Back from the game , Swansea home,

[Kitson12]

Just to bring something else to the thread, there was a massive handball shout in the second-half. I didn't see it, but was it justified?

[SLAMMED]

Didn't even see it, so couldn't have been obvious.

[Man Friday]

Net profit in transfers, not as a club - sorry I haven't posted much for a while...

No, not until we lost to Brendan Rodgers' team. A few weeks ago you posted "I hope Swansea beat Reading". Well you got your wish. You also exposed yourself as a non-Reading supporter. This is supposed to be a forum for Reading fans. People that want Reading to win. Every match.

[Man Friday]

Just to bring something else to the thread, there was a massive handball shout in the second-half. I didn't see it, but was it justified?

Don't know. Suspect it was handball but conveniently ignored by the referee because it was accidental and therefore, strictly in compliance with the rules of the game, subject to an indirect free-kick. It just ain't gonna happen. The rules need changing on this because it's never applied. Penalties are nearly always given for handball, even where it's reasonably obvious that it wasn't intentional. Wenger raised this in a different way a week or so ago and he's half right.

[Ian Royal]

Are you fecking kidding me!!!!

The only players to come out with any credit were Karacan, Feds, Harte and Jobi. Jobi was all over the place trying to make things happen, Karacan was his usual busy self, feds was solid and harte was assured at the back (nothing he can do about being beaten by pace).

What game were you watching mate!!

The rest were dire. Griffin to a lesser extent.

Are you kidding me? If Jobi could just PASS we would much better. But he was rubbish all game. Sure he tried and was all over the place, but nothing came off.

For the whole team, every pass, bobble, deflection and ricochet was just wrong, it was always just out of reach or over hit or what ever, very unlucky today.

That said, Hunt was superb, and should of done better with his chance, but he hasn't played much. Hungry but rusty.

Long did well, Kebe too but why on earth are we playing Armstrong in midfield? What's going on with Howard - surely he would be a better option right now?


Looking forward to City to put it right

At a guess I'd say Armstrong kept his place because we were unbeaten with him in midfield. I'd expect to see a change there for the next match.

Long can't keep his place in a 4-2-3-1 for much longer surely? No matter all the good work he does, he offers pretty much zero goal threat and that good work doesn't really seem to get us a lot very often.

[Royalee]

Net profit in transfers, not as a club - sorry I haven't posted much for a while...

No, not until we lost to Brendan Rodgers' team. A few weeks ago you posted "I hope Swansea beat Reading". Well you got your wish. You also exposed yourself as a non-Reading supporter. This is supposed to be a forum for Reading fans. People that want Reading to win. Every match.

I want us to be successful and know we won't be with the current set-up and am extremely frustrated at the short termism of the club - it was shown up yesterday, so yes I am glad as hopefully it brought forward some home truths.

[Ian Royal]

That would be the short-termism that's in place to make sure we remain a going concern at this level long into the future?

[Royalee]

That would be the short-termism that's in place to make sure we remain a going concern at this level long into the future?

We're slipping and will most probably finish lower than we did last season - we've been in decline for the best part of 4 years now.

[Row Z Royal]

That would be the short-termism that's in place to make sure we remain a going concern at this level long into the future?

We're slipping and will most probably finish lower than we did last season - we've been in decline for the best part of 4 years now.

Decline. Ask Charlton fans about decline. Ask Leeds, Southampton and Forest fans about decline.

[Ian Royal]

That would be the short-termism that's in place to make sure we remain a going concern at this level long into the future?

We're slipping and will most probably finish lower than we did last season - we've been in decline for the best part of 4 years now.

Disgaree we're in decline, especially seeing as that period includes the end of our peak. We're holding steady at the moment in a trough. The next step on our growing profile is probably a few years away, that's all.

But I'm not going to get into the same tired argument with you about it, because you will stick to your position no matter what is said.

[bobby1413]

come on folks tell us drifters what it was like, sounded dire on BBC Berks, shot shy?

Can you change the thread title - it's really annoying.

[Kitson12]

That would be the short-termism that's in place to make sure we remain a going concern at this level long into the future?

We're slipping and will most probably finish lower than we did last season - we've been in decline for the best part of 4 years now.

Yes, there are problems, but we've only lost three out of 11, Swansea have lost 4 as have Leeds. McDermott was brought in to be a permanent manager, not someone who'd fill in until someone 'better' became available. It doesn't take Snowball's statistics to see that we have improved immeasurably since Rodgers left.
Also having been at Swansea Uni, and going to watch Swansea on a fairly regular basis during my three years there, under two managers, Martinez and Sousa, and can confirm that they've always played that kind of football, attractive, free-flowing but not yielding many goals. Rodgers hasn't stamped his authority on Swansea, he's handily just taken over at a club where they ALREADY played his 'continental' system of play, and have done for years.
So why don't you get your head out of Rodgers arse, and shut the oxf*rd up.

[Snowball]

Swansea came and played boring slow football with almost zero threat
as if they would be very happy with 0-0.

They then had one good break where we didn't defend well enough and got their goal.

It felt like it was probably over then, because they don't commit and waste a lot of
time playing keep-ball. it was only because we got a bit gung-ho early in the second half that
we were exposed and could have gone further behind.

Us playing 4-5-1 stops us conceding many goals. I still don't like it. But we have been looking
less and less likely to score and we're grinding poor old Shane into the ground with these
countless punt and hope long passes.


For people to criticise Long or Church and say they are "not strikers" is plain stupid.

Their scoring rate last season for games played was fine. What is different these last few games
is the gap between MF and Long, he's not being supported, and second, McAnuff and Kebe have
played less well

[Big Foot]

Kebe seemed unwilling to knock the ball behind the full back and run after it on Saturday, which is when he is at his best.

He's also at his best going outside, not cutting in on his left foot IMO - as he did on several occasions on Saturday, as well as other games recently.

[Stranded]

Why didn't he sign them then? Because nothing changed in terms of players out to finance those two buys.

Rodgers decided that Tabb at right back was good enough for CCC football, then he spent money on Cummings before going back to Tabb. He tried playing a season without a decent right back. He also thought Alex Pearce was 'the new John Terry' and made him captain.

It wasn't coincidence that as soon as Heston bought in 2 experienced proven defenders results picked up. If Rodgers had done that he may have turned things around.

LOL @ he made the club £7million. More a case of said players wanting out and the club moving them on. Whoever was in charge would have been forced into those moves. Rodgers had money to spend here, much more than a lot of CCC clubs.

We could barely afford Thorvaldsson when Rodgers was here, McDermott was then given budgets to bring in two Premiership players on top wages, clearly something did change. Also, I wouldn't call minus £10 million on a team which whimpered out of the playoffs 3 months before plenty of money to spend. Any manager who could have sold the amount of players we did, bring in youngsters, gel a team and get them playing decent football in the time Rodgers had should be managing Real Madrid. McDermott's job was a lot easier as he knew he had a short time frame just to play it safe, so he did just that with short term signings and mixing the ball up playing hoofball. Anyone honestly think we're in a better position for the long term than we were when Rodgers left needs to take another look.

Hang on, with Rogers here we signed Matt Mills, Brian Howard et al - so he didn't do too badly as far as money to spend is concerned. He certainly spent more than McDermott has, he just didn't get the team playing. Maybe he would have done but the decision was understandable at the time. Swansea have playing the "Rogers" way for years now so it's not surprising he's doing better there at the mo - though he can only be judged in comparison to previous Swansea sides come the end of the year.

[BR2]

Swansea came and played boring slow football with almost zero threat
as if they would be very happy with 0-0.

They then had one good break where we didn't defend well enough and got their goal.

It felt like it was probably over then, because they don't commit and waste a lot of
time playing keep-ball. it was only because we got a bit gung-ho early in the second half that
we were exposed and could have gone further behind.

Us playing 4-5-1 stops us conceding many goals. I still don't like it. But we have been looking
less and less likely to score and we're grinding poor old Shane into the ground with these
countless punt and hope long passes.


For people to criticise Long or Church and say they are "not strikers" is plain stupid.

Their scoring rate last season for games played was fine. What is different these last few games
is the gap between MF and Long, he's not being supported, and second, McAnuff and Kebe have
played less well

The trouble is Snowball,other than the ball that hit Church and went in v Ipswich,neither of them ever seem to convert half-chances.
They don't have the natural goalscoring awareness of a Cureton or a Kitson or a Doyle.
This is a big season for both of them-we can't keep on saying that Church is promising and one day he has to learn how to head a ball.
As for Shane he is far from being a natural footballer-he is really a rugby or Gaelic footballer playing football and for all of his running and chasing which is Premier League his touch and passing are 3rd division.

[Schards#2]

For a decade before Rodgers arrived, Reading were either in the Premiership or challanging for promotion.

Then under Rodgers we were in a relegation battle and had relegation form.

Then, after Rodgers left, we reverted to promotion form.

It's often hard to compare managers, however with Rodgers/McDermott, it's easy as they followed straight after each other with minimal changes to the squad. One would have relegated us to Div 1, the other would have got us promoted had his results ran over an entire season. The comparison could not be more stark.

Rodgers may or may not go on to great things, but whatever he does subsequently will not alter the fact that he was a dismal failure at Reading and IMHO we would be in League one now had we persevered with him.

[Maguire]

For a decade before Rodgers arrived, Reading were either in the Premiership or challanging for promotion.

Then under Rodgers we were in a relegation battle and had relegation form.

Love the way you've ignored the actual relegation we managed in that time, and the fact that we had relegation form under Coppell (check out the home form in 2009). Take that shitty form and remove six of the team that started the p/o game up in Burnley (oh and S.Hunt) and see what you're left with.

Stick your spin.

[Silver Fox]

I don't know if it's been mentioned but why did Griffin get back in the team at the expense of Snoop? The old man then gets rinsed by Sinclair for the only goal in somewhat predictable scenes.

I can't really add much about the game as I was zoning out pretty much the whole way through, very tedious fare, pretty glad the A33 traffic was so bad meaning we managed less than 90 minutes.

[Man Friday]

I don't know if it's been mentioned but why did Griffin get back in the team at the expense of Snoop? The old man then gets rinsed by Sinclair for the only goal in somewhat predictable scenes.

I can't really add much about the game as I was zoning out pretty much the whole way through, very tedious fare, pretty glad the A33 traffic was so bad meaning we managed less than 90 minutes.

The ball was through the middle. It was down to the centre-back(s). Considering his lack of pace Griffin was superb at keeping their left winger under control through anticipation. Get off his back.