Terminal Boardom Who, in the current squad, is regarded as the next "Black Hole" filler?
I'm not going to answer that, as I'm going to blog about it in the next day or so ....
by Svlad Cjelli » 21 Nov 2011 13:03
Terminal Boardom Who, in the current squad, is regarded as the next "Black Hole" filler?
by Terminal Boardom » 21 Nov 2011 13:05
by M-U-R-T-Y » 21 Nov 2011 13:06
by Hoop Blah » 21 Nov 2011 13:52
Svlad CjelliHoop Blah I'm not saying that we shouldn't have cashed in but there is a fair argument that in the cases of Long and Sigurdsson we didn't have to sell them and that there was a possibility that neither were really pushing for that move you seem to say was unstoppable.
How hard did we try and stop them then?
If you really think that there is any way that Reading could have kept Shane Long there this summer - or even that it would be worth trying to do - then I'd like to send you an e-mail I received about a Nigerian inheritance ....
He was ready to go from a career point of view, he wanted to go - and I half suspect that one of the reasons he did so well was because he'd been promised he could go if the right offer came in and we didn't get promotion.
Ditto Gylfi - although different circumstances, an unexpected offer came in which he'd have been stupid to turn down at the time, and ditto for the club.
by Hoop Blah » 21 Nov 2011 13:57
Svlad CjelliTerminal Boardom Who, in the current squad, is regarded as the next "Black Hole" filler?
I'm not going to answer that, as I'm going to blog about it in the next day or so ....
by Harpers So Solid Crew » 21 Nov 2011 18:25
by Mid Sussex Royal » 21 Nov 2011 19:49
readingbedding More and more we're consolidating ourselves as a Championship team.
From where we've come from, that's progress.
But will that be good enough for the fans post 2005?
by Royal With Cheese » 21 Nov 2011 20:17
Terminal Boardom Thing is, how many times did Shorey play in Long for any Reading goals?
by Woodcote Royal » 21 Nov 2011 23:23
Hoop Blah I'm not saying that we shouldn't have cashed in but there is a fair argument that in the cases of Long and Sigurdsson we didn't have to sell them
by Wimb » 22 Nov 2011 07:48
by Vision » 22 Nov 2011 08:37
Wimb Nail Head Hit
Name any Premier League quality player that has stayed with a club for more than a season after he's shown his potential/the club's gone down.
Long is no different than Doyle, Andy Johnson, Adam Johnson, Tim Cahill etc all of them had long histories with their clubs and gave them perhaps longer than they should have but all left in the end. It's not just what the club wants it's just as much about the player.
As others have said in the past, it's our reputation for doing right by players that forms a part of a package that attracts players here in the first place and then keeps them here a bit longer then they otherwise might.
There will always be a conspiracy theory that our best players were forced to leave the club when they wanted to stay but it's just not the case.
by Hoop Blah » 22 Nov 2011 08:53
by Wimb » 22 Nov 2011 09:11
by melonhead » 22 Nov 2011 09:20
Hoop Blah Woodcote, for starters they were both under contract so the reality is that we could have kept them if we wanted to. Would that [keeping them 'against their will] have made business or football sense? No, I'm not saying it would.
Wimb, Dirkers etc, I'm not saying we would've been able to keep them I'm just saying that I don't believe we tried to keep them at all. Do you think we sat them down and said we'll pay you the absolute maximum we can and we'll have another right good go and played on their apparent love for the club to get more out of them? I certainly don't get that impression. The impression I get is that we were just happy to be cashing in and getting the best deal possible.
Yes we have a business model to keep to, yes it would've been a gamble but I just don't think it's as simple as saying we had no choice in the matter (which is the point I'm not agreeing with, not the opinion that it's unlikely we'd have ever kept players who were perceived to be too good for us).
by Svlad Cjelli » 22 Nov 2011 09:22
Hoop Blah Woodcote, for starters they were both under contract so the reality is that we could have kept them if we wanted to. Would that [keeping them 'against their will] have made business or football sense? No, I'm not saying it would.
Wimb, Dirkers etc, I'm not saying we would've been able to keep them I'm just saying that I don't believe we tried to keep them at all. Do you think we sat them down and said we'll pay you the absolute maximum we can and we'll have another right good go and played on their apparent love for the club to get more out of them? I certainly don't get that impression. The impression I get is that we were just happy to be cashing in and getting the best deal possible.
Yes we have a business model to keep to, yes it would've been a gamble but I just don't think it's as simple as saying we had no choice in the matter (which is the point I'm not agreeing with, not the opinion that it's unlikely we'd have ever kept players who were perceived to be too good for us).
by Vision » 22 Nov 2011 09:35
Svlad CjelliHoop Blah Woodcote, for starters they were both under contract so the reality is that we could have kept them if we wanted to. Would that [keeping them 'against their will] have made business or football sense? No, I'm not saying it would.
Wimb, Dirkers etc, I'm not saying we would've been able to keep them I'm just saying that I don't believe we tried to keep them at all. Do you think we sat them down and said we'll pay you the absolute maximum we can and we'll have another right good go and played on their apparent love for the club to get more out of them? I certainly don't get that impression. The impression I get is that we were just happy to be cashing in and getting the best deal possible.
Yes we have a business model to keep to, yes it would've been a gamble but I just don't think it's as simple as saying we had no choice in the matter (which is the point I'm not agreeing with, not the opinion that it's unlikely we'd have ever kept players who were perceived to be too good for us).
To answer this specifically, can I just say that I don't believe that anyone, anyone at all, in the Football Club wanted Long or Gylfi to leave when they did, but they recognised that in the situation of each at the time it was inevitable that they had to leave then.
I suppose it's really a question of semantics - were they sold because the money was needed or were they sold because they couldn't be kept and the money solved a problem? From everything I've seen or heard at the time, I'd say it's definitely the latter.
by Svlad Cjelli » 22 Nov 2011 09:45
VisionSvlad CjelliHoop Blah Woodcote, for starters they were both under contract so the reality is that we could have kept them if we wanted to. Would that [keeping them 'against their will] have made business or football sense? No, I'm not saying it would.
Wimb, Dirkers etc, I'm not saying we would've been able to keep them I'm just saying that I don't believe we tried to keep them at all. Do you think we sat them down and said we'll pay you the absolute maximum we can and we'll have another right good go and played on their apparent love for the club to get more out of them? I certainly don't get that impression. The impression I get is that we were just happy to be cashing in and getting the best deal possible.
Yes we have a business model to keep to, yes it would've been a gamble but I just don't think it's as simple as saying we had no choice in the matter (which is the point I'm not agreeing with, not the opinion that it's unlikely we'd have ever kept players who were perceived to be too good for us).
To answer this specifically, can I just say that I don't believe that anyone, anyone at all, in the Football Club wanted Long or Gylfi to leave when they did, but they recognised that in the situation of each at the time it was inevitable that they had to leave then.
I suppose it's really a question of semantics - were they sold because the money was needed or were they sold because they couldn't be kept and the money solved a problem? From everything I've seen or heard at the time, I'd say it's definitely the latter.
I'd say that actually Gylfi is the former and Long is the latter.
McD made a big point of saying that Glyfi's sale secured the future of the club whatever that meant. Thats not to say he was forced out of course but as Hoop Blah says it's not "cloud cuckoo land" to suggest he wouldn't have stayed if we'd have really convinced him we wanted him too. It was too much money for us to say no,it was desperately needed (black hole and all that) and it's not too much of a stretch to say that had some bearing in Glyfi's decision.
Long is different in that although we didn't desperately need the money we really couldn't stand in his way.
by Vision » 22 Nov 2011 09:47
Wimb I take the point Vision, but my point was more that as soon as they've established their quality or a season after the team gets relegated that they're sold on. Long could have gone a summer earlier and again in January but wanted to do everything he could to get Reading up. Once that didn't happen he decided that after 6 years it was time for a new challenge and to step up, fair play too him.
Andy Johnson like Long played for Palace in the Premier League and gave them a chance to get back up before he left. Cahill worked his way up from Tier 3 with Millwall and was a bit of a late bloomer, I certainly didn't have him tagged for a Premier League top 10 side when I first saw him for Millwall.
I accept that Gylfi was a bit of an odd situation in that we only had him for about 13 months around the first team, but he's gone for one of the highest transfer fees in second tier history, especially for a player who's never played at the top level before. I don't think that's cashing in at the first opportunity, it's more an overwhelming offer that no club could turn down.
Theo Walcott is perhaps the best comparison we have to Gylfi, in that he had about a year in the first team frame at Championship level before being snapped up by a much bigger club for a large transfer fee. Victor Moses would be another one who left his club after only around a year in the team, while Oxlade-Chamberlain could turn out to be the next example.
I've never understood why the club gets blamed more than the player that wants to move on. Gylfi had a good contract here for 4 years I believe and so if he really did love the club he was more than entitled to turn down the advances of Hoffenheim and stay with the club. Would we have been weaker financially? yes perhaps but we had budgetted for him to stay. Similarly if players really wanted to help build a winning team they could have volunteered pay cuts or players like Jimmy Kebe could take a deal he maybe wasn't 100% happy with for the sake of the club. Not saying they SHOULD do that but they have as much power as the club do.
Did we do all we could to keep those players? within our business model yes. It's a bit like saying did a Fireman do all he could to save someone from a burning building. They probably could run in when the place is actually collapsing and the flames are 100ft high, but there's a massive chance that they would die doing so and ultimately there's no point risking another life if the odds are against a successful rescue.
In the clubs case we had those players on good contracts and told them we'd love to keep them but at the same time probably said "we've been made a good offer, if you want to go the ball is in your court now' I doubt for a second that Gylfi and Long's departures had anything to do with the money they were on and everything about the level of football they could be playing.
Football is full of Darren Eadie's and Keith O'Neills who turned down moves to bigger clubs only to suffer big injuries and never reach the highest levels. it's up to each player to judge when is the right time to go. The only exception to that is when the club don't renew contracts or offer a contract that's completely unreasonable.
It's fair enough to want the club to speculate a bit more with the transfer fees recieved, but in terms of the sales themselves it's got as much if not more to do with the ambition of players rather than just a clubs desire to make a sale.
by melonhead » 22 Nov 2011 09:50
by Wimb » 22 Nov 2011 09:55
melonhead as usual with almost any discussion on anything, the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle in the grey, rather at either extreme of black or white
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