JM is confident we'll stay up

[Royal Lady]

He says money is available, but we don't know how much. For all we know, he might only be allowing Coppell a maximum of £3million per player, with a limit on how many players he can sign.

Coppell values his job and isn't going to come straight out and say this is he? If he had an unlimited budget, and hasn't purchased some better players proven in the Premiership, I'm pretty certain Mr Mad would have said, in order to deflect any criticism from himself. I also think, that if it were the case that Coppell had a vast amount of money available to him and all he's done is buy the Kebe's/Matejovsky's of this world, and Mr Mad was desperate for us to stay in the PL, he'd have done something about it by now and possibly ended Coppell's contract.

It's all just speculation of course, no-one except those involved really know the truth about the amounts of money involved/available - but because of this, we, the paying supporter of the club we all love, can only see that the club is in dire straits regarding our position and future in the PL and will complain accordingly. If we didn't care, if we let Mr Mad/Coppell make comments about bringing players in, expanding the stadium, the global game without contesting them, we wouldn't be the true supporters of RFC that we all claim to be imho. I truly cannot understand these people who back Mr Mad/Coppell and their decisions to the hilt, without question, when to my mind there were such obvious solutions to at least TRY and improve our position/future.

[The 17 Bus]

bugger all that RL, where's your avatar gone?

[Royal Lady]

I can see it! Isn't it showing? I did try and change it to a No to Game 39 avatar, but the avatar was too big.

[IMAMATEOFJOVSKY]

We will only continue to go backwards with the current chairman in charge

we were so much better off before he came

- he doesnt understand the financials of football -its not like running autotrader where little investment can bring huge returns

I imagine you are talking from experience here, and know all about the typical investments and returns required in setting up a multinational business from scratch.

Dont anyone be fooled - this guy has made a lot more money out of the club than he's put in -hes NEVER been a benefactor - hes been a loaner, and look at the accounts to see that - i have for every year that hes been at the top - people need to wake up and take of the rose tinted specs

you've seen the accounts?

Great. As you know, then maybe you can clear this up once as for all - how much exactly has Madejski put into the club and how much has he taken out?[/quote

Wny do you ask Reverend- I do believe form your consitent support of the chairamn that you are indeed the same - If you want to know how much is shown in the accounts, get off your Ar*se and look for yourself!

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

Wny do you ask Reverend- I do believe form your consitent support of the chairamn that you are indeed the same - If you want to know how much is shown in the accounts, get off your Ar*se and look for yourself!

in other words you are just talking out of your arse.

Really, you don't have to be exact. Just rough figures will do.

Remarkable coincidence No.1 of the day.

Sir Dodger Royal, a poster with a seeming lifelong dislike for John Madejski, criticising him at every turn, stops posting on Feb 3rd.

IMAMATEOFJOVSKY, a poster with a preoccupation with discrediting John Madejski, starts posting on Feb 3rd.

[Sir Rodger Doyle]

Wny do you ask Reverend- I do believe form your consitent support of the chairamn that you are indeed the same - If you want to know how much is shown in the accounts, get off your Ar*se and look for yourself!

in other words you are just talking out of your arse.

Really, you don't have to be exact. Just rough figures will do.

Remarkable coincidence No.1 of the day.

Sir Dodger Royal, a poster with a seeming lifelong dislike for John Madejski, criticising him at every turn, stops posting on Feb 3rd.

IMAMATEOFJOVSKY, a poster with a preoccupation with discrediting John Madejski, starts posting on Feb 3rd.

From a business point of view, I think John is doing the right thing.

He always said that he intended to take Reading to the Premier league and make them financially viable. He has done this and cannot be critisied for it. As a business man his intention is to make a profit from all of his investments. He may have lent money to this club to keep it running but, he also built the club over ten years to what we have now. His intention to sell the club makes perfect sense, he stands to make far more money from this than any other of his investments since Autotrader. If John wants to sell the club for say £100M then what sort of profit againt his investment would this mean? I don't have the figures but, I would assume that there would be a healthy profit.
You cannot knock the man for wanting to make money out of his business. He has done wonders for us in the process.

[RoyalBlue]

Like JM is going to come out and say "I think we'll go down". Years ago when we were losing in the old 3rd division or what have you, I can't remember moaning about buying new players - we almost accepted that some days we'd play better than others and we knew we had no money. These days when your chairman bigs up how he's raising the price of the ST in order to help compete with the "big boys" in the Prem and that will give us the ability to buy players of PL quality, and when the chairman says there's money available to the manager to strengthen the team, you sort of believe him and so when nothing is done and two years down the line, despite having raked in millions from TV revenue and the increase in STs, you've only spent about 8 million on players and maybe another 3 million on wage increases (and that's me being generous with figures there) - it rather rankles when performances are bad, you don't know where the next win is coming from and you can see your beloved club sliding down to the championship. For the Chairman to still give this hype about "we've got a great bunch of lads and we'll stay up" is taking the p*ss somewhat in my eyes. Yes, we are all eternally grateful to JM for what he has done for this club, but that gratitude is fast waning when he makes false promises. At least when the crowds are well down next season if we're relegated, when ST numbers diminish and we lose half our current players, we'll have the millions from 2 years worth of tv revenue plus a parachute payment to offset the losses which will inevitably occur.

Only the entity that is our club, Reading FC, will not really have that money will it. Once again whether or not that money goes into keeping the stars that we have and adding to them so that we have a team that can bounce back will be entirely down to John Madejski.

Not meaning to sound sexist but how do you plan your household shopping when you don't know what your budget is Royal Lady?

If Mick Gooding is correct, the manager at Reading FC faces exactly that type of problem in trying to put a squad together. He's told the money is there but he hasn't got a clue how much. So does he go for 'Tesco Value' or can he afford to buy from the 'Finest' range, and just how much in total has he got to cover the bills this month?

[The Quiet Man]

But then again without JM there would be no RFC just Didcot Rovers.

[Gordons Cumming]

But then again without JM there would be no RFC just Didcot Rovers.

Exactly

The voice (though quiet ) of reason.

[Platypuss]

But then again without JM there would be no RFC just Didcot Rovers.

JM is Roger Smee? Strange.

[Alan Partridge]

But then again without JM there would be no RFC just Didcot Rovers.

Handy for me, 5 mins away.

[Only one Trevor Morley]

But then again without JM there would be no RFC just Didcot Rovers.

JM is Roger Smee? Strange.

To be fair we were in deep financial trouble with Smee when JM rode to the rescue in 1990.....

[emmer green dave]

Even the main director of the club never went to Everton he was in town shopping (Ian Wood-Smith)
so if he stays at home what's this saying to the fans.

[Platypuss]

But then again without JM there would be no RFC just Didcot Rovers.

JM is Roger Smee? Strange.

To be fair we were in deep financial trouble with Smee when JM rode to the rescue in 1990.....

Agreed. Just not sure where Didcot came into it.

[The Quiet Man]

No not alluding to Thames Valley Royals or whatever it was going to be called. Sorry meant Didcot Town as an example of a non league team not exactly pulling up trees, would Oxford Utd do as a local comparison - new stadium lots of prospective owners who all disappeared and now mid table conference. Didn't mean to confuse the issue with the wonderfully upright and honest Captain Bob and the merger.

Just trying to get across the point that at the time JM took over there wasn't a queue round the block of prospective buyers and surprise, surprise there isn't one now. I certainly wouldn't paint JM as some kind of minor deity, he is a hard headed businessman and has made it abundantly clear since the day we were promoted to the premier league he had achieved what he wanted with RFC and wanted to sell out (no doubt at a profit).

[Forbury Lion]

Money where your mouth is JM, promise to reduce ticket prices if we go down safe in the knowledge that you won't have to because we'll stay up.

[Wycombe Royal]

He says money is available, but we don't know how much. For all we know, he might only be allowing Coppell a maximum of £3million per player, with a limit on how many players he can sign.

We do know it is more than £3m as bid more than that for both Scott Brown and Joleon Lescott, and Dillon has said on the radio that we have the money to buy a player for £10m.

I don't think it is the fees that is the problem. It is finding a player that other clubs are willing to sell, who aren't wanted by a club bigger than us (most of the Premiership), who don't want huge wages and aren't bothered by the perceived "size" of RFC.

[Forbury Lion]

If we are going to thrive as a club and show real ambition - hopefully a premiership club, we definitely need a new man leading the club - madejski has made his money and exposed his name through the club, and now its time for someone new

A new man may not be a better man, plus I can't think of one millionaire Reading supporter by name which suggests there are none. Therefore the investors would be in it for the money and that will probably involve doing what the Glaziers did and converting the cost of them buying the club into a debt owed by the club, technically getting the club for free. They would then look to maximise revenue quickly possibly selling off certain players now to save on interest replayments on the monies owed. They would also raise ticket prices and maybe make it compulsary to buy Cup tickets.

Only a passionate Reading supporter with bags of money to throw away would be prepared to do what we expect JM to do. He may not be the ideal chairman and owner but face facts, he's the best we've had and quite possibly the best we'll have. He may not be prepared to throw his own cash away chasing our dream but by the same token he isn't going to destroy our club.

[rfc58]

If we are going to thrive as a club and show real ambition - hopefully a premiership club, we definitely need a new man leading the club - madejski has made his money and exposed his name through the club, and now its time for someone new

A new man may not be a better man, plus I can't think of one millionaire Reading supporter by name which suggests there are none. Therefore the investors would be in it for the money and that will probably involve doing what the Glaziers did and converting the cost of them buying the club into a debt owed by the club, technically getting the club for free. They would then look to maximise revenue quickly possibly selling off certain players now to save on interest replayments on the monies owed. They would also raise ticket prices and maybe make it compulsary to buy Cup tickets.

Only a passionate Reading supporter with bags of money to throw away would be prepared to do what we expect JM to do. He may not be the ideal chairman and owner but face facts, he's the best we've had and quite possibly the best we'll have. He may not be prepared to throw his own cash away chasing our dream but by the same token he isn't going to destroy our club.

Thats a good, well balanced post.

I won't claim to know the in's and outs of foreign investors in British clubs, but you said about the Glazors, is the same happening at the recently bought clubs, like Man City, QPR, Liverpool etc ? That's not a dig at your post, but an honest question.

[Forbury Lion]

If we are going to thrive as a club and show real ambition - hopefully a premiership club, we definitely need a new man leading the club - madejski has made his money and exposed his name through the club, and now its time for someone new

A new man may not be a better man, plus I can't think of one millionaire Reading supporter by name which suggests there are none. Therefore the investors would be in it for the money and that will probably involve doing what the Glaziers did and converting the cost of them buying the club into a debt owed by the club, technically getting the club for free. They would then look to maximise revenue quickly possibly selling off certain players now to save on interest replayments on the monies owed. They would also raise ticket prices and maybe make it compulsary to buy Cup tickets.

Only a passionate Reading supporter with bags of money to throw away would be prepared to do what we expect JM to do. He may not be the ideal chairman and owner but face facts, he's the best we've had and quite possibly the best we'll have. He may not be prepared to throw his own cash away chasing our dream but by the same token he isn't going to destroy our club.

Thats a good, well balanced post.

I won't claim to know the in's and outs of foreign investors in British clubs, but you said about the Glazors, is the same happening at the recently bought clubs, like Man City, QPR, Liverpool etc ? That's not a dig at your post, but an honest question.

Some of the investors who have taken over clubs have worked wonders, Aston Villa, Man City (although the owner himself is perhaps not the ideal person to have owning your club), Chelsea etc. Liverpool doesn't yet appear to be offering any upside, I think the owners were hit by this sub prime mortgage investment thing in the US so have had to borrow money for the stadium instead of funding it direct. QPR seems to be going okay, although I tend not to follow the lower leagues so much these days.

The most obvious example of a poor chairman has to be Peter Risdale at Leeds, His heart was in the right place but he destroyed the club. same goes for Geofrey whatshisname who did the same for Bradford.

In summary, Until such time as someone goes public with a desire to invest in the club it makes no sense to wish the current chairman out as the alternative may not be better.