The toughest team talk of Gary Johnson's Bristol City career

Bristol City manager Gary Johnson is set to deliver the most important team talk of his career at the Council House tonight.

Members of Bristol City Council's Development Control Committee meet to consider the football club's application for a new 30,000 all-seater stadium at Ashton Vale.

And Johnson will make an impassioned speech, urging councillors to give the go-ahead for the ambitious £65-million scheme.

City have selected a 12-man team to put the case for the stadium plan and Johnson will be the first to address the public meeting in the council chamber.

More accustomed to motivating footballers, the 54-year-old Londoner will try to convince councillors that a new stadium is crucial for the future of Bristol City and south Bristol.

He will take the floor for three minutes and read from a prepared statement, a draft copy of which has been sent to the Evening Post.

"A new stadium is crucial for the future of this football club," writes Johnson. "If we do get it, then we move on and take some major steps forward. If we don't, then I'm afraid we'll be taking some major steps backwards.

"I believe it is that important and I know the chairman (Steve Lansdown) feels it is that important. This is a club with big ambitions to be at the highest level and a new stadium is essential if we want to get there.

"The decision the committee makes tonight will have a major bearing on the kind of club Bristol City becomes in the future.

"Saying yes to a new regional stadium will also have a major bearing on the kind of city that Bristol aspires to become in the future. We all love playing at Ashton Gate and we love the stadium, but it's over 100 years old now and football has moved on. We need a stadium for the next 100 years, a stadium that will be a legacy for the whole of the city for 100 years and more.

"I get to see more new stadiums around the country every season. I get to see the state-of-the-art facilities that new stadiums in cities like Coventry, Swansea and Cardiff now offer to our main competitors.

"Ashton Gate's facilities, from a manager's and the players' perspectives, are not state-of-art, they're out-of-date. And that gives other clubs a major competitive advantage in football terms.

"A new stadium will allow us to bridge that gap, and it will allow us to attract the top-quality players that we need to compete at the highest levels. There is a big corporate market out there and clubs need to move with the times. If they don't, they get left behind. It's as simple as that.

"In the end, if Bristol City stands still, nobody gains. You have to keep pushing and striving to be better. The day that stops happening, you're in trouble. This is a go-ahead club that wants to progress and the next step in our progression has to be a new stadium.

"So much work has gone into this scheme, it would be a crying shame were it not to happen. There are so many good and positive things that hinge on the new stadium.

"It's not just about football, it's about the benefit that the stadium will bring to the whole of Bristol, and south Bristol in particular.

"New jobs, new investment, and most importantly for the local community, real pride in our city.

"I know how much work the chairman has put into it and how much countless other people have put into it. We've come too far and invested too much hope to fail now."