Bristol City will be backed by a sold-out away end when they travel to Loftus Road to face QPR in the ChampionshipLiam Manning and Bristol City sit fifth in the Championship table(Image: Photo by Dan Istitene/Getty Images)

Liam Manning has made a straightforward request to the Bristol City fans travelling to Loftus Road for the Robins’ clash with QPR, urging them to “give everything” and “enjoy it” as the Reds look to boost their play-off hopes against Marti Cifuentes’ side.

City will be backed by a sold-out away end when they travel to West London to face the Hoops on Saturday afternoon. Cifuentes’ side currently sit 15th in the Championship table having ended a seven-match winless run against Oxford United on Wednesday evening to pull seven points clear of the relegation zone and all but confirm their place in the second tier next season.

Throughout the campaign so far, Manning has urged both his playing squad and the City supporters to enjoy the journey rather than focus on the potential outcomes at the end of the season as the Robins battle for a place in the top six of the Championship. Having praised the fans for helping get his side over the line against both Watford and West Brom in the last few days, the Reds head coach is keen to see more of the same at Loftus Road.

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“It’s the same,” the Robins boss told Bristol Live when asked what his message was for the fans making the trip to West London. “The support on the road has been terrific and like I said, we’ve got five to go, let’s have a right go.

“Like you see tonight, we’ve all got the same goal and we all want the same things. Let’s give everything and let’s enjoy it.

“It can be a powerful thing if you turn up and you have that excitement and that buzz rather than waiting to see how the game goes,” Manning continued. “Naturally, there is such a fixation on outcomes on what’s going to happen in the future and this, that and the other that you sometimes forget to live in the present.”

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With their stoppage-time win over West Brom last time out, City have climbed up to fifth in the table ahead of Saturday afternoon’s clash with QPR. With just five games remaining of the season, the Reds are three points clear of seventh-placed Middlesbrough and six ahead of both the Baggies and Millwall.

Beating Albion has put a reasonable buffer between the Robins and Tony Mowbray’s side, with some going as far as to suggest that Tuesday night’s defeat at Ashton Gate may have even pushed West Brom too far adrift in the play-off race. Manning, unsurprisingly, doesn’t subscribe to that school of thought and while he wants supporters to dream in the final weeks of the campaign, he knows there’s an awful lot of work to be done between now and May 3.

“It’s great if you follow it up on Saturday,” the head coach replied when asked how big the win over West Brom could be. “We’ve still got five to go, we’ve still got 15 points. If they [West Brom] go and win five and we don’t win five, that’s the bit for me.

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“Ifs, buts and maybes, it’s kind of a little bit irrelevant and that’s my job, right? I think everybody around it should be excited. It’s been a long time since the club had an evening like tonight with that energy and the position we’re in. Of course, enjoy it, be excited and get ready to go Saturday. That’s my job, making sure the lads understand why we were able to do tonight and it wasn’t because we tried to chase a win, it was because we turned up with the right behaviours and showed real bravery to go and play how we wanted to play.

“We took care of our actions rather than focusing on what-ifs at the end of the game. I’m quite clear that’s my job, I’ve got to keep the players in that space.”

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