Updated POLL After Southampton Debacle.

[Maguire]

Biggest thing for me has been the failure of the new signings.

We won the title and then added Pogrebnyak and Guthrie as our two marque signings in the summer. I was pretty happy with that and saw Guthrie in particular as a great move to strengthen what I felt was a limited central midfield. The fact he hasn't worked out and we're stuck with said limited central midfield is the real issue for me.

Federici's loss of form is bewildering. Not sure what to put that down to. If (and I know ifs are worth shit) he'd been in last season's form we'd probably have won at Chelsea and the whole season would've panned out differently.

[bobby1413]

I'm quite chilled out about it all really. It does seem inevitable (and I'm not being negative, just realistic) that we will get relegated. Y'know what though, we can bounce back like we did before and it's clear so far that our current team aren't performing well enough.

Southampton - Lost
QPR - Drawn
Wigan - Lost
Aston Villa - Lost
Swansea - Draw
Fulham - Draw

I've seen on ReadingFC that Brian McD has said "we need to do better"... not sure we can to be honest.

Considering the results (with the exception of Everton), how much more can we change and what can we do to be "better"? The players are all the same, the manager is the same, the opposition are the same standard as those above or better.

January transfers may help, but that seems so far away and with each game we just seem to be cementing ourselves in the bottom three.

Like I said, I feel quite dismissive of it. I still want to go to all the games (although can't), and I still support them 100%. I'm frustrated but I don't really want Brian McD to be sacked necessarily.

I don't think that will achieve anything.

[RoyalinBracknell]

It's a tough one. It looks increasingly likely we'll be playing in the Championship next season and we know McDermott is an effective manager at that level. The key thing for me is what he's learnt from what's happened in the last few months and the things he'd like to do differently if he had the chance. We need in some way to evolve our play to be effective at this level and I'm sure a few things (e.g. player recruitment, tactics) could be improved upon; the key thing is whether McDermott is aware of these and has plans in place to do so if it's necessary.

We need to think long-term; quite possibly Wolves are now wishing they'd kept Mick McCarthy given they're sitting 16th in the Championship. If I were on the board I'd sit down McDermott and try and get a sense of his long-term strategy for the club. He was successful for 2 and a half years, so I'm not sure if it's in our interests to get rid of him after a few bad months - unless he's totally out of ideas that is.

The waters are furthed muddied by the fact the longer we leave it the closer to relegation we're likely to get and hence any new manager is less likely to have an effect. If you're going to bring someone else in you need to do it sooner rather than later I think.

[Archie's penalty]

heart says stay head says he has to go..w

This.

[Arnie_Pie]

Club is bigger than the manager, so with a heavy heart, I say sack.

We learn't absolutely NOTHING from the last time we went up. Squad is not good enough and not enough quality was brought in, in the summer. Brian has too much faith in the first eleven and appears to be scared to make team changes. The tactics have been appalling and he has no idea how the change the game with subs. Same subs on each week at the same time. Same shit. Taking off Tabb today was the last straw for me. The Pearce fiasco is really pissing me off as well as I firmly believe that if he had continued to play, we would not be in this shit. The payers have a lot to answer for as well though with many of them appearing to be playing pedestrian football.

New manager will have enough time to look at the squad and make changes in January.

Sorry Brian.

[paultheroyal]

That game changed it for me. I have been wobbling of late but we are devoid of ideas, tactically inept and the squad assessment was dire in the summer.

It's little things but cereal gate, kick it out gate, Guthrie gate are themes and distractions we have avoided in recent times. I sense Brian is losing the dressing room.

Thank you, but I want us to stay in the premier league, this can now only be done by a change in management.

[Scutterbucketz]

I went for keep. Unless someone can show me a few stats on clubs that were in the do do pre Christmas, sacked their manager and then stayed up. I can't think of any. Harry did it for Pompey didn't he?

[Avon Royal]

Roy did it for Fulham.

[noelgallagher]

I went for keep. Unless someone can show me a few stats on clubs that were in the do do pre Christmas, sacked their manager and then stayed up. I can't think of any. Harry did it for Pompey didn't he?

And he will do it for QPR too.

[peterroyal76]

Biggest thing for me has been the failure of the new signings.

We won the title and then added Pogrebnyak and Guthrie as our two marque signings in the summer. I was pretty happy with that and saw Guthrie in particular as a great move to strengthen what I felt was a limited central midfield. The fact he hasn't worked out and we're stuck with said limited central midfield is the real issue for me.

Federici's loss of form is bewildering. Not sure what to put that down to. If (and I know ifs are worth shit) he'd been in last season's form we'd probably have won at Chelsea and the whole season would've panned out differently.

This

[MmmMonsterMunch]

Not long got back. Utterly inept - can't say more than that.

HOWEVER....all those calling for his head with these gimp polls on a daily basis, who do you suggest? I wanna hear it!

[RoyalBlue]

Keep, but we need to see something positive in the next five games.

I fear the only chance of seeing something positive in the next five games is if he resigns.

[Arch]

I've seen on ReadingFC that Brian McD has said "we need to do better"... not sure we can to be honest.

We were better in the first eleven games than we've been in the last four. As much as Guthrie was something of a disappointment, we've been more likely to get points with him in the side than recently. Same with Pog, same with Kebe.

[SPARTA]

Club is bigger than the manager, so with a heavy heart, I say sack.

We learn't absolutely NOTHING from the last time we went up. Squad is not good enough and not enough quality was brought in, in the summer. Brian has too much faith in the first eleven and appears to be scared to make team changes. The tactics have been appalling and he has no idea how the change the game with subs. Same subs on each week at the same time. Same shit. Taking off Tabb today was the last straw for me. The Pearce fiasco is really pissing me off as well as I firmly believe that if he had continued to play, we would not be in this shit. The payers have a lot to answer for as well though with many of them appearing to be playing pedestrian football.

New manager will have enough time to look at the squad and make changes in January.

Sorry Brian.

Have to agree with this, and also one thing both Brian and Coppell have in common is the nicely nicely approach/relationship with the players, and also their reputations for getting bargains through the door. The club then and now wanted/expected to achieve survival on the cheap, though I do believe there was still money in the pot and we were very much in the hunt for Zaha on the final day of the window but we wouldn't meet Palace's last minute increase in fee. That still suggests there was £3m ish to play with. We bought poorly, and we've not managed the players well enough either. The buck stops with Brian and reluctantly we need a new manager with new ideas and who can manage egos without creating a 'family' relationship with each player.

[Ian Royal]

Roy did it for Fulham.

Bolton also changed manager - albeit in October - and survived that season having been in the doo-doo.

[Ian Royal]

Not long got back. Utterly inept - can't say more than that.

HOWEVER....all those calling for his head with these gimp polls on a daily basis, who do you suggest? I wanna hear it!

Well, the people who have employed successful managers for us in the past head hunt and let it be known we're looking for someone new in charge for applications. Then what we do is we have a series of interviews and the best candidate gets offered the job.

[Man Friday]

Not sure what we expected to get at saints, they are a much better team than us.

Agreed, but WHY is this?

[Avon Royal]

Not sure what we expected to get at saints, they are a much better team than us.

Agreed, but WHY is this?

I can think of 27 million reasons........

[windermere_royal]

What a difference two weeks make, the last poll had 2 to 1 for him to stay

[GSY-Royal]

Keep, unless we could persuade O'Neill if he gets sacked too. Unlikely though.

Think a change of captain is just as essential. Pearce and Morrison have 100000x the influence of Jobi.