Back from the game (ish)

[Alan Partridge]

Would suggest it's more where Reading are as a team right now rather than 'dropping levels'. The Southampton match wasn't Reading's 'normal' level if it was they'd be 3rd right now, they raised their game for that and played well..

and derby, and boro, and palace etc

which was my point- we play to the level of the opposition we are playing.
shit team, and we play shit
good team, we play well

Didn't win any of those games though.

I thoguht Derby on the night were absolutely wretched yet they still scored twice and led the game twice. A good side would have beaten that rabble 3 or 4-0 on the night. Derby are clearly a half decent side this season but on the day were crap...and still Reading didn't win.

[melonhead]

it could be viewed that way

but then i thought we made boro, saints, palace, and derby all play pretty poorly(and clearly they arent all poor, and didnt pick us to play poorly against randomly)

which is another equally valid way to see things

[Svlad Cjelli]

Perhaps the issue is that while we can stop other teams playing, doing that also stops us playing well?

So we can hold the good teams but can't beat them, but against poor teams it's just a scrappy lottery decided by whoever puts a single decent chance away?

What we need is to be able to stop other teams playing and at the same time mean that this doesn't stop us being creative.

[Hoop Blah]

Perhaps the issue is that while we can stop other teams playing, doing that also stops us playing well?

So we can hold the good teams but can't beat them, but against poor teams it's just a scrappy lottery decided by whoever puts a single decent chance away?

What we need is to be able to stop other teams playing and at the same time mean that this doesn't stop us being creative.

This is it for me.

As AP says we're a pretty average team in an average league. We're set up to stop teams and play the percentages and we do that reasonably well. What we struggle to do is create pressure on the opposition and create chances, let alone score. We just don't have the quality on the ball to really threaten or worry opposition defences.

I think this is probably why we fail to score goals in the first half as well. Playing against us is a test of attrition and concentration. For the first 45 sides handle that pretty well. As they get more tired and make mistakes the law of averages means we finally get, and occassionaly take, scoring chances.

[melonhead]

loads of pressure put on boro, saints, derby, palace, some lovely football, nice passing, not hoofing/percentage football
but i agree that there were not many real chances created still.

[FiNeRaIn]

Jesus christ. When the RTG's come back and post in the manner they have....you know you have problems. Worrying thing is we aren't blessed with quality individuals anymore to pull us out of bad form. We are just a very average squad and teams don't fear us. If you suddenly renamed this reading team "scunthopre" it wouldn't look out of place. Two lower level strikers, no creative midfielders, one winger who wants to move to a bigger club ( kebe) and a club captain on the other flank who has proved at every club he's been too he cannot remain consistent and play well for more than one game in five - the defence is just shite. There is just absolutely nothing to look forward to with this team. People are going overboard saying we'll be relegated...truth is we'll be mid table at best and probably in-between the both of them. I could actually cope if we played semi-decent attacking, attractive football...but the fact is we play the worst football I can ever remember us playing. Even burns teams knocked it around more a level below this. Just WHY do we insist on pumping it long down the channels or over the top? ffs stop...

[melonhead]

what a load of shit

i cleary criticized the performance, highlighted where its going wrong, and suggested ways to try and fix it

and lol at the defence being shit, CBs and central midfield are the only places that were functioning last night

doesnt change the fact that were applied alot of pressure against boro saints derby palace etc

[FiNeRaIn]

what a load of shit

i cleary criticized the performance, highlighted where its going wrong, and suggested ways to try and fix it

Oh look how easy it is...why don't we follow melonheads suggestions and win the league???

What have we got to show for that pressure we applied in our previous games? 4 points out of 12....relegation form.... Now 4 points out of 15 if you include forest.

Don't give me " it was against the good teams, wah wah wah"....because we got even less for barnsley, watford and millwall.

The patters the same...we are distinctly average at best and the style we play is simply AWFUL to have to sit through in the process. BOOM down the line...BOOM over the top!! Why even bother with a midfield...all karacan does it pass it backwards so the defence an launch it over the top. What happened to the side when BMD took over? The one in which we played good attacking football...scored clever and skillfull goals and had wingers in form who were a massive part of that?

[melonhead]

LOL


you said i was being daft and my relentless positivity was upsetting you
i simply offered recent examples where i was more than open to criticism of the team.

and you go off on one like a crazed lunatic.

i just said that we played well in those games, and applied pressure to good teams.
simply to offer you some hope in the gloom of your own brain


up to you if you dont want to take it

i only offer it from the goodness in my heart

[FiNeRaIn]

In football results do the talking..as much as we want to sit here and discuss the other points. The fact is...well...we simply don't win very much no matter who we play. We're just not very good.

[Svlad Cjelli]

Surely explaining why we're not very good is a lot more constructive than just repeating the mantra that we're just not very good.

[FiNeRaIn]

Surely explaining why we're not very good is a lot more constructive than just repeating the mantra that we're just not very good.

I've done that too, see previous post to that.

[melonhead]

In football results do the talking..as much as we want to sit here and discuss the other points. The fact is...well...we simply don't win very much no matter who we play. We're just not very good.

currently i can do nothing but look at the results and reluctantly agree,

but you would have said the same at this point last year too..........

is all im saying

[Barry the bird boggler]

Agreed but we can't keep putting ourselves into a position where "miracle" runs are required to get at least a respectible finish in the table.

With games against Birmingham, Ipswich, West Ham, Cardiff and Blackpool still come in the next couple of months I can see us being in a dodgy position by the start of the New Year unless we start carrying consistent meaningful threat going forward. This means another striker, a creative midfielder (who I think we already have in Howard if Heston would build a team about him) and restoring Harte.

I also think that it would be good to get Obita playing in the 1st team in place of Kebe, but I guess that won't happen unless there is nothing left to play for or Kebe and HRK are both injured at the same time.

[Hoop Blah]

Results are the be all and end all yes, but you shouldn't over look the importance of performances as they'll often be the precursor to a good or bad run of form.

I remember well the messages of 'don't worry how we're playing as we're winning' comments in the lead up to Christmas '08, right before we went on a run of however many games it was without winning a game because Doyle was no longer scoring 90% of his chances and flattering our performances with good results.

I'd argue that we played that well in those games brendy, and posession without a threat of creating something isn't what I meant by pressure. Pressure is about making the opposition work really hard to keep you at bay. I've never felt we've really troubled teams for more than a 10 minute spell at any point this season.

I don't think it's all doom and gloom. I don't think we'll be right in the relegation mix or anything like that, but I do think we'll struggle to win a lot of games playing as we are, and I'm pretty sure that it'll make for painful watching too.

[FiNeRaIn]

Fvcking hell, we have birmingham..cardiff and ipswich away as our next three games closely followed by blackpool, west ham and leeds...we could really be in trouble here.

[DOYLERSAROYALER]

....think this run is also showing how shallow the squad is in terms of quality .........beyond the first 16, and even some of them are up for debate on quality, there's very very little left in the tank ......

.....We've beaten the government to austerity measures.....and its going to hit hard .....imho

[Platypuss]

Would suggest it's more where Reading are as a team right now rather than 'dropping levels'. The Southampton match wasn't Reading's 'normal' level if it was they'd be 3rd right now, they raised their game for that and played well..

and derby, and boro, and palace etc

which was my point- we play to the level of the opposition we are playing.
shit team, and we play shit
good team, we play well

Unfortunately, there are far more shit teams than good ones in the league.

[melonhead]

Agreed but we can't keep putting ourselves into a position where "miracle" runs are required to get at least a respectible finish in the table.

With games against Birmingham, Ipswich, West Ham, Cardiff and Blackpool still come in the next couple of months I can see us being in a dodgy position by the start of the New Year unless we start carrying consistent meaningful threat going forward. This means another striker, a creative midfielder (who I think we already have in Howard if Heston would build a team about him) and restoring Harte.

I also think that it would be good to get Obita playing in the 1st team in place of Kebe, but I guess that won't happen unless there is nothing left to play for or Kebe and HRK are both injured at the same time.

im hopinbg they arent miracles, and just that brrian needs half a season to assess and rebuild each seasons brand new team.

im sure itll happen again after xmas this year....
gulps nervously

[RoyalBlue]

Fvcking hell, we have birmingham..cardiff and ipswich away as our next three games closely followed by blackpool, west ham and leeds...we could really be in trouble here.

I think the famous team/squad spirit will ensure we fight our way to some points in these fixtures. However, I think we can wave goodbye to any promotion push this year and will be having plenty of nervous looks over our shoulders.

More black hole plugging this Xmas could push us over the precipice.