HNA approval/disapproval of NA

[sandman]

In both uses it is pretty disrespectful to call McD a cancer.

[floyd__streete]

As I say, the drama queenery here is someone having the temerity to say that Adkins is being undermined by anything to do with the previous regime.

What undermines Adkins is constant altering of the starting XI, dubious quality of signings made and questionable substitutions. Not to mention the fact he is an insincere, wannabe Estate Agent, psychobabble-squawking helmet.

[sandman]

Exactly.

He just isn't helping himself.

[floyd__streete]

Definition of cancer in English
noun
[mass noun]
[count noun] an evil or destructive practice or phenomenon that is hard to contain or eradicate

The spirit of McDermott is 'evil'

Only on Hob Nob, only Reading fans when speaking about their second best ever manager.

[PistolPete]

Evil OR destructive.

I kind of understand what the poster is saying, that McDermott was so popular that it was always going to be tough for the next guy.

[RoyalBlue]

OP has this spot on. It seems that Adkins isn't even trying to win these days - it's more important for Atkins to maintain his "brand" of passing football than to get results now.

Good for him (maybe) but bad for the club.

Yesterday he explained exactly what he is trying to do and that objective is absolutely spot on. Better to build the team now that is capable of playing in a manner that gives a reasonable chance of survival in the PL than playing the lower league way, securing promotion and then trying to fix things once in the PL. The latter approach is doomed to failure as last season showed. If his persistence in adopting this passing approach costs us a few results in the short term, so what! I can't see how that is in any way detrimental to the club, in that longer term it will make us a much better and stronger team.

Majority of people near me at the games seem to dislike him with a passion. One guy said to me "the guy is a complefe joke" yesterday. But maybe I just imagined this conversation.
Every substitution is met with total contempt for the manager.

That is because most Readings fans are utter idiots.

We certainly have a good number of footballing retards who seem to hanker after the old English style of football, which is the very reason our national team is so damn poor. Those that criticised the substitutions yesterday were shown to be idiots!

[AirRaidSiren]

Coppell may have struggled at first but he was never as unlikeable as this man.

Unlikeable? What? So you and a few bell ends on an internet forum represent the entire Reading FC fan base? I do not know one person or Reading fan who dislikes him. It's all in your mind. It's what you want, not a fact.

Exactly. I definitely like the guy. Seems to me, some may struggle with the intelligent arguments and theories that he comes out with and dislike him for that. Since he is so articulate compared to many managers, some appear to interpret this as arrogance!

On Open day he clearly spoke about what he is trying to bring into our game, how he gets the players to train differently. He never once quoted saying it will be an instant success, he did say it will take time. He is very well liked by so many on and off the pitch, it's not fake. Except some of our disgraceful fans disliked him from the go, for no reason other than they were bitter towards the sacking of McDermott. It's not Adkins fault, he wants to win games, bring success. What harm is that? In the long run if he does not succeed in what he wants to achieve, then he has to go, like any other manager.

[AirRaidSiren]

Exactly.

He just isn't helping himself.

You and Floyd are HNA's equivalent to Laurel and Hardy. A comedy pairing. Bliss.

[RoyalBlue]

Definition of cancer in English
noun
[mass noun]
[count noun] an evil or destructive practice or phenomenon that is hard to contain or eradicate

The spirit of McDermott is 'evil'

Only on Hob Nob, only Reading fans when speaking about their second best ever manager.

Second most successful but I would very much dispute that he was our second best. Much as I dislike the character (after the way he treated our club) there is Pardew who did pretty well and has gone on to much bigger and better things. And there is another, who the anti-Adkins brigade also hounded out of the club who is now sat at the top of the PL. I would argue that both have now displayed greater all round ability than McDermott (and that is not meant to rubbish McDermott's fantastic achievements) McGhee was pretty damn good too, and I seem to remember people didn't like him when he started to try to change our style of football and struggled at first.

If NA is serious he should get rid of the DEAD WOOD, find half dozen players either from the reserves or buy and bed them down for the season forget about promotion and go for it with a settled side next season.

In order to do the latter he has to have significant funds genuinely available for him to use. I take no comfort from Madejski's statement yesterday that funds will be available. How many times have we been told that only to see the equivalent of sweet FA happen in the transfer window as either the 'right players weren't available' or our targets go elsewhere?!

[Tony Le Mesmer]

OP has this spot on. It seems that Adkins isn't even trying to win these days - it's more important for Atkins to maintain his "brand" of passing football than to get results now.

Good for him (maybe) but bad for the club.

Yesterday he explained exactly what he is trying to do and that objective is absolutely spot on. Better to build the team now that is capable of playing in a manner that gives a reasonable chance of survival in the PL than playing the lower league way, securing promotion and then trying to fix things once in the PL. The latter approach is doomed to failure as last season showed. If his persistence in adopting this passing approach costs us a few results in the short term, so what! I can't see how that is in any way detrimental to the club, in that longer term it will make us a much better and stronger team.

So you actually constitute the previous reign as a failure then? Despite only one previous reign having achieved more?

You also seem to be assuming that things will get better playing a supposedly better style of football. Tommy Burns and Brendan Rogers promised the same.

I put it to you that this team will achieve nothing playing the way we are. Above all else, team ethic is what will get Reading promoted and staying up. Passing style or direct, without that you're going nowhere. And we don't have that i'm afraid. I see a set of players with plenty of individual ability who are just not up for it under Adkins.

[winchester_royal]

OP has this spot on. It seems that Adkins isn't even trying to win these days - it's more important for Atkins to maintain his "brand" of passing football than to get results now.

Good for him (maybe) but bad for the club.

Yesterday he explained exactly what he is trying to do and that objective is absolutely spot on. Better to build the team now that is capable of playing in a manner that gives a reasonable chance of survival in the PL than playing the lower league way, securing promotion and then trying to fix things once in the PL. The latter approach is doomed to failure as last season showed. If his persistence in adopting this passing approach costs us a few results in the short term, so what! I can't see how that is in any way detrimental to the club, in that longer term it will make us a much better and stronger team.

Majority of people near me at the games seem to dislike him with a passion. One guy said to me "the guy is a complefe joke" yesterday. But maybe I just imagined this conversation.
Every substitution is met with total contempt for the manager.

That is because most Readings fans are utter idiots.

We certainly have a good number of footballing retards who seem to hanker after the old English style of football, which is the very reason our national team is so damn poor. Those that criticised the substitutions yesterday were shown to be idiots!

Yep, agree with this. Do people want us to regress to the 'give the opposition 65% possession and then hit then on the break' type football after we saw how dramatically outclassed we were last season? I don't understand that point of view tbh. If we were under threat of relegation then I could go along with the concept of abandoning long term progress for.short term results, but given our position in the table I can't get on board with it. We need to evolve a team that not only go up but also stay up. Weddon't have that team at the moment so what's the rush? Let's finish what we've started.

[floyd__streete]

Do people want us to regress to the 'give the opposition 65% possession and then hit then on the break' type football after we saw how dramatically outclassed we were last season?

We were only 'out classed' because we didn't have players good enough to bridge the huge gap to the Prem. Part of that McD is culpable for, largely TSI are culpable for that too.

The idea that you can only be successful in the top flight with >50% possession is a complete non-starter of a concept and a myth perpetuated by the OPTA generation who see things in numbers. I give you Stoke City under Pulis as the model for what Reading FC could have been with better investment in players and - to be fair - better team management.

[MmmMonsterMunch]

Do people want us to regress to the 'give the opposition 65% possession and then hit then on the break' type football after we saw how dramatically outclassed we were last season?

We were only 'out classed' because we didn't have players good enough to bridge the huge gap to the Prem. Part of that McD is culpable for, largely TSI are culpable for that too.

The idea that you can only be successful in the top flight with >50% possession is a complete non-starter of a concept and a myth perpetuated by the OPTA generation who see things in numbers. I give you Stoke City under Pulis as the model for what Reading FC could have been with better investment in players and - to be fair - better team management.

Just playing devil's advocate for a minute though - If it wasn't for TSI we wouldn't have invested at all. We wouldn't have got Roberts & Kebe signed up & you can definitely make a strong case for those signings pushing us to the Prem.

It's very easy to point the finger about money not being available but neither SJM or TSI are willing to cough it up. Unsurprisingly there aren't loads of billionaires hanging around willing to throw their cash away on football teams.

I think Adkins will have to sell to buy in order to create the team he wants & we all have to hope that a few of our academy prospects come good - something that we would never have discussed 10 years ago. It is what it is & there are plenty of clubs worse off than us.

[winchester_royal]

Do people want us to regress to the 'give the opposition 65% possession and then hit then on the break' type football after we saw how dramatically outclassed we were last season?

We were only 'out classed' because we didn't have players good enough to bridge the huge gap to the Prem. Part of that McD is culpable for, largely TSI are culpable for that too.

The idea that you can only be successful in the top flight with >50% possession is a complete non-starter of a concept and a myth perpetuated by the OPTA generation who see things in numbers. I give you Stoke City under Pulis as the model for what Reading FC could have been with better investment in players and - to be fair - better team management.

Yep, that's fair, all out possession football isn't a prerequisite for PL success, but Pulls always relied on experienced pros and Mr Coates' investment to assemble his squad of sizeable grafters. If our intention is to bring through youngsters and rely on the academy to contribute to the majority of our squad then I doubt that style will prove as effective for us.

I don't think myself or Adkins are advocating a Swansea like possession based philosophy of football, but we do need.to be capable of stringing together a sequence of passes that take the sting out of the opposition's pressure when they're on top, or gives us an element of control in the game. Sadly that will require the defenders being comfortable passing the ball occasionally. It works when those defenders are able to pick a pass further up the pitch that moves us into attack rather than aimlessly tapping it around the back. I think/hope that's what we're aiming for. We're not particularly close to that yet though, i'll admit..

[P!ssed Off]

We're barely even attempting passing, possession football.
We're pissing about at the back and then hoofing it up field.

[Muskrat]

Personally I haven't been so dispirited since the shambles that was the Tommy Burns (RIP) era. There are many similarities to back then, with a manager sacked towards the end of a relegation season, a new and relatively high profile name taking over with what seemed like great ideas about taking the team forward, only for that optimism to evaoprate after a very short period of time against a background of underperformance.

Adkins won't be sacked under the present regime as they (AZ in particular) were responsible for appointing him and nobody wants be proved wrong at the end of the day. But for me it isn't working, and as JM more or less confirmed on BBCRB yesterday, the club are actively looking for "alternative investment". Can't come soon enough for me..

[Ouroboros]

As I say, the drama queenery here is someone having the temerity to say that Adkins is being undermined by anything to do with the previous regime.

What undermines Adkins is constant altering of the starting XI, dubious quality of signings made and questionable substitutions. Not to mention the fact he is an insincere, wannabe Estate Agent, psychobabble-squawking helmet.

Comparing out manager to an Estate Agent.

That's the second most crass thing I have ever seen in hobnob.

[floyd__streete]

Comparing out manager to an Estate Agent.

That's the second most crass thing I have ever seen in hobnob.

Ok, some fair points made by Winch and Monster Munch there. Perhaps people will feel a bit less restless about the whole thing when the Russian shyster is finally out of the club.

[Four Of Clubs]

Comparing out manager to an Estate Agent.

That's the second most crass thing I have ever seen in hobnob.

..... Indeed - get Micky Gooding back NOW!

[sandman]

Stone the crows Spurs just beat Southampton playing 4-4-2 in the Premier League.