Reading failing to invest

[Ian Royal]

Personally I reckon Brian is such a modest unassuming fella that felt incredibly lucky to have landed the top job at Reading. Because of this he wanted to defy the odds & please the board by trying to do the almost impossible & stay up on a shoestring.

Bless his cotton socks for trying to do that but he's paid a big price. For me all signs point to him having money available but not spending it. I also think there is definitely a 'little Reading' mentality that feeds through to the way we scout for players & perhaps we didn't aim high enough but again we've tried to do it on the cheap.

I also think there could be some truth in JM being a little bit of a tightass & not supporting big investment. With Anton not wanting to initially rock the boat & upset the atmosphere he might well have kept his mouth shut in the summer & not forced the issue.

I don't buy into the notion that he's a big time charlie throwing his weight around. I reckon he's done this with a heavy heart.

+1 to that. Anton seems to have been quite careful about wanting to have input but deferring to the existing team early on. And he genuinely seemed to like McDermott a lot. I don't think "The Reading Way" is going to get thrown away, but I'm sure it's going to gradually evolve into something more aggressive.

[MmmMonsterMunch]

Personally I reckon Brian is such a modest unassuming fella that felt incredibly lucky to have landed the top job at Reading. Because of this he wanted to defy the odds & please the board by trying to do the almost impossible & stay up on a shoestring.

Bless his cotton socks for trying to do that but he's paid a big price. For me all signs point to him having money available but not spending it. I also think there is definitely a 'little Reading' mentality that feeds through to the way we scout for players & perhaps we didn't aim high enough but again we've tried to do it on the cheap.

I also think there could be some truth in JM being a little bit of a tightass & not supporting big investment. With Anton not wanting to initially rock the boat & upset the atmosphere he might well have kept his mouth shut in the summer & not forced the issue.

I don't buy into the notion that he's a big time charlie throwing his weight around. I reckon he's done this with a heavy heart.

+1 to that. Anton seems to have been quite careful about wanting to have input but deferring to the existing team early on. And he genuinely seemed to like McDermott a lot. I don't think "The Reading Way" is going to get thrown away, but I'm sure it's going to gradually evolve into something more aggressive.

JM has been rather quiet in all this too....He would have had a say in this decision I have no doubt about that so you could definitely argue that Anton has been quite gracious in taking the flack for it.

[multisync1830]

10 mill for 1 player in my eyes is big money especially for Reading



But why wait to the end of January? At the start of the year Gylfi was just about making the Spurs bench, maybe we would have had a better chance.

As good as Gylfi is, why only him? I go back to my comment that Brian was never looking at the more expensive player, not his fault, that is how it was for him as scout
and manager before the AZ takeover!

tom ince
and that 8 million bid for that spanish player say youre wrong.


and for manchester royals- zaha was never coming here. we agreed a price, the club then put it up, so im glad we backed out of that
and the player knew he had interest from some of the biggest clubs in the country.

The version I was told by someone was that Brian and someone else ( Hammond I think) were in a car on the way to their ground to sign Zaha and a call came in saying turn round we don't have the funds available. From what I was told it was a voice of Russian decent..Now maybe that was because the club increased the fee on the way up I don't know but from the tellers version that wasn't implied..

[Ian Royal]

Personally I reckon Brian is such a modest unassuming fella that felt incredibly lucky to have landed the top job at Reading. Because of this he wanted to defy the odds & please the board by trying to do the almost impossible & stay up on a shoestring.

Bless his cotton socks for trying to do that but he's paid a big price. For me all signs point to him having money available but not spending it. I also think there is definitely a 'little Reading' mentality that feeds through to the way we scout for players & perhaps we didn't aim high enough but again we've tried to do it on the cheap.

I also think there could be some truth in JM being a little bit of a tightass & not supporting big investment. With Anton not wanting to initially rock the boat & upset the atmosphere he might well have kept his mouth shut in the summer & not forced the issue.

I don't buy into the notion that he's a big time charlie throwing his weight around. I reckon he's done this with a heavy heart.

+1 to that. Anton seems to have been quite careful about wanting to have input but deferring to the existing team early on. And he genuinely seemed to like McDermott a lot. I don't think "The Reading Way" is going to get thrown away, but I'm sure it's going to gradually evolve into something more aggressive.

JM has been rather quiet in all this too....He would have had a say in this decision I have no doubt about that so you could definitely argue that Anton has been quite gracious in taking the flack for it.

Hmmm not so sure about that. Anton's in the limelight and is the man at the top. People aren't really going to want to interview Madejski about a decision that ultimately isn't his and that at best he may have had some input on. I think his Madj is basically here for continuity, experience and advice. He was never hugely hands on as I understand it and now he's not the one who ultimately makes the decisions either.