Rodgers is still the right man

[Royal Lady]

Rodgers is in for the long haul. Forget any talk of him leaving. I spoke this week to someone close to the very heart of the club
and activities behind the
scenes. Brief was to slash the wage bill and by doing so let go of approx eighty percent of prem team. It was a start again process as we all know and Rodgers would only of gone if poor home run continues past Christmas or if he lost the dressing room. Wins are coming more frequently and more importantly the players absolutely love him, so he is here to stay!

Eh? How do you work that out exactly??

[Royalee]

2 wins in our last 4, hth.

[Royal Lady]

Oh right. That's ok then.

[Row Z Royal]

Oh right. That's ok then.

It is, because by 2015 we'll have won League 1 in emphatic fashion.

[Southbank Old Boy]

Why is everyone so obsessed with strikers? We conceded two soft goals today, were the strike force to blame? I believe we have the least clean sheets in the division now.

Old truism "if you don't concede you can't lose".

You cant expect to keep clean sheets though

You should aim to score a couple of goals a game though, and if you arent doing that then it puts more and more pressure on a defence which means clean sheets become even rarer

Bit of a chicken and egg type thing, but our attacking options have been the problem for far far too long. Coppell couldnt fix it, and now Rodgers has similar issues. Blaming Rodgers for not being able to sort it and so kicking him out is a bit odd when our most successful manager couldnt do it either

Rodgers still needs time, things are moving in the right direction, but there is still a hell of a long way to go too

[Pseud O'Nym]

Why is everyone so obsessed with strikers? We conceded two soft goals today, were the strike force to blame? I believe we have the least clean sheets in the division now.

Old truism "if you don't concede you can't lose".

You cant expect to keep clean sheets though

You would hope for better than fewest in your division though, wouldn't you?

You should aim to score a couple of goals a game though, and if you arent doing that then it puts more and more pressure on a defence which means clean sheets become even rarer

Bit of a chicken and egg type thing, but our attacking options have been the problem for far far too long. Coppell couldnt fix it, and now Rodgers has similar issues. Blaming Rodgers for not being able to sort it and so kicking him out is a bit odd when our most successful manager couldnt do it either

Rodgers still needs time, things are moving in the right direction, but there is still a hell of a long way to go too

I don't disagree on Rodgers needing more time. I do think Rodgers problem is different from Coppell's, last season it was no service to the strikers where this it's looking more like the strikers themselves. I just think that dwelling on strikers when something is clearly going wrong at the back is a mistake.

I wonder if any passing statistician can draw any conclusions from the fact all three of our clean sheets have been 0-0 at home?

[Southbank Old Boy]

Dont disagree, we need to tighten up at the back too

Playing a midfielder at right back who is getting in a muddle a bit too often doesnt help, nor does not having a settled back four, or having a centre back with a bit of pace in there

I do think the lack of a centre forward capable of putting the ball in the back of the net whislt still being able to run around a bit (Church with ability in front of goal would be great) is the quickest and most obvious way to turn things around

[Horsham Royal]

We've lost 14 points when we've been leading (4 matches winning then lost and 1 match winning then drew).

That is the worst record in the division.

It kind of indicates the problem is conceding goals rather than scoring them.

The question is, who's at fault for conceding goals ?

[Sir Rodger Doyle]

Today was obviously a limp performance, but anybody who hasn't noticed a BIG improvement since QPR is too blinded by irrationality. Admittedly it would have been hard to get much worse, but we've shown enough since then to at least allow Rodgers until Christmas. I think he'll guide us comfortably to safety this season and next season we'll be looking at the top half. Maybe after that the play-offs.

Shane Long on the other hand.....he has never fulfilled his potential. Showed glimpses under Coppell but never really stepped up. Since Coppell left he's turned into a joke. He's barely a footballer any more. He at least had a good attitude before - now he's putting on weight and costing the team with his anger. I want him out in the January window.

Shane Long was Coppell's little jem. Coppell bought him and thought he could turn him into a footballer. He couldn't.

The worst thing to come out of the whole sorry Long saga was the sale of Simon Cox to Swindon for £20K. Whoever was behind that move needs to leave the football industry. Coppell wanted to play Long instead of Cox, the problem was Cox was (and is) ten times the player Long will ever be. The only way you could get away with playing Long was to get Cox out. There was a time when Long had a youthful exuberance and naiveté that carried him all the way to the ROI team. This has now gone, and all we are left with is the natural ability.

[Southbank Old Boy]

We've lost 14 points when we've been leading (4 matches winning then lost and 1 match winning then drew).

That is the worst record in the division.

It kind of indicates the problem is conceding goals rather than scoring them.

The question is, who's at fault for conceding goals ?

Or perhaps the problem is not scoring enough goals in the first place???

We havent taken enough of our chances when on top, if we can convert more of those chances the slip ups at the back wont matter so much, and you will more than likely find less slip ups anyway

[floyd__streete]

Rodgers is still the right man. He is the right man to be assistant store manager at Wickes.

Church off at half time, replaced with zero goal Shane Long rather than our top scorer. Jesus wept.

[Pseud O'Nym]

We've lost 14 points when we've been leading (4 matches winning then lost and 1 match winning then drew).

That is the worst record in the division.

It kind of indicates the problem is conceding goals rather than scoring them.

The question is, who's at fault for conceding goals ?

Or perhaps the problem is not scoring enough goals in the first place???

So if you were trying to fill a bucket with a hole in it then your first attempt to solve the problem would be to buy a bigger tap?

We havent taken enough of our chances when on top, if we can convert more of those chances the slip ups at the back wont matter so much, and you will more than likely find less slip ups anyway

Confidence builds from the back. If you fix the defence then you can't lose.

I actually think our main problem is no "General on the pitch". Murty gone, Ivar lost it, Pearce too young and Feds doesn't communicate like Marcus did.

[leon]

We've lost 14 points when we've been leading (4 matches winning then lost and 1 match winning then drew).

That is the worst record in the division.

It kind of indicates the problem is conceding goals rather than scoring them.

The question is, who's at fault for conceding goals ?

Or perhaps the problem is not scoring enough goals in the first place???

So if you were trying to fill a bucket with a hole in it then your first attempt to solve the problem would be to buy a bigger tap?

We lack leadership and experience throughout the team, and we are badly missing experience in the management team.

However i think we have some decent players and we probably should survive.
We havent taken enough of our chances when on top, if we can convert more of those chances the slip ups at the back wont matter so much, and you will more than likely find less slip ups anyway

Confidence builds from the back. If you fix the defence then you can't lose.

I actually think our main problem is no "General on the pitch". Murty gone, Ivar lost it, Pearce too young and Feds doesn't communicate like Marcus did.

[Horsham Royal]

I actually think our main problem is no "General on the pitch". Murty gone, Ivar lost it, Pearce too young and Feds doesn't communicate like Marcus did.

Spot on. That's one of the biggest problems. Not necessarily a general, but a motivator. I've thought the same since Murty got injured. QPR and others recently have emphasised it.

[rhroyal]

People who say goals are the problem....we've scored 7 in our last 4 games. That's not bad at all. We haven't kept a clean sheet in .......(can't remember, Doncaster 0-0?). Before that we conceded 4 at QPR and 3 at West Brom. It's obvious where our problems lie.

[facaldaqui]

I've never called for the sacking of Rodgers; you have to give a man a chance, and there has been some improvement recently. But it strikes me that if his results only improve from terrible to mediocre (the Derby result suggests we are now inconsistent rather than terrible) then we will be stuck with a lower mid side who frustrate us a lot of the time. In a way that would be a worse long-term solution than having sacked Rodgers early on.

I still don't know which way it's going to go with Rodgers, but he's started to get some reasonable performances from what we can all see is a very dodgy mishmash of a team. It seems obvious that he will do better with another couple of forwards and a new right back, at the very least. The problem is that if the present fragile improvement continues, Madejski/Rodgers might be tempted to continue stumbling on as we are, banking on further improvement. I'll be livid if we don't add viable new players in the window.

[The Real Sandhurst Royal]

Brenda has to go before it is too late and beyond recovery.

Just look at how Barnsley have performed since Mark Robins took over.

[ROKERITE]

Brenda has to go before it is too late and beyond recovery.

Just look at how Barnsley have performed since Mark Robins took over.

Simon Davey was at Barnsley for nearly three years. They were in a rut and needed freshening up. I know all too well about Robins' merits; Rotherham United are another team I've got money on this season, and I was not at all pleased when he jumped ship. Reading and Rodgers are very different to Barnsley and Davey. Reading are NOT in a rut, they're improving; and they don't have a manager who has grown stale, they've an exciting young boss who'll take them back to the top flight providing he's given the time.

[Uke]

I actually think our main problem is no "General on the pitch". Murty gone, Ivar lost it, Pearce too young and Feds doesn't communicate like Marcus did.

Spot on. That's one of the biggest problems. Not necessarily a general, but a motivator. I've thought the same since Murty got injured. QPR and others recently have emphasised it.

+1

Derby would be nowhere without Robbie Savage

We need someone who has some authority as well as credibility.

I would have thought that Howard would be the on who most looked like stepping up to the plate, except its now in his jaw...

He was a regularand committed. Athough not necessarily the most skilful the committment to the cause was there

[Dorset-Knob]

I've never called for the sacking of Rodgers; you have to give a man a chance, and there has been some improvement recently. But it strikes me that if his results only improve from terrible to mediocre (the Derby result suggests we are now inconsistent rather than terrible) then we will be stuck with a lower mid side who frustrate us a lot of the time. In a way that would be a worse long-term solution than having sacked Rodgers early

Absolutely agree with this post, the BR apologists make remarks along the lines of, 'well the opposition team are bigger, more accomplished, on form, have better players etc etc'

They also claim with sage like wisdom and certainty that BR is the man and dissenters are merely ignorant of the football facts!

The facts, as represented by the results and league position don't lie, we are awful compared by most methods of measurement and buffing up the opposition and talking us down to a lower level of expectation and achievement is merely settling for less!

Arguing about the reasons are an academic waste of time, competitions are about winning not just taking part!

If there were a steady improvement, drawing instead of losing, winning instead of drawing, competing and growing in stature I would be less concerned, but this is clearly not the case, we continue to flirt with imminent disaster and random results IMHO