The dreaded vote of confidence

[floyd__streete]

I enjoy the mixture of mischief, sententiousness and fluency of Floyds contributions.

Consequently, as a newbie and in deference to Floyd, I have also embellished my username
with an underscore.

You know that the internet has truly arrived as a global phenomenon when Negative Jeff starts posting on Hob Nob! Now that Little and Kitson have left the club, NJ is now the single most person I enjoy seeing on RFC away days

[floyd__streete]

What a great thread this is turning out to be. A likely looking narrow 'yes' vote and the resignation of one of the more sanctimonious members. It's like the 42 day terror detention vote all over again.

[79Royal]

In my humble opinion, our problem is two fold:

1. Football has evolved and changed and Reading FC just seem to have missed the boat, i.e. changing our wage structure.
2. Madejski doesn't want to be here anymore. He needs to sell, but he is over valuing the club and it would appear that he cannot see that he'll have a better chance of selling if we are a Premier League side.

I'm not absolving Coppell of all blame. He's held his hands up and admitted that he made mistakes. But the impression I get is that he is working within a structure that is preventing him from moving the club forwards.

I'm not going to start calling for the board to step down in pre-season, but I must admit that my faith in them is beginning to wane.

[Southbank Old Boy]

Its all well Mr Made saying the club is for sale but at the same time shouldnt he be out there selling the club when lets face it the club cant exactly sell itself. I am sure with some decent marekting about how we are run, facilities and long term potential some oil merchant would have a go at running the club...

That will be why some months ago the club made a statement that they had appointed some high powered financial institution to handle the sale - can't remember who it was now !
Contrary to received wisdom JM isn't a complete amateur in the business world !!
When it happens it's unlikely any sale will have happened as a result of anything other than behind the scenes negotiations in global boardrooms.....

And on top of that, after so long in the football industry, I don't think anyone could really claim that he knows nothing about football either.

He's been watching RFC longer than a pretty high percentage of our fans AND he know a hell of a lot more about what goes on outside of the public domain.

(see we can agree on somethings...just when your not talking drivel)

[rhroyal]

Coppell has done a miracle before, and we've always been willing to invest at Championship level. It's taking it to the next level Madejski had a problem as that requires throwing money away and probably not getting it back, but that's not quite the case down here.

[Roger the Rabbit]

(see we can agree on somethings...just when your not talking drivel)

There's a challenge !
I'll try and come up with some drivel and you can see if you agree ...

Just off to check some of your old posts for a model to work from....

[Gordons Cumming]

I just want to see Reading FC take a risk for once.

[IMAMATEOFJOVSKY]

Far too risk averse - thats the problem -there's being careful and there's being bloody tight and totally shortsighted on the long term strategy -

£5.5m??? The board have never been there with that kind of money either paying out or receiving - they probably p**sed their pants with excitement

The board would sh*te themselves and give themselves sleepless nights if we paid anywhere near £5m on a decent player - we operate in a comfort zone, and under current stewardship , always will

Mensah

It never happened - the fee of £4m scared them off!

[rotherwick_royal]

Man that's a close vote, I wonder if it would have looked any different before the Kitson transfer gathered steam? Not investing is one thing, but selling off your best players at the same time is another. I've still got confidence in RFC...just!!!

Let's wait and see what happens by the end of Aug, and hope it's not last Summer all over again.

[clauski]

I'd agree we need to take some risks. The issue right now is also that going into the new season with nearly half the fans (per this poll so far) not having confidence in the club/manager/team is a sorry place to be. Undoubtedly the lack of positvity from the club this summer, the lack of any new signings and an overriding concern we have lost good players and not improved the team for two years will surface as soon as we lose a game or two. Coppell will come under pressure and whether right or wrong we won't be in a happy place. After convincing Coppell to stay we needed to show we mean business and intend to go straight back up. We haven't and that's what I think has taken us backwards now. 3 weeks left to save it guys.

[Ian Royal]

I have faith, though I am concerned. It's sad to see Hammond being ridiculed once again because of his voice. Pathetic.

Also interesting to see people saying we didn't even spend half of the £10m allegedly available last season. Nice to see people are happy not to let facts get in the way of their blinkers. I believe the transfer fees were something like this:

Bikey - £1m
Fae - £2.5M
Cisse - £600k
Matejovsky - £1m
Kebe - £250k ish?
Then of course there was also Rosenior, although the sale of Seol presumably covered much of that if not all. Was Bennett that season or the one before? I forget, but he's another couple of hundred thousand.

Obviously there were also the bids that were turned down.

Not £10m, but a significant investment of money, unfortunately the big buy has proved a total failure, although we're unlikely to lose large amounts of money on him.

We have money, we are just very careful in spending it, not that that means we don't get our duff buys as well and sometimes miss out on good buys.

[rhroyal]

Risks are wholly necessary, and John Madejski seems to have forgotten his business sense. He wants to sell up, we all know that. Well, what looks more attractive to potential buyers? A club making efforts to establish in the Premiership and taking risks in order to oversee their stadium expansion plans and ambitions top become a top 10 club? Or a club resting on their laurels just sitting on the money from the Premiership and players sold whilst sinking back into mediocrity where they came from? If Madejski wants to sell up he must break the trend of no ambition and and contentment with what he have from the last 18 months or so in order to take us back up, otherwise he'll be stuck here for a long time.

[clauski]

I have faith, though I am concerned. It's sad to see Hammond being ridiculed once again because of his voice. Pathetic.

Also interesting to see people saying we didn't even spend half of the £10m allegedly available last season. Nice to see people are happy not to let facts get in the way of their blinkers. I believe the transfer fees were something like this:

Bikey - £1m
Fae - £2.5M
Cisse - £600k
Matejovsky - £1m
Kebe - £250k ish?
Then of course there was also Rosenior, although the sale of Seol presumably covered much of that if not all. Was Bennett that season or the one before? I forget, but he's another couple of hundred thousand.

Obviously there were also the bids that were turned down.

Not £10m, but a significant investment of money, unfortunately the big buy has proved a total failure, although we're unlikely to lose large amounts of money on him.

We have money, we are just very careful in spending it, not that that means we don't get our duff buys as well and sometimes miss out on good buys.

A significant amount of money that in total equates to less than Stoke have just spent on one player, and far less than every other Premiership club invested - that's the problem. As someone has said before eeking our money out over 5 or 6 average players rather than one class player isn't necessarily careful spending, it could be poor spending. Matejovsky I rate but think of the combined money for Fae, Cisse, Kebe and even Rosenior and Bikey and imagine the difference a Jimmy Bullard or a James McFadden might have made.

[Ian Royal]

Not a huge difference seeing as Bullard spent most of the season injured and we had a defence, attack and midfield out of form most of the season.

And he certainly wouldn't have stayed after relegation. Unlike Bikey, Rosenior and Cisse.

[Royal Lady]

The only reason they're staying, I suspect, is because no-one has come in for them.

[Laura Norder]

steve copell and the teame hae my dreaded vote of confdence and we will be god next this saesen

[Royal Lady]

[Agent Balti]

steve copell and the teame hae my dreaded vote of confdence and we will be god next this saesen

Is this what you get for "Infinite Monkeys"?

[Arch]

I agree with the sale of Kitson, however, I have had NO faith in Steve Coppell since January when he anounced to the whole world that he didn't know what he was doing and had to get KD and WD to pick the team.

You blinkered STG nitwit! It's public knowledge that Brian McDermott was picking the team.

(Wally Downes! I ask you! )

[Arch]

In my humble opinion, our problem is two fold:

1. Football has evolved and changed and Reading FC just seem to have missed the boat, i.e. changing our wage structure.
2. Madejski doesn't want to be here anymore. He needs to sell, but he is over valuing the club and it would appear that he cannot see that he'll have a better chance of selling if we are a Premier League side.

2 is definitely a problem. I don;t think anyone remotely connected with football is unaware of JM's desire to sell, so I think it would be best for all if he just shut up about it and got on with the job of making the club as attractive as possible. There's an air of inertia that we haven't had for a long time and that has come from the leadership - Madejski's ambivalence and Coppell's innate conservatism.

I don't agree with 1. When you look at the profit and loss statistics, the vast majority of clubs including Premiership clubs are running at a loss. In the long run, that's unsustainable. Very rich foreigners invest because they see the money in the game, but teams like Man City and Portsmouth have to be a losing bet. You just can't get the world markets - especially the Asian market - to get interested enough. I really believe there's a bubble in football with foreign investment providing the inflation. Like every other bubble, it's sure to burst. I don't like the way this essentially phony money runs football and I don't want Reading FC to change to fit in. If we're a Championship club that breaks even, in the long run that's better, because in the long run a Championship club that breaks even has the best chance of evolving into a Premiership club that breaks even.