Third time lucky for a foreign Robins coach?

BBC News

20-06-2025

So City have a new head coach in Austrian Gerhard Struber. Judging by fan sentiment expressed on social media, it seems a popular appointment and certainly won't divide supporters like when Liam Manning came in for the popular Nigel Pearson in November 2023.This is City's first European managerial appointment since 1998 when Benny Lennartsson was hired by then chairman Scott Davidson to "help" John Ward, who barely four months earlier had guided City to promotion back to the Championship. John had actually asked for help and wanted to bring in the experienced Ray Harford but the City hierarchy went for the 'fashionable' coach option. John actually resigned feeling his position had become untenable and the red cap wearing Swede had the worst start of any City manager in the post-war years.City lost 5-0 to Bradford City at Valley Parade in his first game in charge and things got even worse in his second as they went down 6-1 at home to Wolves, a match remembered perhaps more for the mascot punch up between Wolfie & the Three Little Pigs!! Lennartsson won only six of his 30 league games in charge as City were relegated.If you go back to 1980, City took the foreign option for the first time when hiring Bob Houghton to replace the long serving Alan Dicks. Houghton, with a young Roy Hodgson as his assistant, had a decent pedigree having guided Malmo to the European Cup Final the previous year - they lost 1-0 to Nottingham Forest - as City sought to make a quick return to the top flight where they had been since 1976. The die had already been cast in terms of City's fate as the financial troubles mounted by the week and the ageing side began to disintegrate. City were relegated for a second successive season and in the January of 1982, Houghton resigned before the volcano of financial despair erupted and what followed was all that we associate with the Ashton Gate Eight.Let's hope it is third time lucky for City with a foreign coaching appointment and we are not hearing cries of "Uber for Struber" before the turn of the year. Personally, I'm excited by what I read about his preferred way of playing and as a person I think we might see someone who wears his heart on his sleeve, which will excite the Ashton Gate faithful who warm to managers who don't stay rooted within the technical area.Find more from David at the Forever Bristol City Podcast, external