Rodgers: The 'Truth'

[Alan Partridge]

There's been something seriously wrong at Reading Football Club for a while now. I am still amazed at how a club that spent so little with the comparison of the money coming into the club over the last 4 years has ended up to be practically broke, especially considering Reading weren't an established club in the top division so relegation was always possible. We didn't do a Pompey, Stoke or a Hull by spending fortunes on transfer fees and wages for players (we had the lowest wage bill in the division) yet we are utterly skint and couldn't even afford a new manager even if we wanted one.


The Rodgers/McDermott fiasco is the next saga to join the list. To headhunt someone and sack him 6 months into a 3 year contract to hire someone that was here all along is the work of imbeciles.

There is something more to what we the fans are told and we will probably never find out what it is.

[floyd__streete]

the major failure was boards failure to sign Tommy Smith after playing silly buggers with Watford (again)

And I am absolutely certain that BR played his part in this failure by speaking out about Smith's desire to join us, giving Watford even more determination to play hardball with RFC and their gobby former manager.

Otherwise, your post is generally revisionist nonsense. Reading were in deep trouble when Rodgers was sacked and they had displayed precious little to suggest that they would improve on their position. People talk of an improvement in that latter few weeks under BR, but the 2-4 thrashing by a mediocre Palace side who hadn't even been paid with the ludicrous dropping of our only young player to show any sustained glimpses of promise (Sigurdsson) and a 2-1 loss to a poor Derby side having completely controlled the first hour of the game suggests otherwise.

[Sir Rodger Doyle]

There's been something seriously wrong at Reading Football Club for a while now. I am still amazed at how a club that spent so little with the comparison of the money coming into the club over the last 4 years has ended up to be practically broke, especially considering Reading weren't an established club in the top division so relegation was always possible. We didn't do a Pompey, Stoke or a Hull by spending fortunes on transfer fees and wages for players (we had the lowest wage bill in the division) yet we are utterly skint and couldn't even afford a new manager even if we wanted one.


The Rodgers/McDermott fiasco is the next saga to join the list. To headhunt someone and sack him 6 months into a 3 year contract to hire someone that was here all along is the work of imbeciles.

There is something more to what we the fans are told and we will probably never find out what it is.

The Premier league money was spent in truck loads. Most of it went on property developement and the rest on awarding massive contracts to players who plainly didn't deserve it. Someone made those desicions. I just don't knowe whoe.

[PistolPete]

the major failure was boards failure to sign Tommy Smith after playing silly buggers with Watford (again)

And I am absolutely certain that BR played his part in this failure by speaking out about Smith's desire to join us, giving Watford even more determination to play hardball with RFC and their gobby former manager.

Otherwise, your post is generally revisionist nonsense. Reading were in deep trouble when Rodgers was sacked and they had displayed precious little to suggest that they would improve on their position. People talk of an improvement in that latter few weeks under BR, but the 2-4 thrashing by a mediocre Palace side who hadn't even been paid with the ludicrous dropping of our only young player to show any sustained glimpses of promise (Sigurdsson) and a 2-1 loss to a poor Derby side having completely controlled the first hour of the game suggests otherwise.

You are quite right, Rodgers should not have spoken so blatantly about Smith, especially after lying to the Watford board about his desire to join Reading himself. I could add your point to the list of his failures, but you may notice that I even wrote 'HUGE' in caps, as I believe that his errors were many and varied.

However Floyd, my views are not simply revisionist, they are my views and my views only. Who is to say that by dropping Sig he was simply protecting him, knowing (like a fool) that his job was a long term one? I don't know, but I still feel that he had something (as proven by his career pre Reading) and that his chance was cut short. 'Why' is the question I still search an answer to, especially in light of the months that followed the sacking...

[SteveRoyal]

Right, this is the first of a couple of old threads I am going to dig up in the search for answers - the next will be our financial situation. Apologies to those who consider it old news but I have surprised myself at how fed up I am at the whole situation and would love someone to shed some light on what I perceive to be very strange circumstances...

WHAT I BELIEVE TO BE TRUE

Rodgers was very highly regarded by Reading FC before he was head-hunted by Mourinho, he was credited for implementing the diamand midfield for Chelsea and was begged to stay by Scolari before being, yet again, headhunted by Watford. He was a huge hit in his short time at Watford and is, you guessed it, head-hunted by his dream job Reading

Players everywhere he went admired his ability; Tommy Smith wanted to go 'wherever Rodgers was', O'Dea calls him 'a great manager' who 'taught him a lot' even though Rodgers didn't play him!The list does actually go on...

Readings board forced the sale of £12m worth of players (Doyle, Hunt, Lita and Bikey) on a squad already in desperate need of better players while allowing the signing of less than 3m (Mills, McAnuff, Raziak and Cummings) - but the major failure was boards failure to sign Tommy Smith after playing silly buggers with Watford (again)

I know Rodgers made some HUGE mistakes (Cummings, changing the team so often, talking big too soon, varying the tactics so often) but it seemed obvious to me that a) he was going to get it right in the end and b)his side was doing everything but score

PLEASE EXPLAIN TO ME, WHY OH WHY DID MADEJSKI SACK RODGERS WITH NO REPLACEMENT IN MIND IF IT WASN'T DUE TO SOME KIND OF 6 MONTH PROBATION COST CUTTING SCHEME?? IT SEEMS SERIOUSLY FISHY

I'm SteveRoyal, and I approve this message,

[Sir Rodger Doyle]

the major failure was boards failure to sign Tommy Smith after playing silly buggers with Watford (again)

And I am absolutely certain that BR played his part in this failure by speaking out about Smith's desire to join us, giving Watford even more determination to play hardball with RFC and their gobby former manager.

Otherwise, your post is generally revisionist nonsense. Reading were in deep trouble when Rodgers was sacked and they had displayed precious little to suggest that they would improve on their position. People talk of an improvement in that latter few weeks under BR, but the 2-4 thrashing by a mediocre Palace side who hadn't even been paid with the ludicrous dropping of our only young player to show any sustained glimpses of promise (Sigurdsson) and a 2-1 loss to a poor Derby side having completely controlled the first hour of the game suggests otherwise.

'sake, Watford accepted an offer from Sheffield utd of I think £1.8M. We made a pathetic offer compared to this and Watford quite rightly turned it down. Watford knew that Smith wanted to go to Reading because he told them and he flatly refused to agree personal terms on any offer, unless the offer came from Reading. I don't see that it makes any difference at all that Rodgers said he wanted the player, when the player himself had decided he was going to Reading. Watford needed the money, so they told Reading about the offer that had already been accepted, "we want £1.8M for our player". Reading then made one pathetic offer after another, they were all refused. When Reading finally blinked and offered the asking price the deal was hijacked Portsmouth. It was the fault of Reading's board, not Brendan.


I am sick of people banging on about how they didn't like Rodgers. "Big Watch" "Arrogant" "Tactics shit" "Didn't know what he was doing". I can't say I liked the man, but I believed he had a long term plan for my club. I could understand the fact that results may not be good to start with. I could accept that, so long as I could see development within the club (and I could).You can pull all the negative results from his tenure, but the performances (in all but one of those games) were light years ahead of the boll*cks I watched at the end of last season. So here we are now, no Manager, no money and seemingly no future. Well done everyone, you have got what you wanted. You have all bought the crap that has been spouted by the club about Rodgers and the current position.

Give yourselves a big gold star. (or a watch if you prefer)

[rob the royal]

I am sick of people banging on about how they didn't like Rodgers. "Big Watch" "Arrogant" "Tactics shit" "Didn't know what he was doing". I can't say I liked the man, but I believed he had a long term plan for my club. I could understand the fact that results may not be good to start with. I could accept that, so long as I could see development within the club (and I could).You can pull all the negative results from his tenure, but the performances (in all but one of those games) were light years ahead of the boll*cks I watched at the end of last season. So here we are now, no Manager, no money and seemingly no future. Well done everyone, you have got what you wanted. You have all bought the crap that has been spouted by the club about Rodgers and the current position.

Give yourselves a big gold star. (or a watch if you prefer)

Yeah that's my position too. I didn't like him either, but I think it's a shame he went so early. But at the time I thought it was the Club being decisive and taking action to prevent relegation by bringing in an experienced manager (having obviously decided they'd failed with the new kid on the block route) - but this didn't happen. I for one will always wonder if he might have been a good manager for us in the long term - even though I thought much of what he had done in his short time was baffling or just plain bad.

[Millsy]

There's been something seriously wrong at Reading Football Club for a while now. I am still amazed at how a club that spent so little with the comparison of the money coming into the club over the last 4 years has ended up to be practically broke, especially considering Reading weren't an established club in the top division so relegation was always possible. We didn't do a Pompey, Stoke or a Hull by spending fortunes on transfer fees and wages for players (we had the lowest wage bill in the division) yet we are utterly skint and couldn't even afford a new manager even if we wanted one.
The Rodgers/McDermott fiasco is the next saga to join the list. To headhunt someone and sack him 6 months into a 3 year contract to hire someone that was here all along is the work of imbeciles.
There is something more to what we the fans are told and we will probably never find out what it is.

You're right. The following is possible:

Madejski put loads of his own money into the club and got us into the Prem. He was probably hoping to achieve a) a name for himself on a stadium - he achieved that b) a name for himself among fans by getting us into the top flight - he achieved that and c) a massive profit selling the club in the Prem. For whatever reason (recession?), once he got into the Prem he found it harder to sell than he thought and so clearly wasn't going to get his big profit that way. Hanging around in the Prem would be too costly and too risky. So he decided to play it lucky and see how much he could milk the Prem whilst spending minimal amounts. It eventually didn't work, we came down and so the only way to milk the profits from the club seem to be to totally bleed it dry. i.e. get rid of all big players, bring in cheap managers who won't want to spend big and get his money that way. Having achieved a) and b) and milking all the rewards by selling off our best assets and havig no intention of replacing them he has gone some way towards mgetting his money back and is looking for his way out. He will never lead us back to te Prem unleshe gets no offers at all and the economy changes such that a newly promoted Prem club might be attractive again.

For this I say thanks Madejski for what you've done, but you've undone all the goodness to fill your pockets up again. Time for you to leave and get someone in who actually wants to take us up.

Before anyone blasts me - yes I'm purely speculating and have no idea!

[Arch]

Time for you to leave and get someone in who actually wants to take us up.

Not blasting you 2WW, but explain to me how this happens, because half the board is clamouring for it but I don't see any proposal about the mechanism.

[Linden Jones' Tash]

I concur with PistolPete in his post - makes no sense - but then, when the brown stuff starts flying around, it takes strong leadership to navigate stormy waters - I'm sure many will have seen MDs abandon a strategy when the numbers don't add up.....even if it was a long term plan....maybe just human nature?

[gazzer, loyal royal]

I heard some interesting stuff about Rodgers last night from my source- but unfortunately he asked me not say anything until the end of the season.


What I can say though is Rodgers is a Liar

[rhroyal]

I heard some interesting stuff about Rodgers last night from my source- but unfortunately he asked me not say anything until the end of the season.


What I can say though is Rodgers is a Liar

What's the point behind this post then?

[readingbedding]

the major failure was boards failure to sign Tommy Smith after playing silly buggers with Watford (again)

And I am absolutely certain that BR played his part in this failure by speaking out about Smith's desire to join us, giving Watford even more determination to play hardball with RFC and their gobby former manager.

Otherwise, your post is generally revisionist nonsense. Reading were in deep trouble when Rodgers was sacked and they had displayed precious little to suggest that they would improve on their position. People talk of an improvement in that latter few weeks under BR, but the 2-4 thrashing by a mediocre Palace side who hadn't even been paid with the ludicrous dropping of our only young player to show any sustained glimpses of promise (Sigurdsson) and a 2-1 loss to a poor Derby side having completely controlled the first hour of the game suggests otherwise.

'sake, Watford accepted an offer from Sheffield utd of I think £1.8M. We made a pathetic offer compared to this and Watford quite rightly turned it down. Watford knew that Smith wanted to go to Reading because he told them and he flatly refused to agree personal terms on any offer, unless the offer came from Reading. I don't see that it makes any difference at all that Rodgers said he wanted the player, when the player himself had decided he was going to Reading. Watford needed the money, so they told Reading about the offer that had already been accepted, "we want £1.8M for our player". Reading then made one pathetic offer after another, they were all refused. When Reading finally blinked and offered the asking price the deal was hijacked Portsmouth. It was the fault of Reading's board, not Brendan.


I am sick of people banging on about how they didn't like Rodgers. "Big Watch" "Arrogant" "Tactics shit" "Didn't know what he was doing". I can't say I liked the man, but I believed he had a long term plan for my club. I could understand the fact that results may not be good to start with. I could accept that, so long as I could see development within the club (and I could).You can pull all the negative results from his tenure, but the performances (in all but one of those games) were light years ahead of the boll*cks I watched at the end of last season. So here we are now, no Manager, no money and seemingly no future. Well done everyone, you have got what you wanted. You have all bought the crap that has been spouted by the club about Rodgers and the current position.

Give yourselves a big gold star. (or a watch if you prefer)

Too raw, too inexperienced and not good enough.
Like it, or lump it.

[RoyalBlue]

the major failure was boards failure to sign Tommy Smith after playing silly buggers with Watford (again)

And I am absolutely certain that BR played his part in this failure by speaking out about Smith's desire to join us, giving Watford even more determination to play hardball with RFC and their gobby former manager.
.

When the chips were down, that would have had no bearing on things whatsoever. Watford were pretty desperate for money at the time and would have bitten our hands off had tightarse and Hammond not tried to take the P by offering well below Watford's (and the market) valuation. They would have even sold Smith to Luton had Luton been able to pay the price!

[brendywendy]

the rest on awarding massive contracts to players who plainly didn't deserve it

the players who had achieved a record breaking season of th egreatest entertainment and football we have ever seen?
trhe players who got to 8th place in the prem in their first ever season after spending.........60 p on one player?
they deserved it. end of.
it was what happened after they got th emoney they deserved that oxf*rd us.

[Fitzroy]

A mate and I have been debating this and came to this conclusion.

What was the point of sacking Buck and paying out, what at a guess 700K, in compensation, plus the goons, so lets say conservative total 500,000.

New striker to assist Buck in RFC's problem of not scroing goals, 500 - 750K? Another Doyle 80,000K.

Seems something is not right at RFC and now the cheapest manager we can find looking for cheap loans as stop gaps to cover vital positions.

[Isaac Hunt]

New striker to assist Buck in RFC's problem of not scroing goals, 500 - 750K? Another Doyle 80,000K.

Yes, because it was that simple.

[Fitzroy]

New striker to assist Buck in RFC's problem of not scroing goals, 500 - 750K? Another Doyle 80,000K.

Yes, because it was that simple.

Mr MAD wouldn't risk another 500k so got shot of Buck and hired a yes man who is unlikely to ask for anything, let alone money.

[Maguire]

People talk of an improvement in that latter few weeks under BR, but the 2-4 thrashing by a mediocre Palace side who hadn't even been paid with the ludicrous dropping of our only young player to show any sustained glimpses of promise (Sigurdsson) and a 2-1 loss to a poor Derby side having completely controlled the first hour of the game suggests otherwise.

How convenient to pick out the games that we lost

If you break BR's 21 games down into three groups of seven (just for convenience as 21 is divisible by three), then you'll see that the last seven produced easily the best results and we were starting to look more settled as a team.

There's been a lot of sense written in the last few posts (PistolPete, Rodger Doyle) which I've foind quite refreshing but when i think about the BR situation I'm always left with this nagging thought that there has to be some other factor involved in all this that we don't know about.

You know you're going through a transitional period, you know you're ripping your squad to pieces, and you know you need to have patience with whoever comes in to navigate us through what will inevitably be a difficult period. So, you headhunt a young manager with strong links to the club, then sack him before he's even played every team in the division, when we're not even in the bottom three, and when you don't have anybody lined up to replace him.

Insanity.

I hope to hell we don't go down but if we do then in terms of the board it's just the chickens coming home to roost i'm afraid.

[Terminal Boardom]

I can see no other reason for BR's departure other than he demanded money for new players. This was refused by Howe and BR threatened to quit. The rest is history. SJM's hands perfectly clean as he didn't do the actual termination.

I would not be surprised if there were other requests from BR which went similarly. Coaching / Backroom staff, technical equipment and the like.

Nigel Howe is to Uriah Heap as SJM is to Mr Wickfield

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uriah_Heep