What has happened to the Bristol Bears culture? As Ashton Gate becomes a temple of doom

I would like to start this week’s column by replacing one well-worn word we have heard continually for far too long and replacing it with another, one which I am hoping (more heart than head) will be more short lived and throwaway.

You could say that these words are inexplicably linked. In fact the failure to act on the former has led us to the introduction of the latter. If you haven’t got it by now, I am of course talking about learnings and failure.

Our constant and continued inability to learn from what is now becoming ever more frequent and occasionally embarrassing defeat has led us into an ever-increasing culture of failure. So much so that while I spoke to the loyal season card-carrying supporters that sit around us in the Dolman Stand before Saturday's kick off against Saracens, there was an air of doom and gloom before a leather clad boot had chance to caress a ball.