Fielding "weakened" teams in the FA Cup

[Dirk Gently]

A different side is not necessarily a much weaker side. People who don't know our squad well won't realise that.

The vast majority of players we will put out against Cardiff will all have first team experience, they just won't happen to be the players that we see regularly or others have heard of.

Spot on.

Surely the point is that a club which truly takes the cup seriously plays its strongest side.

A club which truly takes the cup seriously plays to win every game - not to use it as an opportunity to give experience to other players. They want to win!

[Vision]

A different side is not necessarily a much weaker side. People who don't know our squad well won't realise that.

The vast majority of players we will put out against Cardiff will all have first team experience, they just won't happen to be the players that we see regularly or others have heard of.

Spot on.

But it's certainly not the team we would put out if it was essential to us that we won the match. The fact that we are prepared to experiment with a "Cup team" proves that the result of the match is less important to us than a league match would be.

QED.

If thats the criteria of the journalist then i'll ask the question again about how many other teams picked their supposed best 11 at the start of the competition because none of the eentual semi-finalists (including his paragons of virtue Barnsley) did.

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

So one of our senior players saying "I don't give a sh*t about the FA Cup" has nothing to do with this?

Surely this was taken out of context? He knew he wasn't going to be involved, so when he was asked a question about the game, he said "I don't give a shit". Is that not the case?

The quote I can find is

We're not going to win the FA Cup and I don't care about it, to be honest. I care about staying in the Premier League, as does everybody at this club.

Our Premier League status isn't protected by winning the FA Cup and it's a simple as that. It's a fantastic competition and perhaps one day we'll be in a position where we can compete for it, but not now.

That makes it pretty clear his and the club's attitude to the FA Cup.

Just as paranoids sometimes do have enemies, the Daily Mirror's attacks on Reading FC sometimes are justified.

the problem was that the "it" in "I don't care about it" was Reading's rotation policy, not the cup itself.

The fact that he goes on to say that the FA Cup is a fantastic competiton kind of contradicts the idea that he doesn't give a shit about the FA Cup.


It just another case of reporters deliberately misquoting players to get a story.

[Franchise FC]

Funny how there's no mention of Arsenal making the final, then semi-final of the Carling Cup with their reserves.

Funny how there's no mention of the cup runs that Reading enjoyed whilst getting promoted, and beating some (admittedly mediocre) Premier League teams on the way.

Funny how there's no mention of the 'weakened' teams that Man Utd played in virtually every round - except of course the one when they got knocked out. Actually, that's probably the funniest of all.

Funny how there's no mention of Harry Redknapp's interview yesterday when he claimed that the cup wasn't important and he wanted to concentrate on staying up.

[SteveRoyal]

A different side is not necessarily a much weaker side. People who don't know our squad well won't realise that.

The vast majority of players we will put out against Cardiff will all have first team experience, they just won't happen to be the players that we see regularly or others have heard of.

Spot on.

Agreed. The fact is that this season, Coppell does not know what his strongest team is - especially Midfield pairing. The fact of the matter is that the team will probably be another experiment or test for players not playing regularly - are you good enough to play week in, week out? It's not weakened, it's different because the current starting XI play better as a team, and with regular football you gel as a team faster.

[Ian Royal]

Surely the point is that a club which truly takes the cup seriously plays its strongest side.

A club which truly takes the cup seriously plays to win every game - not to use it as an opportunity to give experience to other players. They want to win!

We play to win every game.

We don't prioritise the cup above the league. In the league it is important to keep a group of players together gaining form and knowledge of each other because every team knows you quite well.

In the cup you can rotate more without that being a worry. Different =/= weaker

People would have a point if we'd gone out to lowly opposition at any point in the last few years. We haven't. We've gone out to Man Utd, Liverpool, Arsenal, Chelsea, Spurs, Birmingham & Stoke. And we've only been convincingly knocked out by Arsenal. Who convincingly beat our LEAGUE side several times.

We make a lot of changes for the cup, but the vast majority of those players could easily be the ones who are playing in the league. We have a big squad of players of similar quality, we need to keep as many of them playing as much as possible and reserve games aren't enough.

When you look at the side to play Cardiff, there will be maybe 3 players who most of HNA wouldn't be happy to see starting in the league. Possibly less.

Anything we lose in terms of quality when we make these changes is made up for in determination, enthusiasm and freshness. Which is why our so called weak teams have taken Man Utd (at the time)the best team in the country to a replay, and bar 15 minutes in the first half, took them apart in that replay.

No one was complaining about United resting Ronaldo against us in that game were they. It's hypocracy because we're smaller and no one outside of our fans knows much about us.

[Hoop Blah]

A different side is not necessarily a much weaker side. People who don't know our squad well won't realise that.

The vast majority of players we will put out against Cardiff will all have first team experience, they just won't happen to be the players that we see regularly or others have heard of.

Spot on.

Agreed. The fact is that this season, Coppell does not know what his strongest team is - especially Midfield pairing. The fact of the matter is that the team will probably be another experiment or test for players not playing regularly - are you good enough to play week in, week out? It's not weakened, it's different because the current starting XI play better as a team, and with regular football you gel as a team faster.

There might be reasonable reasons for doing it but it is a weakened team.

We do have some strong competition for some places but if he doesn't play the likes of Armstrong, Doyle, Stephen Hunt and Rosenoir then he's picking a team he wouldn't pick for a league game. Unless you think Coppell intentionally picks weakened teams week in week out in the league then you have to accept that it's a weakened team.

[bootboy]

Another avenue of thought for playing fringe players. SC needs to see what players are prepared to step up to the plate for inclusion in the regular squad of 20 players thus enabling himself and the club to identify playing areas that need to be strengthened etc. Especially as the transfer window is now open. Also if the club feel they need to move a player on then he is better in the shop window than out of it. For the younger players it is a test to see if they are ready yet or not, but also a platform for a loan period with other clubs watching scouts. Agreed that a cup run for fans is a nice diversion but I would rather the situation be addressed in cup games than league games. We can all see that a championship top six finish will be tight this season therefore we need to maintain a steady balanced league starting XI. I will enjoy the game whatever team is played as my support of the club includes the whole squad, and if we have a game as entertaining as the Stoke fixture then great.

[Silver Fox]

Wht isn't Ian Winwood beefing about the side Liverpool fielded in the 5th round?

[Hoop Blah]

We play to win every game.

But we don't give ourselves the best chance of wining by putting our strongest team out. The players out there might play to win, but as a club we've basically said that this game isn't as important and so we'll put out a side that's not as good.

We don't prioritise the cup above the league. In the league it is important to keep a group of players together gaining form and knowledge of each other because every team knows you quite well.

In the cup you can rotate more without that being a worry. Different =/= weaker

The team we're playing knows us just as well as they did when we played them last week. If making changes gives us an advantage then we should've done it last week too!

As for the cup team not needing to be as well oiled and knowledgeable of the way they should play etc, that just doesn't make any sense. They need to play well together full stop. Being in the cup doesn't mean they don't have to be any less organised or co-ordinated.

People would have a point if we'd gone out to lowly opposition at any point in the last few years. We haven't. We've gone out to Man Utd, Liverpool, Arsenal, Chelsea, Spurs, Birmingham & Stoke. And we've only been convincingly knocked out by Arsenal. Who convincingly beat our LEAGUE side several times.

Perhaps if we'd played our strongest side we might've won one or two of those games we narrowly lost.

We make a lot of changes for the cup, but the vast majority of those players could easily be the ones who are playing in the league. We have a big squad of players of similar quality, we need to keep as many of them playing as much as possible and reserve games aren't enough.

We don't have anyone in the squad on a par with Doyle. If we played the cup side in the league everyone would know and openly admit it was a weakened side as apart from the 4 central midfield players our manager seems to have a pretty clear idea of his strongest XI.

When you look at the side to play Cardiff, there will be maybe 3 players who most of HNA wouldn't be happy to see starting in the league. Possibly less.

Anything we lose in terms of quality when we make these changes is made up for in determination, enthusiasm and freshness. Which is why our so called weak teams have taken Man Utd (at the time)the best team in the country to a replay, and bar 15 minutes in the first half, took them apart in that replay.

No one was complaining about United resting Ronaldo against us in that game were they. It's hypocracy because we're smaller and no one outside of our fans knows much about us.

That was Man Utd's weakened cup team, not the team that was the best team in the country. There may well only be 3 players that most of HNA wouldn't be happy to see starting in the League but probably not the whole team thrown in together.

It's impossible to argue that it's not a weakened side when we all know that if this was the league game Coppell would be playing an almost completely different team.

Also, people moan about the likes of Benitez, Fergie, Wenger etc etc playing weakend sides all the time.

[eleventh earl of mar]

A different side is not necessarily a much weaker side. People who don't know our squad well won't realise that.

The vast majority of players we will put out against Cardiff will all have first team experience, they just won't happen to be the players that we see regularly or others have heard of.

Spot on.

Agreed. The fact is that this season, Coppell does not know what his strongest team is - especially Midfield pairing. The fact of the matter is that the team will probably be another experiment or test for players not playing regularly - are you good enough to play week in, week out? It's not weakened, it's different because the current starting XI play better as a team, and with regular football you gel as a team faster.

Are you really suggesting that Steve Coppell, with all his experience does not know his strongest team in all situations, ie allowing for all fit, injuries or suspensions? I suppose you can tell him then can you? I assume you know better.

[Hoop Blah]

Another avenue of thought for playing fringe players. SC needs to see what players are prepared to step up to the plate for inclusion in the regular squad of 20 players thus enabling himself and the club to identify playing areas that need to be strengthened etc. Especially as the transfer window is now open. Also if the club feel they need to move a player on then he is better in the shop window than out of it. For the younger players it is a test to see if they are ready yet or not, but also a platform for a loan period with other clubs watching scouts. Agreed that a cup run for fans is a nice diversion but I would rather the situation be addressed in cup games than league games. We can all see that a championship top six finish will be tight this season therefore we need to maintain a steady balanced league starting XI. I will enjoy the game whatever team is played as my support of the club includes the whole squad, and if we have a game as entertaining as the Stoke fixture then great.

All well and good but if we're taking the cup as seriously as the league then we could try these players out in one or two of the 46 league games instead of the must win or be knocked out of the competition cup game.

We're fielding a weakened side and not taking the cup as seriously as the league. I don't get why people are so against admitting it.

[eleventh earl of mar]

Another avenue of thought for playing fringe players. SC needs to see what players are prepared to step up to the plate for inclusion in the regular squad of 20 players thus enabling himself and the club to identify playing areas that need to be strengthened etc. Especially as the transfer window is now open. Also if the club feel they need to move a player on then he is better in the shop window than out of it. For the younger players it is a test to see if they are ready yet or not, but also a platform for a loan period with other clubs watching scouts. Agreed that a cup run for fans is a nice diversion but I would rather the situation be addressed in cup games than league games. We can all see that a championship top six finish will be tight this season therefore we need to maintain a steady balanced league starting XI. I will enjoy the game whatever team is played as my support of the club includes the whole squad, and if we have a game as entertaining as the Stoke fixture then great.

How can you tell younger players are ready or not if as can happen we play a team from a lower level?
Dagenham and Redbridge or Luton spring to mind.

[cmonurz]

Agreed HB. Whether or not someone thinks it is right or wrong to field a weakened side is one argument, but surely there can be no argument against that being what Reading are doing.

If Coppell brought in (for example) Murty, Kelly, Karacan, Convey, Lita and Long for the next league match, there would be uproar.

[Archie's penalty]

The point the journalist miss's, is the fact that pretty much every club in the top two tiers of english football, field a weakened side. We are no more guilty than any others. The only difference is that our club has had publicity over the matter, with players and managers publicly displaying a disregard for the cup.

Completely agree.

[Ian Royal]

You can argue the minutae of weakened all you like, but the simple fact of the matter is we DO take the cup seriously and we DO NOT devalue it by not playing the same team as we might in the league

You can say we MIGHT have won a game we lost with the first team all you like, but we MIGHT have performed worse as well.

One off games can see a higher level of performance from players who won't be playing week in week out than it might necessarily from players who were.

It's frankly a pathetic argument and totally meaningless.

[SpaceCruiser]

If the so-called weakened team beat a team that fielded a strong team, will you still be complaining about it after the event?

For what it's worth, our record in cups since 2005 is:

Cup ties
W8 D6(2 ended up in shoot-outs) L6

Shoot outs
W1 L1

I'd say that's not a bad record.

[cmonurz]

Surely the fact that one player is a first-team regular and another is not suggests that the former is more likely to produce a good performance in the cup game, i.e. the balance of probabilities is that the usual first-team will out-perform the reserves?

[Hoop Blah]

You can argue the minutae of weakened all you like, but the simple fact of the matter is we DO take the cup seriously and we DO NOT devalue it by not playing the same team as we might in the league

You can say we MIGHT have won a game we lost with the first team all you like, but we MIGHT have performed worse as well.

One off games can see a higher level of performance from players who won't be playing week in week out than it might necessarily from players who were.

It's frankly a pathetic argument and totally meaningless.

You're right it is, I really don't get why you tried to make it in the first place!

[Franchise FC]

Agreed HB. Whether or not someone thinks it is right or wrong to field a weakened side is one argument, but surely there can be no argument against that being what Reading are doing.

If Coppell brought in (for example) Murty, Kelly, Karacan, Convey, Lita and Long for the next league match, there would be uproar.

Except that :
Myrtle would most likely have played before now but for injury
Caravan (of Love) performed reasonably well in the first team. May only have been left out to provide a better combination in midfield rather than whether he's the better player
4 Lita injection - well, loads of nobbers have been calling for his recall and reinstatement to the team
Long John has played a considerable number of minutes in the last few games (and scored and assisted)

I'll give you Kelly and Convey, but that would only be two changes.