AFTER last season’s 5-0 thumping at Preston North End in April, the pressure from supporters for head coach Lee Johnson to be removed from his position was almost overwhelming.

Bristol City’s owner Steve Lansdown has subsequently gone on record as saying that he met up with the board to discuss Johnson’s future.

City won their next game against Wolves, had they not done so it is fair to speculate that Johnson may well have been sacked.

Instead, City have now embarked on a great run of form going all the way back to that Wolves game.

The run of 19 games since that day has resulted in just two defeats for City, coincidentally both to Birmingham City.

Therefore, it is only right to acknowledge that Johnson, his coaching staff and the players have done an excellent job to turnaround our fortunes.

City now lie seventh in The Championship ahead of the likes of Middlesbrough and Aston Villa, both of whom were picked out as potential title-winners at the beginning of the season.

It should be noted that City have exactly the same number of points they did at this stage last season – 17 – and still ended up in a relegation fight.

However, the general consensus amongst supporters is that the team is playing better than it was last season.

In particular, we seem to have displayed much more grit and determination in games and also have goals coming from all areas of the team.

This is in comparison to last season when we lacked the ability to hold onto leads and were heavily reliant on the goals of the now-departed Tammy Abraham.

This week, City ground out a good point at Carrow Road against Norwich City before beating a very poor Bolton Wanderers side 2-0 on Tuesday evening at Ashton Gate.

Next, they travel to Suffolk on Saturday to face Ipswich Town (3pm) who have enjoyed an excellent start to the season themselves culminating in a 5-2 demolition of Sunderland on Tuesday.