Brian: The right decision?

[old woman]

Just when you think the season couldn't get any worse - Brian gets sacked and now people are saying Di Canio is in the running to be next manager, not only saying that he might be, but actually calling for him to be manager!

It's hasn't been easy to be a Reading fan for 46 years, but it may well be impossible for me to carry on supporting any club who appoints a dyed-in-the-wool Nazi as manager.

I have the same cold feeling, never been so distant from the club in an emotional sense than I am today!

This is me at the moment. Feel personally wounded.

[sandman]

I can not believe the amount of people who think this is the right decision, absolutely shocking. Even if it might have been inevitable, now was not the time to do it! loss hope of staying up now. It also goes against the morals and foundation of our club. I take it most of the people saying yes are the plastics that sit quietly during every single game. bluergghhhhh so frustrating

Disagree there. We are down regardless. Why not 'roll the dice' and see if a new manager can give a bit of impoetus for the last 9 games? If not, then well, we're no worse off than we were.
Too much sh1t has happened now. BM's position was untenable.

Tell that to Wolves.

[LoyalRoyalFan]

Stan Collymore has it spot on!

http://www.talksport.co.uk/radio/kickof ... um=twitter

First time I can say that though....

[MmmMonsterMunch]

I can not believe the amount of people who think this is the right decision, absolutely shocking. Even if it might have been inevitable, now was not the time to do it! loss hope of staying up now. It also goes against the morals and foundation of our club. I take it most of the people saying yes are the plastics that sit quietly during every single game. bluergghhhhh so frustrating

Disagree there. We are down regardless. Why not 'roll the dice' and see if a new manager can give a bit of impoetus for the last 9 games? If not, then well, we're no worse off than we were.
Too much sh1t has happened now. BM's position was untenable.

Tell that to Wolves.

There is definitely a bit of a risk but for every Wolves you can also find a Southampton, West Brom or Swansea. The belief had gone & it's the right thing to do IMO.

[PieEater]

My initial reaction was it was a bad decision and not the Reading way, but the more I think about the more I can see why. Having left at half time during the Wigan debacle and witnessed another pisspoor result on Saturday I was seriously considering giving up this year and just waiting for next season. The football has been pretty dire and a lot of the time we've been totally out classed. I can't be alone in wondering why I bothered going.

At least now there is some interest in the rest of the season and the slim chance we might actually get some entertaining football rather than the aimless hoofball we've become accustomed to.

[howser]

No doubt it was the right decision, possibly three or four games too late but Anton has acted now and only time will tell, I think maybe this not just a result of on field activities, there has been several issues behind the scenes Pearce, Feds, Guthrie, Pog have all been subject of "rumour" disruption and I do believe that all was not well at Chez Mad Stad, and maybe it's not quite the perfect happy place its made out to be.

But it's happened now and the next couple of days will see the fall out and what is said, and it is now time to get behind whoever is in charge saturday and for the rest of the season and give them our utmost support to get us out of this mess we are in.

There was a post on the "Sacked" thread from one guy who has a Southampton ticket but will try and sell it and not go again this year, sad reaction sacking managers is a part of football get over it and to qoute the most overused Saturday night phrase "we move on"

[Big Ern]

No doubt it was the right decision, possibly three or four games too late but Anton has acted now and only time will tell, I think maybe this not just a result of on field activities, there has been several issues behind the scenes Pearce, Feds, Guthrie, Pog have all been subject of "rumour" disruption and I do believe that all was not well at Chez Mad Stad, and maybe it's not quite the perfect happy place its made out to be.

But it's happened now and the next couple of days will see the fall out and what is said, and it is now time to get behind whoever is in charge saturday and for the rest of the season and give them our utmost support to get us out of this mess we are in.

There was a post on the "Sacked" thread from one guy who has a Southampton ticket but will try and sell it and not go again this year, sad reaction sacking managers is a part of football get over it and to qoute the most overused Saturday night phrase "we move on"

3 or 4 games? I would say 3 or 4 months too late.

Also enjoying the out pouring of grief and over the top statements.

Brain, great guy, but was not up to the level we needed.

[notloyalenuffroyal]

Your 7 year old knows all about Di Canio? Impressive.

Would it not be a good idea if he concentrated more on his school work

Don't worry about his school work worry about your own. If you don't go to bed you'll never be able to concentrate in class.

Probably my fault on Di Canio front. I spent first half of the season moaning about him. My boy jumped up and down with excitement when he found out he had been sacked / had left / or whatever.

How much school work do you think a year 2, 7 year old gets?

[Reading R]

Hi guys. Not wanting to start an argument here but both being over achieving clubs and neither being prepared for the EPL, it is mistifying as to what RFC hope to achieve in sacking a manager with just 9 games to go whilst In as much s**t as we are and with no transfer window available. I pray to god that you do not end up with the Welsh muppet (Hughes) as reported that our owners got conned into employing and spending vast amounts of cash on his best friend agents players. Do you think it's a problem having a Russian owner who apparently has to rely on his old mans cash or is it Madjeski & co who are still running the show ?.

[genome]

whilst In as much s**t as we are

No, our situation isn't that bad.

[Reading R]

Not the financial situation but league position.

[Rex]

It's probably about desperation for the money gained from next season. Realistically i see it as wiping out this season and starting afresh. How this eventually pans out is another matter.

[Paul Cowin]

We'll be keeping you company in the Championship next season for sure

[Rex]

Will you still have Harry?

[TBM]

Hi guys. Not wanting to start an argument here but both being over achieving clubs and neither being prepared for the EPL, it is mistifying as to what RFC hope to achieve in sacking a manager with just 9 games to go whilst In as much s**t as we are and with no transfer window available. I pray to god that you do not end up with the Welsh muppet (Hughes) as reported that our owners got conned into employing and spending vast amounts of cash on his best friend agents players. Do you think it's a problem having a Russian owner who apparently has to rely on his old mans cash or is it Madjeski & co who are still running the show ?.

As said on another thread - they probably have their main target who is currently available with no other Premiership club without a manager it's a bigger pull than trying to get a "big name" when we're a Championship side and clubs like Everton, West Ham, Villa etc are probably looking to employ too

[72 bus]

As said on another thread - they probably have their main target who is currently available with no other Premiership club without a manager it's a bigger pull than trying to get a "big name" when we're a Championship side and clubs like Everton, West Ham, Villa etc are probably looking to employ too

[Hoop Blah]

I think it's probably got to the point where McDermott and his one-dimensional tactics might have reached the end of the road both in reality and in the trust and preception of the players.

Please explain to me what is one dimensional about:

Having the balls to go from Feds to McCarthy, changing the lynchpin of the team overnight

Overnight? He dropped Federici after throwing him into the season totaly under prepared and after Federici had made mistake after mistake in the three opening games.

He wasn't fit and hadn't played anywhere near enough football to be ready for the Premier League and shouldn't have started the season, especially when we had such a talented alternative in McCarthy.

I don't think tactically, changing the keeper or not has any bearing on the set up of the side so I'd say it's largely irrelvant to the discussion of being one dimensional.

Going from championship winning 442 to 451. Then changing style of play again to 442. Then switching dimension again back to to 451.

He's chopped and changed the formation a little bit, but the style of play hasn't really evolved and he never really found a blend in the side that worked. We won a number of games where we managed to stick in the game, despite being overrun in most of them (Sunderland at home being the most obvious exception where we played really well), and then score some late goals. Throughout all those games we've been a side that plays percentage football for most of the time.

We went up by absorbing pressure and putting teams on the back foot with our largely route one football that forced teams into mistakes. During the run in last season we were excellent at converting the relatively few chances we created and went on an amazing run.

However we've set up the team formation wise we've mainly played the same way. That's one dimensional.

It's also arguable that McDermott changed back to 4-4-2 due to the players available to him. He rarely seemed to change the setup specifically for the opposition, just for who he had available.

Putting Jobi in central midfield

It became the only way he'd go after a game. Take a holding midfielder off, move a the winger inside and throw on a forward. It was his only variation on his starting line up and we all knew what was going to happen.

There were very few surprises when we made a substitution. If that's not being one-dimensional then I'm not sure what is.

Using Morrison, dropping championship winnig gorkss
Etc etc etc

Dropping a player, after far too many games I might add, is not evidence that he's not one dimensional. Gorkss was, unfortunately, having a nightmare season. He had to be taken out of the side irrespective of how big a part he'd played the season before.

If anything it can be accused that he kept switching dimensions of play from 442 attacking to 451 and back, switching how he used certain players etc etc and he was at some points likened to Brenda.

As above, his changes were largely dictated to how he'd pidgeon holed players and who was available (ie when Pogrebnyak was suspended he went back to 4-4-2 out of perceived necessity not tactical reasons)

The poor guy struggled with a woefully woefully inadequate squad and as a result had to change paradigms several times.

How he can be called one dimensional is beyond me, except in the final stages when all he was resigned to doing was trying to win by holding on for 70mins then letting Alfie on. Bt it took him several dimension shifts to get to that point.

Why do I feel like watching star trek now?

McDermotts teams have, apart from when he built it around the outstanding talent of Sigurdsson, been teams who play direct, percentage football and feed off the mistakes of the opposition. Our midfields role is to get the ball forward as quick as possible and let the forwards pressure the opposition in the final third. We've rarely had any real guile to the way we play, it's predictable and one-dimensional.

I don't expect any manager to deviate too far from the way they think the game should be played but the style that McDermott has employed over the last 3 seasons is very limited. It doesn't pull or move teams around much, it doesn't give players much freedom to do things differently and that, for me is one-dimensional.

[Biscuit_Boy]

I think the timing is a bit off, it should have happened when we lost seven on the trot. We then had that good run which gave everybody false hope, but quite a few of those points were gained more by luck than judgement.

[MrsScreech]

Timing and manner of this is completely off. Last thing we need with 9 games left to stay up. Brian has been a true and loyal servant to this club. Anton has proved what a total muppet he really is. Cannot begin to explain how pissed off I really feel about this.

New manager? Di Matteo or Adkins. Please please do not appoint Di Canio...I think we all know why...

[RoyalBlue]

Hi guys. Not wanting to start an argument here but both being over achieving clubs and neither being prepared for the EPL, it is mistifying as to what RFC hope to achieve in sacking a manager with just 9 games to go whilst In as much s**t as we are and with no transfer window available. I pray to god that you do not end up with the Welsh muppet (Hughes) as reported that our owners got conned into employing and spending vast amounts of cash on his best friend agents players. Do you think it's a problem having a Russian owner who apparently has to rely on his old mans cash or is it Madjeski & co who are still running the show ?.

I am mystified why so many people seem to find the timing strange and argue that it is wrong. It's not just about this season, which in most people's eyes is already blown, it's about getting a new manager in earlier and giving them longer to prepare for next season. They have the added advantage of being able to see the squad play competitive games this season and form their view on what is required over the summer, rather than having to wait till the start of next season. A smart move in my eyes. And if they manage to pull a miracle out of the bag and keep us up, that is a very real and unexpected bonus.