SC hasn't a clue.

[T.R.O.L.I.]

lose half the team if SC left in the summer-all our best players gone
-total rebuild of team= mid table if we were lucky

I for one wouldn't be too annoyed at that if our rebuilt team was full of younger players (i.e Pearce, Karacan, Henry).

[brendywendy]

lose half the team if SC left in the summer-all our best players gone
-total rebuild of team= mid table if we were lucky

I for one wouldn't be too annoyed at that if our rebuilt team was full of younger players (i.e Pearce, Karacan, Henry).

this season coming yes, i agree, id be quite happy with that too
either way really

but i can see why the club saw it as its best chance of getting up this season, by retaining the prem players and coppell and gioving it one (last?) hurrah
which still may7 come off-who knows

[Deathy]

lose half the team if SC left in the summer-all our best players gone
-total rebuild of team= mid table if we were lucky

I for one wouldn't be too annoyed at that if our rebuilt team was full of younger players (i.e Pearce, Karacan, Henry).

This what I'm hoping for this summer. New manager, new ideas, fresh approach, few faces to the team, the Doyle's, S.Hunt's, Harper's out and youngsters in. I'll take 12th place next season for all of that.

[boy1985]

The idea of rebuilding with a young side always sounds good, but its not always as easy as that. Southampton have a better acadamy than us and look where they are.

Plus if we had started this season with Henry, Karacan, Pearce etc we would probably have finished mid table, and then they would have been snapped up by bigger/better clubs anyway.

[Deathy]

Plus if we had started this season with Henry, Karacan, Pearce etc we would probably have finished mid table, and then they would have been snapped up by bigger/better clubs anyway.

[Hoop Blah]

If we could figure out the problem, we'd be managers, but whoever said we've been flattered, think again.

Look at these results. just the wins. This CANNOT be flattering. Not 19 wins.

The results were flattering the performances, for example the 4-0 against Watford was a pertty poor peformance and we only opened them up once we'd gone ahead and they went for broke.

Many of the other games around that time saw us beat teams that we didn't necessarily deserve to on performance alone. Now we're not alone in that, it's common in football for the better team on the day to lose, but we had a style of play that played to the percentages and we made the most of the few chances we created.

As for the rest of your look at points gained etc, your right that the position hasn't changed that much, but if you look at how well positioned we were at Christmas compared to November I think you see where we made up the most of that ground.

The other teams at the top have had similar poor form to us, that doesn't make our form less of an issue, it just goes to show how we could've sown up this division again if we'd made better use of the talent we have in the squad. Instead we've seen all the gusto and confidence built up during the good run of results (but IMO poor performances) turned into a squad bereft of ideas and the guile to score a goal let alone beat a team.

[Agent Balti]

The idea of rebuilding with a young side always sounds good, but its not always as easy as that. Southampton have a better acadamy than us and look where they are.

Plus if we had started this season with Henry, Karacan, Pearce etc we would probably have finished mid table, and then they would have been snapped up by bigger/better clubs anyway.

Parallels with Southampton are moot as their 'back end' is nonsense compared to ours. Bad financial planning is why they are in the state they are in, nothing to do with their academy. (I cite off-loading Stern John to Bristol City on loan to back this up.)

[brendywendy]

If we could figure out the problem, we'd be managers, but whoever said we've been flattered, think again.

Look at these results. just the wins. This CANNOT be flattering. Not 19 wins.

The results were flattering the performances, for example the 4-0 against Watford was a pertty poor peformance and we only opened them up once we'd gone ahead and they went for broke.

Many of the other games around that time saw us beat teams that we didn't necessarily deserve to on performance alone. Now we're not alone in that, it's common in football for the better team on the day to lose, but we had a style of play that played to the percentages and we made the most of the few chances we created.

As for the rest of your look at points gained etc, your right that the position hasn't changed that much, but if you look at how well positioned we were at Christmas compared to November I think you see where we made up the most of that ground.

The other teams at the top have had similar poor form to us, that doesn't make our form less of an issue, it just goes to show how we could've sown up this division again if we'd made better use of the talent we have in the squad. Instead we've seen all the gusto and confidence built up during the good run of results (but IMO poor performances) turned into a squad bereft of ideas and the guile to score a goal let alone beat a team.

what about some of the defeats and draws that have flattered the opposition?

[Hoop Blah]

The idea of rebuilding with a young side always sounds good, but its not always as easy as that. Southampton have a better acadamy than us and look where they are.

Plus if we had started this season with Henry, Karacan, Pearce etc we would probably have finished mid table, and then they would have been snapped up by bigger/better clubs anyway.

Parallels with Southampton are moot as their 'back end' is nonsense compared to ours. Bad financial planning is why they are in the state they are in, nothing to do with their academy. (I cite off-loading Stern John to Bristol City on loan to back this up.)

Their experienced players aren't much good either.

You need some solid experienced pro's to help the youngsters coming though.

[Hoop Blah]

what about some of the defeats and draws that have flattered the opposition?

To be honest I can't ever remember coming away from a game this season thinking we'd been robbed.

Which games were you thinking of?

[boy1985]

Plus if we had started this season with Henry, Karacan, Pearce etc we would probably have finished mid table, and then they would have been snapped up by bigger/better clubs anyway.

We'd have done better than mid table then? LOL

[CMRoyal]

If we could figure out the problem, we'd be managers, but whoever said we've been flattered, think again.

Look at these results. just the wins. This CANNOT be flattering. Not 19 wins.

The results were flattering the performances, for example the 4-0 against Watford was a pertty poor peformance and we only opened them up once we'd gone ahead and they went for broke.

Many of the other games around that time saw us beat teams that we didn't necessarily deserve to on performance alone. Now we're not alone in that, it's common in football for the better team on the day to lose, but we had a style of play that played to the percentages and we made the most of the few chances we created.

Isn't it also the case that we played well in some matches and that wasn't reflected in the result? I'm thinking Burnley away, Swansea (I think?) away, possibly QPR home. Overall, I believe that if you are playing well, results will reflect that. Overall, Sheff Utd are playing well and we are not, so in a game where we didn't deserve to lose and they didn't deserve to win, what happens? They come away with the points. So I don't think our number of wins flatters us - you can pick out certain wins that do flatter us, but overall the total reflects the performances pretty accurately.

[Agent Balti]

The idea of rebuilding with a young side always sounds good, but its not always as easy as that. Southampton have a better acadamy than us and look where they are.

Plus if we had started this season with Henry, Karacan, Pearce etc we would probably have finished mid table, and then they would have been snapped up by bigger/better clubs anyway.

Parallels with Southampton are moot as their 'back end' is nonsense compared to ours. Bad financial planning is why they are in the state they are in, nothing to do with their academy. (I cite off-loading Stern John to Bristol City on loan to back this up.)

Their experienced players aren't much good either.

You need some solid experienced pro's to help the youngsters coming though.

Indeed. We need a core nucleus of respected pro's, but none with the mercenary attitude of some that have dragged us down this year. I need mention no names.

If we had played Henry, Karacan and Pearce then I couldn't see them being sold off...how long did we hold onto Sidwell and Shorey before letting them move on? And they only moved on due to being in the last year of their contract.

[papereyes]

We did not play well in the Burnley away game.

As for the rest of your look at points gained etc, your right that the position hasn't changed that much, but if you look at how well positioned we were at Christmas compared to November I think you see where we made up the most of that ground.

I think you'd have to be an absolute numpty to look at just the position until about March*. So, yes, while we didn't lose too much ground or whatever excuse you want to throw at the issue (its stiLOL in our hands? there's three worse teams redux), the fact that we were not racking up the points remained more important.

The points we were failing to get went somewhere. And if Birmingham or Wolves were not winning, it meant someone behind us was slowly catching up - and now, not one but two sides have jumped in over us. I would not shed too salty a tear if Swansea put two or three wins together and jump in over us as well.

I said somewhere else that I felt that 'its still in our hands' put a sense of complacency amongst the fans. I wonder how much this affected the players ... after each failure to win, they still see themselves up there and it stops hurting as much.





*in our relegation season, a standard answer was "we're 12/13/14th, why worry about relegation" when we were only ever 8 or 9 points above the relegations spots. Now, given that Jan/Feb/March were tough months anyway, it was only ever 3 or 4 bad weeks between us and a dogfight. So what happens when we have 8 bad weeks on the trot?

[Mr Angry]

what about some of the defeats and draws that have flattered the opposition?

To be honest I can't ever remember coming away from a game this season thinking we'd been robbed.

Which games were you thinking of?

Preston away

Burnley away

Forest at home.

[Mr Angry]

We did not play well in the Burnley away game.

Thats cobblers; we BATTERED Burnley that freezing cold night - their keeper (jenson) made several fantastic saves and we hit the woodwork 3 times, whilst Burnley scored with just about their only attack in the 2nd half. Left feeling VERY mugged.

[CMRoyal]

Isn't it also the case that we played well in some matches and that wasn't reflected in the result? I'm thinking Burnley away, Swansea (I think?) away

I thought wrong - it was the other lilywhites, Preston.

[papereyes]

We did not play well in the Burnley away game.

Thats cobblers; we BATTERED Burnley that freezing cold night - their keeper (jenson) made several fantastic saves and we hit the woodwork 3 times, whilst Burnley scored with just about their only attack in the 2nd half. Left feeling VERY mugged.

We had a 15-20 minute spell at the start and then froze up as Burnley came into the game.

2nd half was pretty much a midfield battle, with Burnley getting the better of it, imo.

We were only mugged in that we failed to capitalise on that early spell.

We did not play well at all. Likewise Preston, tbf - even though the goal that settled it was a fluke, we didn't do enough to really warrant victory in that game either.

[Hoop Blah]

I didn't go to Burnley (I remember the radio being full of praise for their keeper though) or Preston away so I'll take the various word on those, but I certainly don't remember us playing well against Forest, in fact I remember us being pretty poor and without too many ideas.

These things should even themselves out, but as mainly a home fan only this season I can't say I've seen many games I've felt we deserved more from. Perhaps thats to be expected to an extent as I've not seen too many away games.

[Top Flight]

It's not Steve Coppell that doesn't have a clue...........

It's the people of Reading that don't have a clue.

If you want a decent football team, then 25,000 more people need to show up every week. Then Reading could afford to hold onto their best players. Whilst we can't even sell out the Mad Stad then Reading are a Championship club.