Coppell's latest backtrack

[Alan Partridge]

that latest Q&A is so disheartening from a fans view, why do we even bother?

'The transfer window is wrong, why should we be forced to make 7 signings in case of what if? instead of being able to uy them as and when like the old window'

Steve it's the DAMN RULES!!! You might not like them but FIFA aren't going to change it because the manager of Reading dislikes it!! Deal with it, everyone else makes do.

Last post on the matter cos I'm bored of it now, game today!

[cmonurz]

I love how Pearce and Henry moving up to a Championship club while remaining our players is seen as another reason for knee-jerk negativity. Our players will learn a lot more at Norwich than they did at Bournemouth or they will in our reserves or on our bench. Unless of course they end up on the bench... like Henry did at Bournemouth... if you recall

Whilst our central defence resembled Hitchin Town, Alex Pearce wasn't even selected in the XVI for Norwich.

[RoyalBlue]

Before Christmas Steve Coppell said that he hadn't wanted to sign players over the previous summer because he wanted to stay loyal to the players that he already had. He then said that had been a mistake and he needed to sign good players in the January transfer window who could come straight into the team and perform.

He has just been on BBRB now saying that he didn't want to sign any more players over the January transfer window because he wanted to stay loyal to the players he had. He then went on to say that if he got it wrong it would cost him his job.

Well his misplaced loyalty (you gave them the chance up to Christmas SC and they let you and us down big time) is now going to cost him his job and the club its place in the PL.

Just who did we have of any real quality on the bench today? A player who could take the game by the scruff of the neck and turn it right around. Absolutely no-one and SC virtually admitted that when he said he wasn't sure what he could change.

[Coppelled Streets]

So are we blaming the manager here, or pointing a finger at a chairman who's raking it in and quite possibly not offering enough money to Coppell to get the players he actually wants?

I don't want to blame anyone, but I certainly wont hold Coppell responsible. He can only work with the tools he's given!

[Platypuss]

SC:

"If we could have signed a long-term top quality centre half who we all had confidence in then we would have.

"We would have liked to supplement that, maybe with other recognised defenders who would be more suited to our long term goals as opposed to short term stopgaps.

"We've got a lot to do between now and the end of the season in terms of performance and determining our future.

"I would have liked to supplement it, but the two signings we made are long term. They're players we had looked at.

"We've not been ultra-busy, and if you're not doing deadline day deals then it sometimes looks like you've not been in there, but we'd done our planning in advance.

"It was never going to be a panic situation for us."

[RoyalBlue]

So are we blaming the manager here, or pointing a finger at a chairman who's raking it in and quite possibly not offering enough money to Coppell to get the players he actually wants?

I don't want to blame anyone, but I certainly wont hold Coppell responsible. He can only work with the tools he's given!

I don't really believe it is down to Coppell either but unless he has the balls to come out in public and point the finger at the Chairman for, in my opinion, his egotistical, vain and stubborn belief that RFC can compete and remain in the PL on a completely different financial basis from every other club, then it is Coppell that will pay the price for the team's failure.

JM keeps telling us that RFC is a business. Well in any real business it is the Chairman's head that is on the line when things go badly wrong. It is also the Chairman who is expected to show real leadership. So what is the Chairman doing at present? LOL at BBRB who today said they were trying to get a post match interview with JM but 'he is a shy person'. He didn't seem particularly shy when riding on the crest of the wave and making the most of the plaudits.

I wonder whether he will find his showbiz friends are as keen to come along and watch Championship football!

[Southbank Old Boy]

So are we blaming the manager here, or pointing a finger at a chairman who's raking it in and quite possibly not offering enough money to Coppell to get the players he actually wants?

I don't want to blame anyone, but I certainly wont hold Coppell responsible. He can only work with the tools he's given!

So you won't blame the man who buys and selects the players in his squad even is he is given the funds to bring in additional players?

That makes no sense at all.

I don't know where the problem lies, but if it's Coppell's decision to not add to his squad then it is his responsibility.

[RoyalBlue]

So are we blaming the manager here, or pointing a finger at a chairman who's raking it in and quite possibly not offering enough money to Coppell to get the players he actually wants?

I don't want to blame anyone, but I certainly wont hold Coppell responsible. He can only work with the tools he's given!

So you won't blame the man who buys and selects the players in his squad even is he is given the funds to bring in additional players?

That makes no sense at all.

I don't know where the problem lies, but if it's Coppell's decision to not add to his squad then it is his responsibility.

Do you really believe the Chairman gave him the capital and wage budget to properly compete with other teams for player's signatures?!

Nor do I buy into all that guff that there weren't the players available for sale. Who would have thought Portsmouth would have been prepared to let Benjani go? Reality is that if you offer enough money clubs might well think - 'well we can let him go and then use that money and a bit more to buy someone even better'.

[Southbank Old Boy]

So are we blaming the manager here, or pointing a finger at a chairman who's raking it in and quite possibly not offering enough money to Coppell to get the players he actually wants?

I don't want to blame anyone, but I certainly wont hold Coppell responsible. He can only work with the tools he's given!

So you won't blame the man who buys and selects the players in his squad even is he is given the funds to bring in additional players?

That makes no sense at all.

I don't know where the problem lies, but if it's Coppell's decision to not add to his squad then it is his responsibility.

Do you really believe the Chairman gave him the capital and wage budget to properly compete with other teams for player's signatures?!

Nor do I buy into all that guff that there weren't the players available for sale. Who would have thought Portsmouth would have been prepared to let Benjani go? Reality is that if you offer enough money clubs might well think - 'well we can let him go and then use that money and a bit more to buy someone even better'.

I don't know if he did or he didn't.

I suspect that he had a big enough budget to bring in some re-inforcements but he chose not to.

My point is that Jay has said he won't blame Coppell, when he clearly doesn't know if it's his fault or not. Unsurprisingly it's a completely nonsensical comment.

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

So are we blaming the manager here, or pointing a finger at a chairman who's raking it in and quite possibly not offering enough money to Coppell to get the players he actually wants?

I don't want to blame anyone, but I certainly wont hold Coppell responsible. He can only work with the tools he's given!

it all depends on what's going on behind the scenes. All we can do is speculate.

There have been noises all along that the money is there for signings if needed, so I don't get the impression that Madejski is keeping all the cash himself. As a businessman, I'm sure he's fully aware how bad things could be if we do drop.

The set-up we seem to have is that others at the club find targets and see if Coppell wants them. What we don't know is whether Coppell hasn't signed more because he doesn't think they've been good enough, or if he's been offered players who are good enough and he's turned them down out of loyalty to the promotion XI (or X as sidwell's gone).

[winchester_royal]

So are we blaming the manager here, or pointing a finger at a chairman who's raking it in and quite possibly not offering enough money to Coppell to get the players he actually wants?

I don't want to blame anyone, but I certainly wont hold Coppell responsible. He can only work with the tools he's given!

its coppell who will not spend, dillon said in an interview a couple of weeks ago that coppell could spend 10 million on a player if he wanted to

[Skin]

The players have to want to come here, trouble is the wages. Pure and simple. I don't doubt we tried bringing in more players than we got, just think the negotiations don't past the "how much will I earn?" question. The agents probably know this too.

[Sir Dodger Royal]

Hello Boys
Once again we have gross mismanagement on behalf of the Madman and I am afraid the Quiet One who is not man enough to handle the tight fisted old ghit of a Chairman.

It is simple business economics. In a competitive world you need to have the right proposition.

In football terms this means investment in players as we have the facilities. What's the bloody use of a massive press / media centre being built if you are on the slide?

You get virtually no media exposure in the Championship so who is going to use these facilities? Probably SDR and his media chums!

Mark my words the Royals are on the slide and the product is just not good enough. A blatant lack of foresight by the Quiet One during the Summer and in January.

A wage structure that is bloody rediculous which can barely attract Championship or unheard of players from Bali, Malta and Basingstoke Town.

I can see that Dodger is going to have to kick a few arses to sort this mess out but it could be too late.

Reading are just a big welly team once again. When you look at the Premier League stats then Reading have the worst record of any Club in passing to their own players and when they do they are unable to retain the ball beyond one or two passes. It barely meets school boy standards.

Wally Downes may have more coaching qualifications that any other coach in the Premier League but at present he appears to be a f*t tw*at who is unable find the plug to our leaking defence.

So no doubt all the RTGs will have a clear focus of what needs to be done. Well most of them, including Hampshire Royal, are as blind as bats and were probably knocked over by the rush of folks trying to leave the Madhouse yesterday after Reading's pathetic and I mean pathetic performanceeeeeeee

I can't understand why the Madman isn't parading around the pitch these days doing his monkey claps. Hopefully he is trying to sell the Club for a realistic and I must stress realistic price to get someone in who is prepared to inviest in the team. At present the new media block will be filled only by 107 FM, BBC local radio, Reading Chronicle and the Evening Post. None of them having the guts to ask real penetrating questions just in case they are banned from the ground.

Not that it will matter because next season we will be lucky to have 12000 RTGs remembering the good old days of January 2008 when we had played nine games without a win.

Listen to Dodger as he is the main man on the planet and his wisdom could yet save Reading FC with his wonderous advice.

However I am not sure if I can be bothered whilst the Madman is milking the goodies for all they are worth.

Have a pizza you know it makes senseeeeeeeeee
SDR.

[Sir Dodger Royal]

Free speech is dead on this board as every SDR topic posted is deleted. Is it now owned by the Madman???????

Get wise. We are Dodgered.
SDR

[Platypuss]

What a maroon.

[Sir Dodger Royal]

You are quite right young man or should I say a jobsworth moderating the real facts.

SDR is the purveyor of Real Facts in the Real World which is more than you can say for an Australian acquatic egg laying mammal with a pliable bill shaped so that not a word of common sense has ever been uttered.

Get real your have been Dodgeredddd

[Royal & Ancient]

Dodger is back - albeit likely to be censored out again as some of his rhetoric makes uncomfortable reading for the Executive. I,too, was excommunicated some 18 months ago for daring to suggest that the 'brick on brick' theory was probably based on Legoland bricks. And,as the site had become overused by uneducated children whose bad language was deemed acceptable, I became just a 'watcher'.
This season will,almost certainly, be my last as a S/T holder as my pension will not, now, justify supporting a Team I have followed since 1947 whenever King and career allowed when the motivational life of the Club has become so abject.
So many ups and downs in that time but none so exciting as the past few years when being a 'Reading supporter' became something to be really proud about. But yesterday was a bitter pill to swallow. In essence they tried hard but were shown not to be good enough against similarly placed apponents- even without Anelka! And the lack of ambition to attract Premiership players here has to be the responsibility of the Club Management.
Signing off before my good memories become soured! - Is there anyone on here who can remember going up to Old Trafford in 1955 for a Cup replay. Through thick snow all the way up and back in a completely iced up A30 - the supporters coach didn't make it until half time.All for a 4-1( if memory serves) drubbing on an unplayable pitch-at least by Reading!

[Platypuss]

Dodger is back - albeit likely to be censored out again as some of his rhetoric makes uncomfortable reading for the Executive.

Oh please.

SDR started a brand new ego-stroking thread covering the same old ground and it was merged with another similar thread (plenty to choose from). He then threw his teddies out of the pram and went on to post his whinging complaint about censorship onto about 20 other threads - including the very one his thread had been merged into.

And another hearty LOL at thinking that the mods censor negative posts.

[1960]

Isn't it funny, over the last two seasons, with our record-breaking promotion and the eighth in the league, that SDR was totally silent? Now, with a bit of trouble he is on here pontificating as of old. How awful the last two seasons must have been for him, with nothing to moan about. At least his son stayed on here through the good times - he could learn from him.

[Smoking Kills Dancing Doe]

So are we blaming the manager here, or pointing a finger at a chairman who's raking it in and quite possibly not offering enough money to Coppell to get the players he actually wants?

I don't want to blame anyone, but I certainly wont hold Coppell responsible. He can only work with the tools he's given!

So you won't blame the man who buys and selects the players in his squad even is he is given the funds to bring in additional players?

That makes no sense at all.

I don't know where the problem lies, but if it's Coppell's decision to not add to his squad then it is his responsibility.

Coppell has said time and time again that we compete financially. If Coppell could blame JM for this mess he'd be shouting it from the roof tops. He's been in this game far too long, he's not gonna take the fall for someone like JM, he just wouldn't do it. I'm sure there is a budget he has to work in, but if that was stopping him buying players he really wanted, then he'd be saying that.