Bristol City go toe-to-toe with the big boys again as familiar problems emerge in Burnley loss

After two weeks without Championship football, Bristol City supporters will have been left deflated having seen Liam Manning's side return to action with a 1-0 defeat to promotion-chasing Burnley, particularly after a convincing win over Norwich last time out.

But that scoreline didn't certainly tell the whole truth. For large periods of the game the Robins were the better of the two sides and had they had a slice more luck, they would have come away with a well-earned point at Ashton Gate.

Yu Hirakawa should have scored when he was played in excellently by Max Bird midway through the second period, but the Japanese winger's first touch let him down as he picked out James Trafford between the posts.

On top of that, the Reds really should have been awarded a penalty when the ball bounced up and struck Josh Brownhill's arm in the box. Everyone inside Ashton Gate appeared to stop and wait for the referee's whistle, only for Bobby Madley to wave play on after a brief look at his linesman.

Manning noted in this week's fans forum that there are three types of draw: one where you steal a point, a fair stalemate, and one where it feels like a defeat. This game had all the makings of a fair stalemate, other than the scoreline.

There's plenty to delve into from Saturday's defeat at Ashton Gate. Here are the stand-out talking points...

Goals are the most valuable currency

It's a bit of a cliche, but goals are what win teams football matches and so far this season, City are not scoring anywhere near enough, especially at Ashton Gate. So much of the blame has been levelled at the likes of Sinclair Armstrong, but on Saturday, the Robins really struggled to turn good possession into scoring chances for their attackers.

Nahki Wells had 29 touches in his 66 minutes of action, but only four of those came in the Burnley penalty area. The Bermudian international is in excellent form in front of goal but only managed one shot against his former club which possessed an xG of just 0.05.

In fact, as a collective, the Robins only managed to register an xG of 0.77 over the entire match as only two of their seven attempts on goal found the target. A whopping 0.3 of that xG came from Hirakawa's second-half effort alone so it is clear that City didn't create enough scoring chances throughout the game.

There is absolutely no shame in that, particularly against a Burnley side that has only conceded six goals in their opening 16 matches this season and kept clean sheets in each of their last three games, but it serves as a bit of a marker of where this City team is currently.

The Robins are not the finished article, but they are heading in the right direction. This young side has plenty of raw talent at their disposal, but they lack that bit of experience and know-how at times to break down teams that are defensively resolute. Somehow, Manning and his coaching team need to find a way to make this side more consistently threatening when they're on top.

Battling with the big boys

Before a ball was kicked this season, most City fans would have marked this clash with Burnley, last month's meeting with Leeds United, and the Ashton Gate showdown with Sheffield United as three of the Reds' hardest home games.

Although some concerns will be raised about the fact the Robins have only claimed one point from those three matches, the manner in which Manning's side has played against all three teams tells a much different story.

Burnley spent the first ten minutes of the first half and large portions of the second period on the back foot as City penned them in and piled on the pressure in search of an equalising goal. Similarly, for 86 minutes against the Blades, Bristol City held their own against one of the most effective sides in the division and were unfortunate to come away empty-handed.

When Manning's Reds met Leeds, they not only picked up a point but they frustrated Daniel Farke's immensely with their solid defensive structure that proved difficult to break down. Of course, football is a results business and that will be the true measure of success, but under Manning, City have given three-promotion-chasing sides a tough time at Ashton Gate and beaten Middlesbrough away from home.

These are teams with Premier League-level players and resources that routinely brush away Championship opposition without care. The fact that the Reds are mixing it with the big boys shows how solid the foundation that Manning has created is and Scott Parker noted that in his post-match press conference.

"I don't know exactly what the stats are, but this is one of the first games they've lost here at home," Parker said. "They've played some very good sides here, Leeds come to mind and this will be a tough place for a lot of teams to come."

Does the back three work?

Having been so successful with the back three away at Norwich before the international break, it was always likely that Manning would stick with the same system against the Clarets on Saturday.

In the win at Carrow Road, it was Cam Pring who played as the left centre-back with Haydon Roberts ahead of him whereas in Saturday's showdown, it was Luke McNally who took on that role against his former side.

Although the former Burnley man had a reasonable afternoon, barring a heavy challenge on Hannibal Mejbri in the first half, City felt like they were missing a dimension in possession by not having a left-footer in that role. Whether it be Pring, Roberts, Kal Naismith, or Rob Atkinson, having a left-footed player on that side of the backline allows the Robins to progress up the field more when in possession and use their natural width with more ease than a right-footed player.

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Naismith is understood to be progressing well as he continues his recovery from injury, but with the Scotsman ruled out for now you have to wonder if the time could be right for the return of Atkinson if Manning decides to continue with the back three. He may not have played for the first team in almost two years but he has completed back-to-back 90 minutes for the under-21s and has been named on the bench in each of the Robins' last three matches.

If the 26-year-old isn't yet ready to be thrown into the fold, the Reds will have to revert to the back four they used in the second half on Saturday, especially as Manning felt it gave his side more control against the Clarets.

"The first 10 minutes we got joy a certain way, they then changed how they set up which pushed us a bit deeper which is not ideally what we want," the Red boss explained post-match.

"We want to get after it, we want to press high. We then changed it to the four and managed to get a little bit higher."

Scott Twine has a big role still to play

It's safe to say the signing of Twine on a permanent basis has split the fanbase over the first few months of the campaign, even though his arrival was initially met with positivity from the majority of City supporters.

The excellent recent form of Bird has perhaps played into that narrative slightly. He has shone as a number 10 just behind Nahki Wells while Twine has been sidelined and that has led some to question whether the money needed to be spent to bring the attacking midfielder to Ashton Gate permanently.

But Saturday lunchtime's game showed that Bird himself is not faultless. The little tricks and flicks that have made the attacking midfielder so effective so far this season didn't come off in the wet and windy conditions and the former Derby County man ultimately had one of his quietest games in City colours.

This was always going to happen at some point, especially with such an intense run of fixtures on the horizon. Manning will need to rest and rotate his players and that will open the door for Twine to stake his claim for the starting position.

"Having the option to bring on someone like that [Pring] back in, or Twiney and Yu speaks volumes about where we're at," insisted Manning after the full-time whistle. "It's only going to stand us in good stead when you look at how many games we've got in the next six weeks."

Although he couldn't produce that moment of quality needed to unlock the away side's defence, Twine's energy changed the dynamic of the game in the second half and it would be incredibly naive to assume he won't have a major impact at Ashton Gate over the coming weeks and months.