A 0-0 draw at Nottingham Forest last Saturday formally ended City’s 2017/18 season promotion ambitions, however in reality our hopes of playing Premier League football next season died many weeks ago.

Ever since the turn of the year, City’s form has just not been good enough to trouble the sides near the top end of the Championship table.

A play-off place looked near assured back at the end of December as City battled at the top of the table with Wolves and Cardiff.

But since then, the likes of Fulham, Millwall and Middlesbrough – particularly the former two clubs  – have been in unbelievable form whilst City have floundered and not won a single away game since the middle of December.

Even at Forest on Saturday we struggled massively to compete with a side that we beat comfortably at Ashton Gate back in December. We ended the game having had no shots on target, an all too familiar story of late. The players appeared to have run out of puff and we are simply nowhere near the creative force we were earlier in the season.

This Sunday City face Sheffield United – another team that ran out of gas in the second half of the season – at Ashton Gate in the final game of the season (12.30pm). The Blades currently sit a point below City in 11th position and they too have had a significant fall from grace.

The Yorkshire club topped the Championship in the middle of November but after a 5-4 reverse at home to Fulham they have been in decline since.

City can still finish anywhere between seventh and 11th and so there is a bit riding on this game. I feel it would be much better from a psychological perspective going into next season having finished seventh or eighth than 11th.

So I hope the players can put on one last good performance before the summer break.