back from the game- cardiff

[Handsome Man]

We were rubbish really. We played the ball around well and didn't hoof it too much but a goal looked most unlikely.

Lots of bits of the team looked ok, but there is something massive missing. It seemed more obvious today than ever before that we need a striker: just think of the divisions where our team should be playing their football.

Fed Premiership

Cummings Championship
Mills Championship
Gorkss Championship
Pearce Championship

Leigerwood Championship
Karacan Championship
MacAnuff Championship
Kebe Premiership

LeFondre Division 1
Hunt Scottish/Irish League
Manset Conference
Church Division 1

We just need one of the strikers to step up.

[Get Carter]

McD you need to watch some videos of Shorey's free kicks & corners, as we are so poor. Our conversion rate of goals to set plays must rank amongst the worst in the football league, if anyone did the number crunching. We have one of the worst home records in the division and cannot score before halftime and have conceded more goals than we have scored, which is not difficult - Fortress Madejski, you must be aving a larf!
Time to rest Federici as he was beaten yet again by a 30 or 40 yard lob. Meanwhile, McCarthy performs superbly for Leeds.

[RoyalBlue]

A game we dominated but for nothing. Seems that this line up is macs first choice. The worst possible start with two fantastic saves by fed's only to be let down by Kebe giving the ball away far to easy for there goal.

Only they weren't fantastic saves (and I rate Feds). He should have cushioned both shots more rather than playing volley ball - no give in his hands whatsoever. That having been said, we cleared the ball only for Kebe to decide to play fancy football well within his own half and, rather than playing like a winger, cutting right inside to a central position.

[Forty]

I thought we were shambolic today. Not for any spell did we really look like we were bossing the game - yes, we had opportunities, yes there were bright moments, but there's just too much of either hit blind and hope, or trying to hit the eye of a needle. There's no creativity in midfield - so there's no point playing 2 up front as they will NEVER NEVER NEVER get the service they need. Am sick to death of McNotenuff's 10 minute games (granted he was better today), and Kebe's 2 minute performances. Between them they create our best chances. (Oh - except that our league striker played the best 2 crosses this afternoon, but didn't quite have the legs to get on the end of one of them) but those two wingers don't do 1 players work between them.
And as for taking off Cummings. WTF was that about. He must have been injured or knackered, because to move Jem there is either saying that Jem is a better right back that Cummings - in which case why doesn't he play there, or its saying that we're going to change shape - 3 at the back perhaps - which we didn't - or that we haven't a clue - possible - or that we're desperate and clueless - probable.

11/10 for endeavour. 4/10 for quality.

Yet another McD comment that we deserved more, to go alongside a dozen other identical sets of post match comments. 1 game every now or then and you can wear that, but this season, it's been continuous - and it comes from a truth McD MUST know. We all know it. We're simply not good enough, and it is about fine margins, and we are mid table tripe. bet you a pound one of the players - probably Pearce this week comes out with some prepared, cliched tripe about fine margins, or a new resolve amongst the squad, and how we're so close to being good and how the championship is so tight. Give the boy a certificate.

[melonhead]

thought we pretty much bossed the whole game, restricted them to only a few attacks, let alone real efforts on goal


amazing how people see the same game differently

i guess thats where all the glasses rubbish comes from,

[Royalee]

Third game I've been to this year, glad I didn't renew...

Are the players told to hoof the ball forward as quickly as possible by McDermott and the coaches? Dreadful ball retention, no creativity in midfield and a real lack of quality across the team which will happen when your chairman strips the club's assets. Karacan and Leigertwood are too similar, Kebe needs to sod off and Federici needs to learn how to catch. Le Fondre got slated but still produced more than our entire midfield put together for the ball to Karacan second half, if only we could supply him with those sorts of passes every so often.

The football's getting worse, the average intelligence of Reading fans is getting worse with mongtards whinging about not having a 'natural goalscorer' on the radio when ALF's already got 4 and is one of the most natural goalscorers in the league - I heard one idiot say we need to get the ball forward quicker...wrong, we need to keep the ball and pass and move. Unless there's a change at board level or in transfer policy, I can see us going down within the next couple of seasons.

[Basingstoke Royal]

I really don't get all this doom and gloom.

We outplayed them for almost the whole game and created a enough to have won the game. A lucky goal and some very poor refereeing cost us today - as soon as that goal went in you just knew it wouldn't be our day. The reaction would have been totally different if we had won - and the margins are so fine.

Cardiff will be going away knowing they got away with daylight robbery.

I do agree though that the substitutions were questionable to say the least. Putting karacan at right back and taking Cummings off I just don't get.

Keep playing like we did today and we will be ok. If we were getting outplayed each week I would be more concerned - but we aren't.

[Basingstoke Royal]

thought we pretty much bossed the whole game, restricted them to only a few attacks, let alone real efforts on goal


amazing how people see the same game differently

i guess thats where all the glasses rubbish comes from,

Totally agree. I can only think forty wasn't at the game. Many more corners, possession, attempts - but we didn't boss the game.

[West_Reading]

-We were by far the better side and should have converted more than one of dozens of chances/attempts and 15+ corners we seemed to have.
-Fed should have done better with the initial effort which led to the first goal. Kebe could also have just lumped it away. But that's why I love Kebe, because he will attempt to beat three men in one go, ten yards from our eighteen yard box, and now and then it will come off.
-Mills is getting better and better. I take back much of my previous criticism of his on the ball skills. He was excellent although faded in the last 20 minutes.
-Legs was missing today but he is allowed an off day. Has been excellent in the last few games.
-Aron Gunnarsson looked very good and we could do with a guy like that in our midfield.
-ALF was very quiet but got no protection from the ref (who was dreadful to another level) but still managed to get an assist.
-I love Kebe and people need to get off his back when he trips over his own feet or seems like he pulled out of a challenge. He knows what he's doing.

[West_Reading]

Third game I've been to this year, glad I didn't renew...

Are the players told to hoof the ball forward as quickly as possible by McDermott and the coaches? Dreadful ball retention, no creativity in midfield and a real lack of quality across the team which will happen when your chairman strips the club's assets. Karacan and Leigertwood are too similar, Kebe needs to sod off and Federici needs to learn how to catch. Le Fondre got slated but still produced more than our entire midfield put together for the ball to Karacan second half, if only we could supply him with those sorts of passes every so often.

The football's getting worse, the average intelligence of Reading fans is getting worse with mongtards whinging about not having a 'natural goalscorer' on the radio when ALF's already got 4 and is one of the most natural goalscorers in the league - I heard one idiot say we need to get the ball forward quicker...wrong, we need to keep the ball and pass and move. Unless there's a change at board level or in transfer policy, I can see us going down within the next couple of seasons.

That was actually the most I've seen us 'build' from the back in a long time today. Fed must have rolled it out at least 7/8 times. Shame Gorkss' passing wasn't on par with his vision though.

[Chaney]

Third game I've been to this year, glad I didn't renew...

Are the players told to hoof the ball forward as quickly as possible by McDermott and the coaches? Dreadful ball retention, no creativity in midfield and a real lack of quality across the team which will happen when your chairman strips the club's assets. Karacan and Leigertwood are too similar, Kebe needs to sod off and Federici needs to learn how to catch. Le Fondre got slated but still produced more than our entire midfield put together for the ball to Karacan second half, if only we could supply him with those sorts of passes every so often.

The football's getting worse, the average intelligence of Reading fans is getting worse with mongtards whinging about not having a 'natural goalscorer' on the radio when ALF's already got 4 and is one of the most natural goalscorers in the league - I heard one idiot say we need to get the ball forward quicker...wrong, we need to keep the ball and pass and move. Unless there's a change at board level or in transfer policy, I can see us going down within the next couple of seasons.

then how are you in a postion to comment then?, most of us have been to every home game, and today was one of our better performances, bossed the game by keeping cardiff on the back foot, the only thing they did better then us was to deliver set pieces properly,

[Royalee]

Third game I've been to this year, glad I didn't renew...

Are the players told to hoof the ball forward as quickly as possible by McDermott and the coaches? Dreadful ball retention, no creativity in midfield and a real lack of quality across the team which will happen when your chairman strips the club's assets. Karacan and Leigertwood are too similar, Kebe needs to sod off and Federici needs to learn how to catch. Le Fondre got slated but still produced more than our entire midfield put together for the ball to Karacan second half, if only we could supply him with those sorts of passes every so often.

The football's getting worse, the average intelligence of Reading fans is getting worse with mongtards whinging about not having a 'natural goalscorer' on the radio when ALF's already got 4 and is one of the most natural goalscorers in the league - I heard one idiot say we need to get the ball forward quicker...wrong, we need to keep the ball and pass and move. Unless there's a change at board level or in transfer policy, I can see us going down within the next couple of seasons.

then how are you in a postion to comment then?, most of us have been to every home game, and today was one of our better performances, bossed the game by keeping cardiff on the back foot, the only thing they did better then us was to deliver set pieces properly,

In terms of the football getting worse, I mean year on year (although we at least knocked it about well against Southampton) - we don't pass the ball and if that's one of the better performances this season then I'm utterly delighted I didn't shell out for a season ticket. Do you think our build up play's good and we create enough chances then?

[West_Reading]

We're definitely creating enough chances. Not all of them are gilt-edged but we're certainly effective at working the ball to in and around the box to get into shooting positions.

[The Prisoner]

God I'm getting bored of this. Most games this season we've had the same report....we were unlucky...worst ref ever.....didn't deserve to lose....the cat ate my homework....ALF is filming an 80s TV show.....global warming.....Elvis is still alive....the CIA were behind 9/11....yogurt pot lids are designed to rip when they come off....

You make your own luck

I've supported this club for 35 years and last night was possibly the first time ever that I was not totally devastated by a loss. Thats worrying, not least as I don't truly know why, only a faint feeling somewhere that my ambitions for the club are becoming increasingly unlikely and that there is so much more to worry about in 2011.

[leicsRoyal]

Time to rest Federici as he was beaten yet again by a 30 or 40 yard lob. Meanwhile, McCarthy performs superbly for Leeds.

I had to suffer taking the father in law to Burnley yesterday, which I have to admit was a very good game. McCarthy was indeed superb, the Leeds fans already love him. In fact one of the comments from them was 'if this is Reading's number 2 then their number one must be something special'. A couple more performances like that and McCarthy won't be at either Reading or Leeds come January!

[RoyalBlue]

I've supported this club for 35 years and last night was possibly the first time ever that I was not totally devastated by a loss. Thats worrying, not least as I don't truly know why, only a faint feeling somewhere that my ambitions for the club are becoming increasingly unlikely and that there is so much more to worry about in 2011.

Exactly this, and the same applies to 2012.

It will be absolutely staggering if season ticket sales don't plummet next time around. And, unless we start to see some decent performances and results at home, attendances will drop off in the meantime.

People will realise that they have far greater priorities for their time and money than turning up to watch the slow decline of a club suffering from its Chairman's repeated cuts.

[Royal Lady]

I didn't think we were *that* bad yesterday. If anything, them scoring so early on meant that we had to up our game, I believe that if they hadn't scored when they did, we wouldn't have had such a good game to watch. I don't expect anything out of this this season, personally, so even though we lost, I thoroughly enjoyed the game - we created a few chances and everyone seemed to have a better game this week. I thought Joe Mills had a great game, you have to remember, that if all our players never made mistakes and played how we, as fans, wanted them to, they wouldn't be playing for us, they'd be playing for a top 4 Prem side!!

I am worried about our lack of goals, however, once again, we've sold our best strikers and not replaced with anyone anywhere near as good, or even potentially as good, in my eyes. So you can't expect miracles. Jimmy has never been one to get in loads of tackles and win the ball - he's a bit of a luxury player really - but I believe he's the best player we have at that position and we're not exactly spoilt for choice. As for bringing in Harte, that would be dependent on us actually winning a load of free kicks and getting set pieces and on his previous showing this season, his dead ball kicks have been pretty dire. Again, he'd be a luxury as he *might* get us a goal with a free kick, but he sure as hell isn't going to keep up with his player when running for a ball, so we're more likely to concede than score, with him in the team.

I enjoyed the game - it wasn't all one-way traffic by any means, everyone looked up for it and it was only the ref who spoiled it in my opinion.

[Sarah Star]

It was an excellent first goal for Cardiff!

It's a shame that for all our hard work, you can't get excited when we get close to goal. Can't we work on our set pieces a bit more... do something original... or something?

[sandman]

McD you need to watch some videos of Shorey's free kicks & corners, as we are so poor. Our conversion rate of goals to set plays must rank amongst the worst in the football league, if anyone did the number crunching. We have one of the worst home records in the division and cannot score before halftime and have conceded more goals than we have scored, which is not difficult - Fortress Madejski, you must be aving a larf!
Time to rest Federici as he was beaten yet again by a 30 or 40 yard lob. Meanwhile, McCarthy performs superbly for Leeds.

[Tony Le Mesmer]

As for bringing in Harte, that would be dependent on us actually winning a load of free kicks and getting set pieces and on his previous showing this season, his dead ball kicks have been pretty dire. Again, he'd be a luxury as he *might* get us a goal with a free kick, but he sure as hell isn't going to keep up with his player when running for a ball, so we're more likely to concede than score, with him in the team.

Are you judging Harte on 4 games this season (playing next to that charlie from Spurs), or 50 games last season? We lost 9/49 league games last season finishing 5th and reached the 1/4 finals of the cup. With Harte playing nearly every week. Yet you think we will conceed more than score with him in the side??? Based on what?

Quite frankly, watching Reading this season is like watching paint dry. Our set pieces are embarrassing and we cant score goals. Our main attacking threat has said he doesnt want to play for us, yet he still gets picked. Meanwhile, Ian Harte is sat on the bench. That is nothing short of an insult. And until it changes, our support and league position will only head in 1 direction.