Every word James Ellis said in Bristol City pre-season interview

Ahead of the season, Sporting Director James Ellis spoke to Bristol City's Head of Communications Sheridan Robins and spoke about the transfer window, reflections on the pre-season trip to Spain, excitement for Newcastle United and the club’s upcoming Giving Back Day.

In case you haven't had the chance to watch the interview, here is every word from the wide-ranging pre-season briefing...

Sheridan Robins: Well, James, it's been a month since we last caught up. What's changed in that time?

James Ellis: Has it been a month? Feels like a lot longer than that! But listen, there's been a lot happening—not just with the first team, but with the whole club. I think Charlie, myself, and the football leadership team know that there's a lot of work to do at the club, and it's really exciting work. I'd like to make sure that we represent all of the work that's going on, not just what's happening with the first team. To create a successful club, you need all the components of the club pulling in the right direction.

So, what's happened since we last spoke? Obviously, we've had some new players arrive—just a few—which is fantastic. We've had to say goodbye to some as well, which is sad, but unfortunately that's the business. We've had some young players come up from the academy, train with the first team, and do really well. We've had all the staff together as everyone returned to talk about the future and how we're going to operate together.

The building feels like it's coming together. It's really important at a football club that the first team, the academy, and all of the people supporting all of that great work come together and understand where we're trying to go. Charlie, myself, and the football leadership team have made clear the messages that we need to deliver on over the next one, two, and three seasons.

It's been a really exciting time and lots has been happening—I can't remember it all, to be honest! I can assure the fans and the community that everyone here at the training ground is working really hard to give us a good start to the season. We want to allow our young players to experience what we want them to experience: having the opportunity to represent Bristol City or go and develop their careers, and for everyone who works here—both here and at Ashton Gate, and connected to the club—to feel part of the success that will hopefully come.

Sheridan Robins: Everyone is now back from tour in Spain, and some of those young players got that opportunity. That was big for them.

James Ellis: Yeah, it's fantastic. Listen, we've got a manager who understands youth development; he's worked in it himself. We've said from the outset that it's really important to connect what I call the "player pipeline" and the first team together. There's no better way to do that than with those young players who actually deserve to go train and take their opportunity with the first team, especially in preseason.

Six or seven have done that this preseason already. They've been on a really tough preseason training camp to Spain, and I don't think many of them will have had that level of experience before. All of them have come back with credit in the bank.

Now, listen: will all of them get on the pitch at Bristol City this year? Probably not, but they're all being watched. They're all being assessed, and they're all getting their opportunities—whether that's here training with the first team, out on loan, or staying at the top end of the academy with our new coaching staff. We feel we're creating an environment that will allow us to develop young players like Bristol City have done in the past, who will represent us or go on to better things in their careers.

Sheridan Robins: And on that environment, seven new signings have come in. How are they bedding in?

James Ellis: We've gone for quite an aggressive approach to the squad build this summer. We felt that things needed freshening up in certain positions to give Michael and the staff a chance to bring in some new blood across all lines—in the back line with the goalkeeper, the defensive line, and in midfield. As you can see now, we've brought in a number nine as a center-forward with Emil.

We thought it was really important to try and do a lot of the business this summer. I'm not going to lie—that takes time, so there's going to be a cohesion challenge. But actually, when you watch training day-to-day—and I've just been out there today—all of the players, whether they've been here two, three, four years or five minutes, are giving their everything to make sure that we can start performing when the season kicks off.

Sheridan Robins: And on that squad build, where do you think we're at from a signing point of view?

James Ellis: We've got a plan, though obviously I can't divulge what that is! But have we stopped looking? 100% no. Do we understand what we need? Yes.

What we need to do is make sure that we take the opportunity to improve the squad, both from a football perspective and a financial perspective. Football is, unfortunately, about doing deals and being ahead of the game. If there isn't the opportunity to do something, we shouldn't do it. But if the opportunity is there, we should do it for the right reasons for the football club—both performance-wise and financially.

We talk about sequencing: we're currently in what we would call "Sequence Two." There's one final sequence left, and that last sequence is topping up the cherries on the cake, or taking advantage of market opportunities.

I want everyone to know that one of the major things we wanted to do in bringing Michael and his team in was to give them every possible reason to get the squad of players as cohesive as possible when we start on day one. Although we've got seven in now, I think they've all been together roughly for at least two or three weeks. That gives them a chance to understand each other, understand how Michael wants to play, get the mistakes out of their legs, and athletically develop together—because it's been a really tough preseason.

Sheridan Robins: And it's not just players, is it? Since we last spoke, Ian and Neil have joined the team as well, alongside Pat and Bally. How are those relationships forming?

James Ellis: Michael's got a very clear structure of how the staff operate, and I think Neil and Ian have bedded in really well. Both are very experienced. The dynamic between Michael, Ian, Neil, Pat, and Bally has been really good.

Bley provides that really important continuity and connection with the young players. He's excellent at working with players one-to-one and gives us all a bit of balance regarding what's happened in the past with Bristol City, so that we can learn from it and develop.

It's really important as well to remember that there's a team outside that team: the medical staff, the performance staff, the operations staff, the recruitment team, you guys in the media team—everyone at the club. There's an atmosphere here where we're trying to create an "all-in" culture where everyone plays their role. Obviously, we need the players to go out on Saturday and Tuesday afternoons to perform, but we're trying to create an environment at the training ground where everyone feels part of what we're trying to do.

Sheridan RobinsWe've had two preseason games so far, Stockport and Newport. What can you learn from those at this early stage?

James Ellis: For me, it's learning what you need to do—and there's a lot we need to do. In both games, we played two different XI's for 45 minutes each.

It was great to engage with the fans, which was terrific in Spain. I really enjoyed it—positive conversations, challenging conversations, but me fronting up to where we were. To everyone who was there, it was really good to meet you all, and thanks to all of you for traveling out to support the team.

Back to your question about the two games: the most important thing about these matches is that we're learning more and more about each individual player as we go along. Of course, we'd love to win every game leading up to the season, but no one wins a trophy in preseason—that's what the league games are for. It's more about learning, developing, understanding each other, cohesion, physical prep, tactical prep, and honestly, just getting around each other and enjoying working really hard day-to-day.

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Sheridan Robins; Looking ahead, we have Saturday at Swindon, and then Wednesday against Newcastle. That's going to be a big game—it looks like there's going to be a crowd of 18,000 City supporters. How good is that going to be?

James Ellis It's fantastic! That just shows what a big club Bristol City is, and what a great community and city we live in. We hope those fans turn up, enjoy the evening, and enjoy supporting us at Swindon on Saturday.

It's another step in our development towards getting to the first game of the season against Millwall. Prior to that—and actually most importantly in between—we've got the Balloon Festival that we've all got to go to! So if anyone wants to take me up in a balloon, I've never been up in one and I'd love to!

Sheridan RobinsYou mentioned those two weeks leading into those big games. What do the next two weeks look like?

James Ellis: It's fine-tuning, really, Sheridan. A lot of the work Michael and the staff are doing is making sure—touch wood—that we don't pick up any injuries, while tactically starting to hone in on the nature of how we're going to play as a team: how all of the units connect, and how each individual player contributes to that so that we run into those first two games with a clear idea of how we're going to play.

The Carabao Cup game is really important to us as well. But as I said at the beginning, it's a team that needs to develop its cohesion, so we can't expect everything to just click straight away. If it does, though, that would be fantastic.

Sheridan Robins: We mentioned them in passing, but this comes after the announcement that Louis Carey is coming in as the Under-21s Head Coach. How good of an appointment is that—not only because he's so well-known to the club, but also for his coaching experience?

James: The first thing to say about someone like Louis is that he's a legend of this football club—he's played the most games for the club. But Louis got the job on merit. He's gone away, developed himself as a coach, and worked in other environments, which is really important to me. It's important to have people who know Bristol City inside out, but it's also important to bring in people who have experienced football elsewhere.

He's experienced being an assistant manager in the pyramid, he's been at Southampton, and he understands individual elite development. Then you layer on the fact that he's played that many games in the Football League—you can't ask for a better background from someone who's going to translate both their experiences and their learning.

We're really lucky to have him coming back to the football club. He'll provide not only that affiliation to Bristol City, the community, the fans, the parents, and the players, but internally there will be a really strong connection between the work he does at the top end of the pipeline, Bley, and the first-team staff. We wanted someone who could put a foot in both camps and feel completely comfortable.

Sheridan Robins Just lastly, James: on Thursday, July 30th, we're introducing something a little bit different. The whole squad and staff are going to go around the community on what is going to be a "Giving Back Day."

James Ellis: The Giving Back Day allows us to connect with lots of different people in various challenging situations in their lives. I fundamentally believe we should do as much of that as we possibly can.

That's not just the first-team players—that's everyone in the building. Next week, everyone is going: the recruitment staff, medical staff, physical performance staff, analysts, first-team coaching staff, senior coaches, and myself.

I think it'll be a really great day, setting us up for hopefully a positive start to the season and showing how important it is that we're out there connecting with our community. Looking forward to seeing everyone on that!

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