Kyreece Lisbie

[tidus_mi2]

To be fair, we were financially sound and stable when signed the likes of Murty, Butler et al whereas now we're quite screwed and the club needs a hell of a lot of fixing. I'd rather funds go into sorting out the infrastructure (aren't they spending millions on club improvements already), stabilising accounts etc. Apples and oranges situation.

And it's not fair to point out good expensive purchases like Murty without also pointing to awful expensive purchases. Or even more importantly good cheap purchases (Doyle, Long, Kitson etc). It's not liek there's an easy linear relationship between money spent and quality gained.

I criticised JM heaviily for not spending enough but older and wiser now I've gone the other way and prefer infrastructure, stability, and love Rob's approach of looking for relative bargains.

Sure, spend big if you just need one or two pieces of a jigsaw on the backdrop of a stable club. But a club as screwed as ours needing huge input in all areas on and off the pitch, I'm quite happy with a more cautious approach. We don't want another Dai do we.

I find it hard to criticise the owners for their handling of the club overall, there's a lot of noise about on the field decisions, manager hiring included and people are making a fair bit of noise about One Royal but, eh, I don't see the issue.

[From Despair To Where?]

It amazes me that last time we were at this level under JMs chairmanship we were signing players like Murty, Curo, Butler and Forster.
Now people are wetting themselves over some nobody from Colchester.
Though saying that we did have a decent manager in Pards unlike the clown we’re stuck with now.

Agree, but easier to attract the top L1 players back then; we were the big fish in the pond with one of the first new grounds etc and SJM had the cash back then.

As an aside, pretty sure Murty and Forster were signed by Tommy Burns?

I'm not sure Tommy Burns survived for long enough after the Magnificent Seven to sign either of them.

Interestingly we paid £700K (when we finally coughed it all up) for Murty back in 1998. 28 years and insane transfer fee inflation later and it seems a budget of £750K for a player is likely to be an issue for our current owners!

Oh, and when we signed Murty he arrived 'broken' and took some time to fix!

Tommy Burns was around for 18 months after the Magnificent 7.

He signed Murty in the summer of 98 and Forster in the summer of 99, getting sacked in September 1999.

[Forbury Lion]

I suspect the budget we had under SJM, which was the biggest in the league at the time, would just be middling L1 losses now.

Looking at who has gone up automatically in the past few years, Birmingham and Wrexham blew everyone's out of the water financially. Lincoln were low spenders who were just smarter than everyone. Then Cardiff, Portsmouth and Derby are of similar size to us but I expect spent a bit more. Then play off winners like Charlton and Bolton had decent budgets too.

We should be able to replicate most of these with the right decision making, with Birmingham and Wrexham being the exceptions. But 7 or 8 teams will be saying the same, whether slightly larger clubs or smaller ones with ambitious budgets like Stockport.

Maybe we need a weaker league to get promotion? By that I mean hope the big spending well run teams get promoted and get replaced with badly run clubs from the championship with the same issues we had when we got relegated.

[traff]

I suspect the budget we had under SJM, which was the biggest in the league at the time, would just be middling L1 losses now.

Looking at who has gone up automatically in the past few years, Birmingham and Wrexham blew everyone's out of the water financially. Lincoln were low spenders who were just smarter than everyone. Then Cardiff, Portsmouth and Derby are of similar size to us but I expect spent a bit more. Then play off winners like Charlton and Bolton had decent budgets too.

We should be able to replicate most of these with the right decision making, with Birmingham and Wrexham being the exceptions. But 7 or 8 teams will be saying the same, whether slightly larger clubs or smaller ones with ambitious budgets like Stockport.

Maybe we need a weaker league to get promotion? By that I mean hope the big spending well run teams get promoted and get replaced with badly run clubs from the championship with the same issues we had when we got relegated.

Like Sheff Wed?

[MR. CYNICAL]

Yes that maybe the case but they still chose Reading.

Similar to Stockport, smaller club with an ambitious budget. They gave Brannagan a new contract most L1 clubs wouldn't be able to afford.

Players will still choose Reading over a myriad of equally mired clubs. And a nobody he might currently be at the moment but so were Dave Kitson and Kevin Doyle at one point - and also every player just starting out.

Yes it was easier back in 2000 but in those days 750k was really serious money that barely anyone in the bottom 2 divisions could get anywhere near. Nowadays it’s pretty much a fee available to everyone so the club has to be able to sell itself and “the project” to convince players. Hope they have that charismatic “seller” in these dealings.

No. They've got Leam Richardson.

[MR. CYNICAL]

To be fair, we were financially sound and stable when signed the likes of Murty, Butler et al whereas now we're quite screwed and the club needs a hell of a lot of fixing. I'd rather funds go into sorting out the infrastructure (aren't they spending millions on club improvements already), stabilising accounts etc. Apples and oranges situation.

And it's not fair to point out good expensive purchases like Murty without also pointing to awful expensive purchases. Or even more importantly good cheap purchases (Doyle, Long, Kitson etc). It's not liek there's an easy linear relationship between money spent and quality gained.

I criticised JM heaviily for not spending enough but older and wiser now I've gone the other way and prefer infrastructure, stability, and love Rob's approach of looking for relative bargains.

Sure, spend big if you just need one or two pieces of a jigsaw on the backdrop of a stable club. But a club as screwed as ours needing huge input in all areas on and off the pitch, I'm quite happy with a more cautious approach. We don't want another Dai do we.

We've been bought out. Why are we screwed? Thought we were only screwed until Dai sold the club.
if we're not financially sound now, will we ever be?

[SouthDownsRoyal]

Rather have Kevin Lisbie

[From Despair To Where?]

To be fair, we were financially sound and stable when signed the likes of Murty, Butler et al whereas now we're quite screwed and the club needs a hell of a lot of fixing. I'd rather funds go into sorting out the infrastructure (aren't they spending millions on club improvements already), stabilising accounts etc. Apples and oranges situation.

And it's not fair to point out good expensive purchases like Murty without also pointing to awful expensive purchases. Or even more importantly good cheap purchases (Doyle, Long, Kitson etc). It's not liek there's an easy linear relationship between money spent and quality gained.

I criticised JM heaviily for not spending enough but older and wiser now I've gone the other way and prefer infrastructure, stability, and love Rob's approach of looking for relative bargains.

Sure, spend big if you just need one or two pieces of a jigsaw on the backdrop of a stable club. But a club as screwed as ours needing huge input in all areas on and off the pitch, I'm quite happy with a more cautious approach. We don't want another Dai do we.

We've been bought out. Why are we screwed? Thought we were only screwed until Dai sold the club.
if we're not financially sound now, will we ever be?

We may not be falling into a sinkhole anymore but we're still at the fixer upper stage.

The other thing to remember is that when Madejski was spending £750,000 on League 1 players, this all predates Leeds imploding, Leicester building a title winning squad on the back of shitting on creditors and all the stricter financial accountability that followed.

Without a big increase in revenue, we can't spend £750,000 on a player without cutting it from somewhere else in the budget. I've we're committing £X to the Academy, it has to work for us.

[stealthpapes]

It amazes me that last time we were at this level under JMs chairmanship we were signing players like Murty, Curo, Butler and Forster.
Now people are wetting themselves over some nobody from Colchester.
Though saying that we did have a decent manager in Pards unlike the clown we’re stuck with now.

At the time, Pards was a complete unknown. My memory is that PANTS day was under his watch.

Murty, signed from York, relegated to bottom tier in 98-99.
Cureton, signed from Bristol Rovers, top scorer League 1 98-99 but they finished beneath us in our worst season of that era.
Butler came from Cambridge, recently promoted from fourth tier.
(Forster, yeah, fair, dropped down from Birmingham city.)

But most of these signings were astute ones from around our level, backed up with picking up talented players jettisoned by much higher clubs. Either way, AT THE TIME, these players were not necessarily big names, but at most stand-out talents at appropriate levels.

Two seasons in this tier wasted due to Dai but our form under Selles once he got going was play offs. Hunt missed out by a game. For all the criticism, Richardson kept us in the hunt to the very end of the season. We are not that far off with a club that is slowly turning around.

The difference here is going to be 1 or 2 wins every handful of games. The rest is vibes.

[Orion1871]

It amazes me that last time we were at this level under JMs chairmanship we were signing players like Murty, Curo, Butler and Forster.
Now people are wetting themselves over some nobody from Colchester.
Though saying that we did have a decent manager in Pards unlike the clown we’re stuck with now.

Agree, but easier to attract the top L1 players back then; we were the big fish in the pond with one of the first new grounds etc and SJM had the cash back then.

As an aside, pretty sure Murty and Forster were signed by Tommy Burns?

I'm not sure Tommy Burns survived for long enough after the Magnificent Seven to sign either of them.

Interestingly we paid £700K (when we finally coughed it all up) for Murty back in 1998. 28 years and insane transfer fee inflation later and it seems a budget of £750K for a player is likely to be an issue for our current owners!

Oh, and when we signed Murty he arrived 'broken' and took some time to fix!

Burns definitely signed Murty because Murty said that when he was called up for Scotland duty Burns was assistant manager and jokingly introduced Murts as "the guy who got me the sack at Reading".

[skipper]

It amazes me that last time we were at this level under JMs chairmanship we were signing players like Murty, Curo, Butler and Forster.
Now people are wetting themselves over some nobody from Colchester.
Though saying that we did have a decent manager in Pards unlike the clown we’re stuck with now.

At the time, Pards was a complete unknown. My memory is that PANTS day was under his watch.

Murty, signed from York, relegated to bottom tier in 98-99.
Cureton, signed from Bristol Rovers, top scorer League 1 98-99 but they finished beneath us in our worst season of that era.
Butler came from Cambridge, recently promoted from fourth tier.
(Forster, yeah, fair, dropped down from Birmingham city.)

But most of these signings were astute ones from around our level, backed up with picking up talented players jettisoned by much higher clubs. Either way, AT THE TIME, these players were not necessarily big names, but at most stand-out talents at appropriate levels.

Two seasons in this tier wasted due to Dai but our form under Selles once he got going was play offs. Hunt missed out by a game. For all the criticism, Richardson kept us in the hunt to the very end of the season. We are not that far off with a club that is slowly turning around.

The difference here is going to be 1 or 2 wins every handful of games. The rest is vibes.

Spot no. My fear going into the new season is, we don't actually have a squad do we? A few stand out players, subject to some of those going... I'm not sure we really have a cohesive team. And that worries me.

[stealthpapes]

More than this time last year (and, indeed, two seasons before that).

Less than we need.

[SouthDownsRoyal]

Any news on this signing?

[linkenholtroyal]

It amazes me that last time we were at this level under JMs chairmanship we were signing players like Murty, Curo, Butler and Forster.
Now people are wetting themselves over some nobody from Colchester.
Though saying that we did have a decent manager in Pards unlike the clown we’re stuck with now.

At the time, Pards was a complete unknown. My memory is that PANTS day was under his watch.

Murty, signed from York, relegated to bottom tier in 98-99.
Cureton, signed from Bristol Rovers, top scorer League 1 98-99 but they finished beneath us in our worst season of that era.
Butler came from Cambridge, recently promoted from fourth tier.
(Forster, yeah, fair, dropped down from Birmingham city.)

But most of these signings were astute ones from around our level, backed up with picking up talented players jettisoned by much higher clubs. Either way, AT THE TIME, these players were not necessarily big names, but at most stand-out talents at appropriate levels.

Two seasons in this tier wasted due to Dai but our form under Selles once he got going was play offs. Hunt missed out by a game. For all the criticism, Richardson kept us in the hunt to the very end of the season. We are not that far off with a club that is slowly turning around.

The difference here is going to be 1 or 2 wins every handful of games. The rest is vibes.

Spot no. My fear going into the new season is, we don't actually have a squad do we? A few stand out players, subject to some of those going... I'm not sure we really have a cohesive team. And that worries me.

The cohesive team bit is what is interesting, the 106 side was built on good scouting and having a manager that galvanised lower league and youth team players casted aside by there clubs. A lot of them had a point to prove either way and that brought them together. There lies the problem as players theses days all have big egos and are harder to manage due to this as they are looking for the next big move rather then trying to build something. I think the only way to do it is to throw money at it or build from the lower levels. We are doing neither.

[stealthpapes]

At the time, Pards was a complete unknown. My memory is that PANTS day was under his watch.

Murty, signed from York, relegated to bottom tier in 98-99.
Cureton, signed from Bristol Rovers, top scorer League 1 98-99 but they finished beneath us in our worst season of that era.
Butler came from Cambridge, recently promoted from fourth tier.
(Forster, yeah, fair, dropped down from Birmingham city.)

But most of these signings were astute ones from around our level, backed up with picking up talented players jettisoned by much higher clubs. Either way, AT THE TIME, these players were not necessarily big names, but at most stand-out talents at appropriate levels.

Two seasons in this tier wasted due to Dai but our form under Selles once he got going was play offs. Hunt missed out by a game. For all the criticism, Richardson kept us in the hunt to the very end of the season. We are not that far off with a club that is slowly turning around.

The difference here is going to be 1 or 2 wins every handful of games. The rest is vibes.

Spot no. My fear going into the new season is, we don't actually have a squad do we? A few stand out players, subject to some of those going... I'm not sure we really have a cohesive team. And that worries me.

The cohesive team bit is what is interesting, the 106 side was built on good scouting and having a manager that galvanised lower league and youth team players casted aside by there clubs. A lot of them had a point to prove either way and that brought them together. There lies the problem as players theses days all have big egos and are harder to manage due to this as they are looking for the next big move rather then trying to build something. I think the only way to do it is to throw money at it or build from the lower levels. We are doing neither.

It also took three odd seasons to put together. Our fanbase barely gave Hunt one transfer window and a sizeable proportion appear unwilling to give Richardson one at all.

[skipper]

At the time, Pards was a complete unknown. My memory is that PANTS day was under his watch.

Murty, signed from York, relegated to bottom tier in 98-99.
Cureton, signed from Bristol Rovers, top scorer League 1 98-99 but they finished beneath us in our worst season of that era.
Butler came from Cambridge, recently promoted from fourth tier.
(Forster, yeah, fair, dropped down from Birmingham city.)

But most of these signings were astute ones from around our level, backed up with picking up talented players jettisoned by much higher clubs. Either way, AT THE TIME, these players were not necessarily big names, but at most stand-out talents at appropriate levels.

Two seasons in this tier wasted due to Dai but our form under Selles once he got going was play offs. Hunt missed out by a game. For all the criticism, Richardson kept us in the hunt to the very end of the season. We are not that far off with a club that is slowly turning around.

The difference here is going to be 1 or 2 wins every handful of games. The rest is vibes.

Spot no. My fear going into the new season is, we don't actually have a squad do we? A few stand out players, subject to some of those going... I'm not sure we really have a cohesive team. And that worries me.

The cohesive team bit is what is interesting, the 106 side was built on good scouting and having a manager that galvanised lower league and youth team players casted aside by there clubs. A lot of them had a point to prove either way and that brought them together. There lies the problem as players theses days all have big egos and are harder to manage due to this as they are looking for the next big move rather then trying to build something. I think the only way to do it is to throw money at it or build from the lower levels. We are doing neither.

the 106 side was built on good scouting and having a manager that galvanised lower league and youth team players casted aside by their clubs

I don't believe in our scouting or player acquisitions.

I said it when we were relegated, we're down here for a decade at least. We're about to go into our 4th season in League 1, and I see no end. *I'm usually the optimistic one...*

[WestYorksRoyal]

How much do you bet that, whoever wins the race to sign him, he's a massive let down?

[Royalwaster]

How much do you bet that, whoever wins the race to sign him, he's a massive let down?

Knee injury 10 minutes into his debut.

[stealthpapes]

How much do you bet that, whoever wins the race to sign him, he's a massive let down?

Knee injury 10 minutes into his debut.

LEAM OUT