Dear Mr Chairman

[Man Friday]

We're in danger of turning into Barnsley rather than being Stoke

No, Crewe.

[rob the royal]

Have to say I agree with all of that.

So do I[/quote]

So do I.

Except that FWIW I'm happy to give Lee Hendrie a trial. If he proves he can still be of some use then sign him up, our central midfield hasn't exactly been setting the world on fire so far this season. I doubt he'll offer much, but then he won't cost much either and he'll give us a bit of experienced cover. I'd like to at least have the option of calling on a player that's got some experience if we hit a sticky period rather than piling the pressure constantly on our academy products to rise to the challenge...

[andrew1957]

Having calmed down a tad from my extreme anger of yesterday, I am trying to be rational about the future.

On one level I am still very annoyed. Sig was the one undoubtedly class player that we have. Some others may go on to be PL class but in his case I have no doubts. I cannot, therefore, see how selling him - at whatever price we got - can be taken as "the club being ambitious". The truth is that even if we get promoted again we would never be able to afford a player of his quality, so our one chance of having such a player was to develop one. As soon as we did so the club cashed in rather than see what an asset he could be for the future. I think we have very right to be very angry about that.

But on the other hand with the addition of two experienced defenders the squad does look a lot more balanced now. The question now is whether the likes of Church, Hunt and possibly Taylor or Davies (if he comes back into the fold) can make up for the 20 or so goals that we are losing in Gylfi. The other question is whether we will now be forced to go back to 4-4-2 which looked so sterile at the end of the Coppell regime. If we persist with 4-2-3-1 - then who plays behind the striker. Is Hendrie good enough to replace Sig?

If RFC go on to win 4 of the next 5 games (for example) then I suspect that our anger will dissipate and we will get back to thinking about the future. If on the other hand we have a bad spell, then I can see the fans revolting and many voting with their feet. The club, therefore, have taken a huge risk IMO. They "have" to have success on the pitch during September and October. If they do, then we all move on - despite feeling resentful about where all the money has gone. Failure on the pitch, however, will lead to disillusionment and anger in abundance and I do then fear for the future of the club.

Do the club deserve success - probably not in my opinion - but at the end of the day it is not the fault of the players left, so I guess those of us who really care about the club have no choice but to a/ get behind them or b/ give up coming. Stopping attending is after all the only way we can hurt the club, but most of us have been going for years and it is very hard to give up attending and believing in success on the pitch. And it is that loyalty that ultimately this club and to be fair many others rely upon.

[under the tin]

The worst thing about the AE lock-down is having to venture onto this board.

Please back the club properly or sell up & oxf*rd off.

+1

Have to say I agree with all of that.

So do I

^^^ Mental problems ^^^

/\/\/\ delusional problem/\/\
"Sod the icebergs, we're unsinkable, full steam ahead"

[papereyes]

I think we should treat the next game as a real cup final.

[Row Z Royal]

Guess what I'm not reading all of.

[Alan Partridge]

It's a tough one, it's not the players fault and i don't think it's McDermott's fault, he's been dealt a worse hand than Jeremy Beadle.

Take your best player away but here's £50,000 to spend.

I think Harte might do ok, he'll chip in a few goals and assists from dead balls, unlike Gylfi though he's in a crucial defensive position and I'm not sure his defensive work will be anywhere near as good as his set pieces. Harte will probably cost a few goals as well as score some. Something that with where Gylfi played he couldn't do really.

I agree with the last paragraph Reading as a club do not deserve any type of success, they have tried to do things ridiculously on the cheap for the last 4-5 years so it's no surprise that they have got gradually worse and are now in the situation of having 3 pretty mediocre forwards. I quite like Noel Hunt but I think he massively benefited by playing alongside Kevin Doyle and also his fitness is still a big concern.

[knobby_1871]

Having calmed down a tad from my extreme anger of yesterday, I am trying to be rational about the future.

On one level I am still very annoyed. Sig was the one undoubtedly class player that we have. Some others may go on to be PL class but in his case I have no doubts. I cannot, therefore, see how selling him - at whatever price we got - can be taken as "the club being ambitious". The truth is that even if we get promoted again we would never be able to afford a player of his quality, so our one chance of having such a player was to develop one. As soon as we did so the club cashed in rather than see what an asset he could be for the future. I think we have very right to be very angry about that.

But on the other hand with the addition of two experienced defenders the squad does look a lot more balanced now. The question now is whether the likes of Church, Hunt and possibly Taylor or Davies (if he comes back into the fold) can make up for the 20 or so goals that we are losing in Gylfi. The other question is whether we will now be forced to go back to 4-4-2 which looked so sterile at the end of the Coppell regime. If we persist with 4-2-3-1 - then who plays behind the striker. Is Hendrie good enough to replace Sig?

If RFC go on to win 4 of the next 5 games (for example) then I suspect that our anger will dissipate and we will get back to thinking about the future. If on the other hand we have a bad spell, then I can see the fans revolting and many voting with their feet. The club, therefore, have taken a huge risk IMO. They "have" to have success on the pitch during September and October. If they do, then we all move on - despite feeling resentful about where all the money has gone. Failure on the pitch, however, will lead to disillusionment and anger in abundance and I do then fear for the future of the club.

Do the club deserve success - probably not in my opinion - but at the end of the day it is not the fault of the players left, so I guess those of us who really care about the club have no choice but to a/ get behind them or b/ give up coming. Stopping attending is after all the only way we can hurt the club, but most of us have been going for years and it is very hard to give up attending and believing in success on the pitch. And it is that loyalty that ultimately this club and to be fair many others rely upon.

+1 well said

[robinsfriday]

Dear Reading fc fanz URZZZZZZZZ

Could everyone who has been supporting Reading FC since we moved to the spakker dome please fuck off with their no.13 urz shirts and soccer am dvd's and lick the sweat off a dead man's scrote. Leave those with a hint of realism and experience of the harsher times to enjoy the fact that we are a lot better than we used to be, but still a small town club.

Kind Regards.

Could not have said it better.

[rabidbee]

It's not so much about living in the past, it's about recognising that there are certain limitations on the club that haven't really changed. We're still an unfancied provincial club with a fairly modest fan base. Potentially, we could draw on millions in the wider area, but we're too close to London and its alternative attractions, footballing and otherwise. If Madejski is either unwilling or unable to finance a significantly increased outlay, where will that money come from? No one else seems interested in buying the club, and we've had to reduce ticket prices since coming down. As our time in the PL showed, the huge increase in TV revenue is quickly swallowed by inflated wages, and banks are much less willing to give clubs unlimited credit it seems.

Madejski seems perhaps overly cautious, but fair enough, it's his money. And frankly, he's the one who is the successful businessman; unless there are loads of self-made millionaires on here, I figure he's the one who knows what he's talking about. People are just going to have to accept that he has opted for limited risk, I think ever since the collapse of ITV Digital.

And personally, whilst that first season was fun, I think the Premiership is shit anyway. Why would I want to pay £35-40 a week to watch us try to cling to bottom-16 status? We're competative at this level, it's cheaper, there are more games and they're more fun. Nuff said.

[Norfolk Royal]

I just wondered whether to raise finance whether SJM would ever consider new investors coming on board and in return for a boardroom place investing money in return for shares.

Plenty of clubs operate in that way and it is a way of spreading the risk. It seems to me that SJM would like to keep all his pears in one basket and wouldn't countenance that.

[Gordons Cumming]

So Reading FC has no ambition? Maybe.................

Whoever thinks that, and doesn't like it, move along to support a team that does.You wont be missed (not by me anyway)

Leave Reading FC to it's own real supporters as you lot are becoming very boring.

Reading FC (ambitious or not ambitious, makes no diference to me I'll still support them)

Life's too short for all this moaning.

If we were in the Prem Gylfi would have stayed, we weren't, so he left (we got 7 million ) move on............(yawn)

[rob the royal]

I just wondered whether to raise finance whether SJM would ever consider new investors coming on board and in return for a boardroom place investing money in return for shares.

Plenty of clubs operate in that way and it is a way of spreading the risk. It seems to me that SJM would like to keep all his pears in one basket and wouldn't countenance that.

According to him he's waiting for a billionaire to come along and make an offer for the whole thing because they're the only people that could afford to move the club forward (more like they're the only ones who would possibly offer anything like what he wants for the club).

There's not much can be done about it, that doesn't mean everyone has to lick his arse like they can't see it.

[westendgirl]

So Reading FC has no ambition? Maybe.................

Whoever thinks that, and doesn't like it, move along to support a team that does.You wont be missed (not by me anyway)

Leave Reading FC to it's own real supporters as you lot are becoming very boring.

Reading FC (ambitious or not ambitious, makes no diference to me I'll still support them)

Life's too short for all this moaning.

If we were in the Prem Gylfi would have stayed, we weren't, so he left (we got 7 million ) move on............(yawn)

Dare I say - its only a game? If only success will do there are a few clubs you could choose (at the moment) but beware no club had ever stayed at the top forever. After all if there were not clubs in relative decline there would be no room for improving clubs to get a chance of promotion.

[rhroyal]

Shut it. I will always support this club and at the Mad Stad I will not boo the players, the team or JM. I will fully support them. However I'm a member of this messageboard to vent my opinions. I'm not going to lie and say everything is great if I don't think that. Believe it or not, what you or me write on here means oxf*rd all to the club so long as we continue to buy tickets and support the team, which I fully intend to do.

So please don't suggest that I'm any less of a supporter than you just because we're disagreeing on a few things at the moment.

[Norfolk Royal]

I too will never stop supporting the team. However, I draw the line at buying overpriced food items in the concourses. I'd also like to see some real ale being sold in the concourse bars.

[Scarface]

So Reading FC has no ambition? Maybe.................

Whoever thinks that, and doesn't like it, move along to support a team that does.You wont be missed (not by me anyway)

Leave Reading FC to it's own real supporters as you lot are becoming very boring.

Reading FC (ambitious or not ambitious, makes no diference to me I'll still support them)

Life's too short for all this moaning.

If we were in the Prem Gylfi would have stayed, we weren't, so he left (we got 7 million ) move on............(yawn)

I have no problem with the club selling Gylfi and Rasiak this summer, but what I do have a problem is they've then replaced them with Lee Hendrie. We got in over £6m for Glyfi and we've spent about 50k, it's a fooking joke and does show a total lack of ambition to get promotion.

I'm still a fan and I'll still go to all matches, however if I pay my my money for a season ticket, it gives me the right to moan about decisions and not blindly and studpidly support the club/players in everything they do.

[Norfolk Royal]

I disagree that only a billionaire can move the club forward. A couple of million invested would be a help.

[rob the royal]

Equally, if we take the original poster's logic...

If you don't like people moaning about the club on this forum, why don't you move along to one where everyone is up SJM's bum all the time and can't wait for league one football even if is avoidable and where everyone pretends everything in the garden is rosy even though it's not.

That's what you OUGHT to do by your own logic.

Personally, I think you should stay and continue to engage in discussion and debate, just as I don't see why you think you can tell people to get lost and support another club just because they don't agree with your point of view.

[Schards#2]

So Reading FC has no ambition? Maybe.................

Whoever thinks that, and doesn't like it, move along to support a team that does.You wont be missed (not by me anyway)

Leave Reading FC to it's own real supporters as you lot are becoming very boring.

Reading FC (ambitious or not ambitious, makes no diference to me I'll still support them)

Life's too short for all this moaning.

If we were in the Prem Gylfi would have stayed, we weren't, so he left (we got 7 million ) move on............(yawn)

But it's not as simple as that is it? Football supporters don't, can't really, move on to another team. For many of us, no doubt you included, "Reading 'til I die" is a statement of fact, not just a song. However much I rant about things on here and however much I disagree with the direction the club may take, i will always follow them. That is not to say that I can't be dissolusioned, pissed off, frustrated, whatever about the current obvious lack of ambition.

I see it rather like if one of your children hugely disappoints you, you don't have the option of giving up on them and focussing your attention elsewhere as they are still your children and you still love them.

Supporting a team doesn't mean you cannot criticise them periodically and it doesn't make you less of a supporter if you do. To suggest that, if you don't like it you can simply flounce off to another club is a completely empty argument.