The Summer clearout / Coming in thread. Updated 27/8

[loyalroyaldaz]

Friend of mine from Wolverhampton has heard that Mills is on his way there for £4m

Told you this last week and you oxf*rd ingnored it !

Sorry what did u say?

Er, you`re a twat.

[DOYLERSAROYALER]

Irrespective of whether offers are good or not – accepting the money does not take the club forward if little or nothing is reinvested.

The point remains that if we hypothetically sold Hunt for 1.8M then where are we going to get a better replacement at less than that price (as the club never reinvests all of the transfer fees received).

The same goes with Mills. OK to say that 3 or 4M is a good price, but if the replacement is a League 1 or 2 untried youngster - how does that help?

Not sure how Hunt is all of a sudden in the £1.8m bracket tbh? ....he's still got a lot to prove and his injury record doesnt exactly help him in his value..... still think a £1m return on him would be good business.....

[andrew1957]

Irrespective of whether offers are good or not – accepting the money does not take the club forward if little or nothing is reinvested.

The point remains that if we hypothetically sold Hunt for 1.8M then where are we going to get a better replacement at less than that price (as the club never reinvests all of the transfer fees received).

The same goes with Mills. OK to say that 3 or 4M is a good price, but if the replacement is a League 1 or 2 untried youngster - how does that help?

Not sure how Hunt is all of a sudden in the £1.8m bracket tbh? ....he's still got a lot to prove and his injury record doesnt exactly help him in his value..... still think a £1m return on him would be good business.....

Yes but name some realistic replacements who will be better. What is the point of 1M in the bank and no strikers??

[DOYLERSAROYALER]

Irrespective of whether offers are good or not – accepting the money does not take the club forward if little or nothing is reinvested.

The point remains that if we hypothetically sold Hunt for 1.8M then where are we going to get a better replacement at less than that price (as the club never reinvests all of the transfer fees received).

The same goes with Mills. OK to say that 3 or 4M is a good price, but if the replacement is a League 1 or 2 untried youngster - how does that help?

Not sure how Hunt is all of a sudden in the £1.8m bracket tbh? ....he's still got a lot to prove and his injury record doesnt exactly help him in his value..... still think a £1m return on him would be good business.....

Yes but name some realistic replacements who will be better. What is the point of 1M in the bank and no strikers??

£1m in the bank is better than a striker on the treatment bench half the season imho

[Who Moved The Goalposts?]

£1m in the bank is better than a striker on the treatment bench half the season imho

But how does 1m in the bank help the team to earn points? You can't deny Hunt has certainly made a contribution on that score, injuries or not.

[RoyalBlue]

Good news!

"It is an on-going process but we want to offer Jimmy a new contract. In fact, we're hoping to keep everyone - that includes Shane Long, Matt Mills, Adam Federici, Simon Church and Jimmy Kebe. That's the perfect scenario for us.

"There's not so much of a rush with those players with two years left on their contracts like Adam Federici.

"But senior players going into the last year of the contracts like Jimmy Kebe are a priority."

http://www.readingchronicle.co.uk/sport ... r-quartet/

If they're hoping to keep everyone then they clearly don't need to raise money by selling players. Ergo, if they do end up selling players because they want to leave, the full proceeds should be given to McD to reinvest in players.

[Big McC]

Good news!

"It is an on-going process but we want to offer Jimmy a new contract. In fact, we're hoping to keep everyone - that includes Shane Long, Matt Mills, Adam Federici, Simon Church and Jimmy Kebe. That's the perfect scenario for us.

"There's not so much of a rush with those players with two years left on their contracts like Adam Federici.

"But senior players going into the last year of the contracts like Jimmy Kebe are a priority."

http://www.readingchronicle.co.uk/sport ... r-quartet/

If they're hoping to keep everyone then they clearly don't need to raise money by selling players. Ergo, if they do end up selling players because they want to leave, the full proceeds should be given to McD to reinvest in players.

Yes, agree with this.

Assuming that we equate 'success' as promotion to the premier league and equally that staying there is also success, then how often in the past few years have we been very close to success, but just missed out? The margins between success and failure seem to me to be quite narrow (though I admit that may be a somewhat skewed personal view!). For instance, how close this last season were we to getting automatic promotion? How many draws could have been wins? How close have we been in recent yers to getting into or winning the playoffs? How close were we to staying up in our second season in the premiership? How often did you say if only we'd spent just a little more on one or two better players? Whilst spending on players does not necessarily equal success, my view is that spending just a little more could tip the balance just enough to shift the margins in favour of success. To me that is reason enough to do just as mentioned above - allow McD to reinvest everything the club gets for players leaving this summer.

[Sarah Star]

My gut feeling is that we will be trying to keep players and attempting to sign others to give us a better chance of promotion next season. I have no statistics to back this up. I base it purely on the reported new contracts in front of our top players, the comments of Hammond, McDermott et al that they have targets, the way SJM was behaving at Wembley and what he has said since. If his love of Reading FC goes up and down it must be on a high now.

Against that, I have the players who would understandably be tempted by Premier League offers of more money and a place on the bench/1st team action in a struggling team rather than push for promotion with Reading in the Championship in a team they feel comfortable in and a slightly improved contract.

[Svlad Cjelli]

We'll also almost certianly be talking to other clubs to line up replacements if some of the "stars" are allowed to leave. So, for instance, agreeing a conditional offer with another club to buy a striker at a set price, and tying teh sale of Long up to that deal like a houre-buying "chain."

We've certainly done that in the past, when SHunt almost left for Sunderland we'd agreed a conditional deal for a potential replacement.

[Extended-Phenotype]

“Nick Hammond wrote:"It is an on-going process but we want to offer Jimmy a new contract. In fact, we're hoping to keep everyone - that includes Shane Long, Matt Mills, Adam Federici, Simon Church and Jimmy Kebe…”

Can't help but feel mistrust for this sort of article. Contract talks can mean anything. They could be offering Kebe a doughnut sandwich. But it LOOKS like JM is doing something, and when our best are sold on to Wolves we will all affectionately ruffle his weird hair and thank him for trying. It's a nice PR stunt, but otherwise meaningless. I don’t think we will ever:

a) offer a competitive salary

b) turn down an offer from another club

Replacements? Academy. Reading FC is a “business” apparently.

[Svlad Cjelli]

“Nick Hammond wrote:"It is an on-going process but we want to offer Jimmy a new contract. In fact, we're hoping to keep everyone - that includes Shane Long, Matt Mills, Adam Federici, Simon Church and Jimmy Kebe…”

Can't help but feel mistrust for this sort of article. Contract talks can mean anything. They could be offering Kebe a doughnut sandwich. But it LOOKS like JM is doing something, and when our best are sold on to Wolves we will all affectionately ruffle his weird hair and thank him for trying. It's a nice PR stunt, but otherwise meaningless. I don’t think we will ever:

a) offer a competitive salary

b) turn down an offer from another club

Replacements? Academy. Reading FC is a “business” apparently.

See the many previous posts about this. A player signing a contract isn't ever guaranteed to stay with the club, but the new contract ensures that it costs more for a club to purchase that player.

Oh, and JM has nothing to do with contract talk etc - people within the club, notably NHa - handle all of that. JM is very hands-off and leaves those he's employed to run teh football club(just one of his business units) to do just that. So JM is doing nothing.

We do offer a competitive salary as far as we can, but we're never going to get involved in a financial pissing competition with other clubs over wages. Why should we and how could we - where would the money come from?

[Extended-Phenotype]

Oh, and JM has nothing to do with contract talk etc - people within the club, notably NHa - handle all of that.

You are taking me a little too literally, there – for JM read JM’s people under his vision; I do appreciate he has staff. When I later say something like “JM sold Long”, don’t assume I believe JM personally took long to a market in the trunk of his car.

Why should we and how could we - where would the money come from?

From the money we earned selling our best players? I dunno, you either want to take risks in life for what you love or stagnate in limbo. Our promotion push this season was a fluke, and any success we have next season will be an added bonus to being “a stable business” of a player factory for genuine football clubs with ambition.

And before I’m blasted with “you’d rather we’d bankrupt ourselves like x,y,z”, buying a decent 2m striker or attacking mid when we flogged Gylfi for 7m is hardly going to require the IMF’s involvement.

[Svlad Cjelli]

Fair enough - but I think you're mixing up the capital sum of transfer fees with the ongoing expense of salaries, which are the real killer and which are a long-term (3+ years) commitment rather than a one-off. The average wag bill in the Championship is £15M and we're not far off that level.

That impression was especially gained when you said :

I don’t think we will ever:

a) offer a competitive salary

What we pay individual players certainly is "competitive" by Tier One standards - there is a wage "level" for each division and everyone knows what it is - and if we didn't pay at that level we'd not have any senior players.

What we won't do is pay over that figure to any player, or pay that sort of level to the whole squad or to reserves - or get into a pissing competition to outbid others who can and will pay a lot more. Because we can't afford to and there are no guarantees it'll work.

[brendywendy]

“Nick Hammond wrote:"It is an on-going process but we want to offer Jimmy a new contract. In fact, we're hoping to keep everyone - that includes Shane Long, Matt Mills, Adam Federici, Simon Church and Jimmy Kebe…”

Can't help but feel mistrust for this sort of article. Contract talks can mean anything. They could be offering Kebe a doughnut sandwich. But it LOOKS like JM is doing something, and when our best are sold on to Wolves we will all affectionately ruffle his weird hair and thank him for trying. It's a nice PR stunt, but otherwise meaningless. I don’t think we will ever:

a) offer a competitive salary

b) turn down an offer from another club

Replacements? Academy. Reading FC is a “business” apparently.

what a lot of rot. our salarys are competetive for championship sides without parachute payments, we have turned down countless bids for our players for the last few seasons.only ever sell if the valuation we put on the player is met.


and JM has absolutely nowt to do with contract renewals, wage structure etc. he puts the management team in place, tells them what the budget is ie-they must live within their means, and the decisions are left totally to hammond and McD.

[brendywendy]

Oh, and JM has nothing to do with contract talk etc - people within the club, notably NHa - handle all of that.

You are taking me a little too literally, there – for JM read JM’s people under his vision; I do appreciate he has staff. When I later say something like “JM sold Long”, don’t assume I believe JM personally took long to a market in the trunk of his car.

Why should we and how could we - where would the money come from?

And before I’m blasted with “you’d rather we’d bankrupt ourselves like x,y,z”, buying a decent 2m striker or attacking mid when we flogged Gylfi for 7m is hardly going to require the IMF’s involvement.

stop doing the accounts while ignoring everything in the out column!

[Mr Angry]

Added to which is the oncoming UEFA Fair Play rules that come into force shortly; paying over the odds on wages will damage the club in future years.

I love it when posters blather on about "no investment" and "having no ambition"; its both inaccurate and lazy and is symptomatic of how those kids (because generally they are kids) view football today; if you aren't in the Premier League, boasting to all your mates at play-time about the latest overseas over-hyped mercenary your club has signed for £Millions, then the club you "support" is nothing.

Whats the point of having an Academy if those young players coming through the system don't end up playing for you?? I don't see the fact that a growing number of our 1st team squad are from our Academy as anything but a good thing - in fact, I'd go so far as to say it makes supporting RFC more satisfying when 5 or 6 of the starting 11 for a game have come through the ranks, rather than been brought or, even worse (like Cardiff last season) been parachuted into the team on loan.

And yet....... some posters see the emergence of home grown young talent from the Academy graduating into the 1st team as some sort of indication that SJM is a tightwad!



Such a tightwad, that he bankrolled the Academy to the tune of nearly £500k a Year for a number of Years before we starting seeing players come through.

[roadrunner]

“Nick Hammond wrote:"It is an on-going process but we want to offer Jimmy a new contract. In fact, we're hoping to keep everyone - that includes Shane Long, Matt Mills, Adam Federici, Simon Church and Jimmy Kebe…”

Can't help but feel mistrust for this sort of article. Contract talks can mean anything.

If anything it helps us up the players prices. I think it's a given we'll lose Shane at the very least, and I expect Kebe too as he has said a few times about a return to France and he only has one year left.

Hammond is pretty decent when it comes to contracts. He's more important to us than any player IMO.

[roadrunner]

Added to which is the oncoming UEFA Fair Play rules that come into force shortly; paying over the odds on wages will damage the club in future years.

I love it when posters blather on about "no investment" and "having no ambition"; its both inaccurate and lazy and is symptomatic of how those kids (because generally they are kids) view football today; if you aren't in the Premier League, boasting to all your mates at play-time about the latest overseas over-hyped mercenary your club has signed for £Millions, then the club you "support" is nothing.

Whats the point of having an Academy if those young players coming through the system don't end up playing for you?? I don't see the fact that a growing number of our 1st team squad are from our Academy as anything but a good thing - in fact, I'd go so far as to say it makes supporting RFC more satisfying when 5 or 6 of the starting 11 for a game have come through the ranks, rather than been brought or, even worse (like Cardiff last season) been parachuted into the team on loan.

And yet....... some posters see the emergence of home grown young talent from the Academy graduating into the 1st team as some sort of indication that SJM is a tightwad!



Such a tightwad, that he bankrolled the Academy to the tune of nearly £500k a Year for a number of Years before we starting seeing players come through.

Great post.

[royal67]

Added to which is the oncoming UEFA Fair Play rules that come into force shortly; paying over the odds on wages will damage the club in future years.

I love it when posters blather on about "no investment" and "having no ambition"; its both inaccurate and lazy and is symptomatic of how those kids (because generally they are kids) view football today; if you aren't in the Premier League, boasting to all your mates at play-time about the latest overseas over-hyped mercenary your club has signed for £Millions, then the club you "support" is nothing.

Whats the point of having an Academy if those young players coming through the system don't end up playing for you?? I don't see the fact that a growing number of our 1st team squad are from our Academy as anything but a good thing - in fact, I'd go so far as to say it makes supporting RFC more satisfying when 5 or 6 of the starting 11 for a game have come through the ranks, rather than been brought or, even worse (like Cardiff last season) been parachuted into the team on loan.

And yet....... some posters see the emergence of home grown young talent from the Academy graduating into the 1st team as some sort of indication that SJM is a tightwad!



Such a tightwad, that he bankrolled the Academy to the tune of nearly £500k a Year for a number of Years before we starting seeing players come through.

^^^^ WHS ^^^^

[Royal Rother]

I dunno, you either want to take risks in life for what you love or stagnate in limbo. Our promotion push this season was a fluke, and any success we have next season will be an added bonus to being “a stable business” of a player factory for genuine football clubs with ambition.

You infer that RFC is not a genuine football club and lacks ambition and that because of the financial prudency and integrity with which the club is run, any success is a fluke. Brilliant.

I don't care how many years you have been supporting RFC, how much money you have spent on tickets, merchandise and whether you think you bleed blue and white, if that is honestly how you feel (and you are quite entitled to your opinion of course) you seriously should be following another club.

(God, that was restrained.)