teams in the league up until the final pass, owing a lot to the complementary midfield pairing of Jason Knight’s boundless energy and Max Bird’s composure and technical quality.
Highlights of the Sky Bet Championship match between Sheffield Utd and Bristol City.
Still, there is a level of apprehension around the wider City fanbase precisely because of doubts over that finishing touch. If the Robins fall short this season it will be more down to failure of execution than intent.
Turning their possession in and around opposition 18-yard boxes into goals has not always come so easy. They have the worst shot-conversion rate of any side in the top half and are one of only three who are underperforming their expected goals tally.
Manning does take some responsibility for that given this is his team and his style. His sides have never historically been huge goalscorers. But he was dealt a tough hand with the way last season’s top scorer Tommy Conway, the most natural finisher at the club, was replaced last summer.
One of two arrivals, Fally Mayulu, found adapting to the Championship so difficult he was shipped back out on loan in January. The other, Sinclair Armstrong, is showing potential as a rough diamond but has only three goals to his name since joining from QPR.
A 1-1 draw last weekend against a Hull side who played for 75 minutes with 10 men and completed only 17 second-half passes perhaps summed up the frustrations best, but more widely there are signs the tide is turning.
That comes not least in their xG tally over recent games and a run of scoring at least two goals in four of their last eight matches – their joint-best spell of the season.
There is a visible cohesion which was lacking at times in earlier periods of the season and Scott Twine, the showpiece summer signing driven by Manning after the pair had worked together at MK Dons, is beginning to deliver the creative spark his arrival promised.
A talented but porous Norwich side, who have conceded more goals than third-bottom Derby and dropped 30 points from winning positions, more than anyone else in the Championship, will on paper provide an opportunity to extend the Robins’ run, and edge them closer to finally turning that Premier League dream into a reality.
But this is the Championship. In a league this chaotic, it would be dangerous to predict whether the South West will finally have its second Premier League representative, and a first since 1993, next season. But the chances have not been this good for quite some while.
Watch Bristol City vs Norwich from 7.30pm on Friday on Sky Sports Football, kick-off 7.45pm.
