Sinking Ship

[Tredder]

Brighton had one, Southampton had 2, Leicester were financially bankrupt and Pompey are laughable.

Brick by brick or let's live a little.

It's all a little embarrassing at the moment.

[The Real Sandhurst Royal]

you forgot to mention Leeds, Charlton, Sheffield United and Sheffield Wednesday all sunk as well to div 1.

[Royal Lady]

Can I be the first person to say phuck off Tredder - where were you when we were doing well?

[Man Friday]

One thing's for sure: Something is terribly wrong behind the scenes. We're playing without heart, without balls. It tells us something is terribly, terribly wrong somewhere. My feelings are that McD, despite his professional pronouncements, is very disheartened by the fire sales and this has fed through to the players. Next week will be interesting.

[LUX]

It is grim, but I was far more worried in January 2010 when Mcd took over and we were miles from safety.

[MmmMonsterMunch]

One thing's for sure: Something is terribly wrong behind the scenes. We're playing without heart, without balls. It tells us something is terribly, terribly wrong somewhere. My feelings are that McD, despite his professional pronouncements, is very disheartened by the fire sales and this has fed through to the players. Next week will be interesting.

I agree with this. Something is not right. Worst game I've seen since Fulham at home in 2008. If you sell your best players those that remain will question their credentials to gain promotion & it will have a detrimental effect. I just hope they snap out of it sooner rather than later.

It's pretty obvious we don't have a plan B - we just lump it down the channels & hope someone will get on the end of it. No one really comes out with much credit from yesterday other than Gorkss, Mills & HRK. I do woory as to whether Brian has something to do with that & if he is actually able to change the style we play with the personnel we have left. We just looked lazy yesterday - for a sh1t team like Watford to carve us open at will is worrying. God knows what will happen when we start playing the likes of West Ham.

[The Real Sandhurst Royal]

Man Friday wrote: One thing's for sure: Something is terribly wrong behind the scenes. We're playing without heart, without balls. It tells us something is terribly, terribly wrong somewhere. My feelings are that McD, despite his professional pronouncements, is very disheartened by the fire sales and this has fed through to the players. Next week will be interesting.

Behind the scenes is one thing on the pitch is another ...The team needs to be led, McAnuff is not a leader.

[MmmMonsterMunch]

Maybe Brian needs one of those team meetings again where they all have it out & decide how to move forward. It worked last season....

What bugs me most is watching the lack of desire - even if we were crap in some games last season you could never fault the lack of effort. Sadly that's not the case now - even if the quality isn't there we should be harrying the opposition & trying to get the ball back & moving a bit quicker around the pitch etc.

We were truly awful yesterday.

The atmosphere is just dreadful too which compounds the problem. Neither the players or fans seem to believe we can be in the promotion mix.

Having said all that - I do think we will turn things around eventually & I don't expect us to be relegated. 5th place seems a distant memory now though. If we finish top half BM will have yet again worked miracles as that squad lacks any star quality from back to front.

[Percy's Rocket]

The one crumb of comfort is that it looks to me that there are a load of teams in as much mire as us (a point per game or less) in the bottom half of the table and
though it will be a long hard fight we just have to be better than three of them over the season....surely we can manage that.... The top six or so are flying away and we will never catch them...

Long term that picture will not change unless the ownership does.

[Ferris]

we just have to be better than three of them over the season

hmmm, that sounds familiar. The 'there's three worse teams than us' theory didn't work out too well last time

[leicsRoyal]

Maybe Brian needs one of those team meetings again where they all have it out & decide how to move forward. It worked last season.....

Unfortunately with these type of meetings they are very much impact, positive and negative.

We heard all about the one last season due to the hugely positive impact it had. How do we know that the same type of meeting hasn't already taken place this season?

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

One thing's for sure: Something is terribly wrong behind the scenes. We're playing without heart, without balls. It tells us something is terribly, terribly wrong somewhere.

I agree. I just think it's about the play-off defeat. Teams do often take a bit of time to get their mojo back.

My feelings are that McD, despite his professional pronouncements, is very disheartened by the fire sales and this has fed through to the players.

...except the same poor attitude was there for all to see in pre-season, where we were second best for long spells against League Two teams.

I think it's no coincidence that our best performance was in our hardest game on paper. It would also have been the game we'd have been most up for.

[leicsRoyal]

Forget the free coach travel to places like Man City.

Madejski was quick to criticise the fans booing a couple of weeks ago, how will he react to yesterday's performance and reaction.

Make the match £10 to get in and give all season ticket holders a cup game credit would be a good start! Otherwise I can see our lowest league gate for a while next Saturday. He wants the one for all and all for one attitude with the fans, time to show it!

[Compo's Hat]

Doncaster haven't won in 18 league games. Pack your bags for Carlisle, Yeovil and Hartlepool if they win on Saturday!

[FiNeRaIn]

Doncaster haven't won in 18 league games. Pack your bags for Carlisle, Yeovil and Hartlepool if they win on Saturday!

0-0 or 1-1 is my bet, if we lose im selling my season ticket for a massive cut price under classifieds.

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

Doncaster haven't won in 18 league games. Pack your bags for Carlisle, Yeovil and Hartlepool if they win on Saturday!

Poor as we've played, does anyone believe the squad we have is one of the worst in the division?

[MeMeMe]

As I said in my Draw your own conclusions post:

If you sit there watching your best staff leave you will start to question. When you do this your performance and approach will change, others will notice and they will be affected too. Before too long you have an under-performing team that cannot achieve what it did when it's best staff were there. This is where the manager steps in to quell the unrest, motivate staff and maybe bring in a 'star performer' to lead by example.

See the gap ?

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

As I said in my Draw your own conclusions post:

If you sit there watching your best staff leave you will start to question. When you do this your performance and approach will change, others will notice and they will be affected too. Before too long you have an under-performing team that cannot achieve what it did when it's best staff were there. This is where the manager steps in to quell the unrest, motivate staff and maybe bring in a 'star performer' to lead by example.

See the gap ?

So how do you explain the poor performances before Long went, going back to pre-season?

And clubs always sell players. They don't just completely give up hope as a natural consquence.

[Harpers So Solid Crew]

We`have players that wanted the move up very badly, sadly no one came in for them, so they are now at a club they would rather not be at.

[No Fixed Abode]

Got to agree with Tredder here. Brick by brick Reading are going down the pan. They've been lucky with cheap signings for so long now, there was going to be a day when it all went wrong and the fans would be crying out for some 'established' signings. luckily, you've got a lot of the season left, but I fear McDonut will be out the door by Christmas if results do not dramatically improve.