Shane Long

[handbags_harris]

Snowballs obsession with Long is beginning to be a bit worrying.

Plain and simply, he just isn't that good.
Simon Church and Noel Hunt are both better strikers. I just don't understand how you can't see that.
Stats won't show you anything, whereas watching how they play and the style of play the use does.

Psst, tell that blind clown, McDermott. Or better still take his job, you clearly know more about football than he does.

The major difference between you and any other poster is that you seem to imply that McDermott picks Shane Long because his stats are good. Everybody else thinks McDermott picks him because he is currently best suited to the formation that we are playing (I happen to disagree, I think Noel Hunt is best suited but hey ho, that's my opinion being spouted).

[Snowball]

The major difference between you and any other poster is that you seem to imply that McDermott picks Shane Long because his stats are good. Everybody else thinks McDermott picks him because he is currently best suited to the formation that we are playing (I happen to disagree, I think Noel Hunt is best suited but hey ho, that's my opinion being spouted).

That's silly.

NO. I believe he picks Shane Long because he is vital to the system we mostly play
and is far better suited to that position then either Hunt or Church.

I support my argument with the stats because the majority of this
list has always had a downer on Shane that flies in the face of his
overall scoring record.

I'm on record as saying I think Noel Hunt is a great all-round player
and was very close in ability and scoring power to Doyle, but he
played 2/3 of every game because he was carrying a long-term injury.

In a 442 my first name on the team-sheet would be a fit Noel Hunt

But do I think Noel could take the battering Shane does? No is the answer

[Snowball]

seeing as no one can get past their own preconceptions and predjudices on here

Agreed,

LONG has had a whipping,
Kebe cannot EVER be a player,
Bikey is a joke,
Howard is a fat w-nker,
Cummings is the worse player ever to wear a Reading shirt,
Harte is a thousand years old, too slow, will get rinsed every week, and will get us relegated,
Pearce is SH!T and has the turning circle of a tanker
Mills is a liability and we should get rid.
Griffin is old and slow, why did we bring HIM in?
Federici is "rubbish", useless on the near-post, makes camera saves
Harper is gash and just waves his arms around
Tabb is too small and will never be more than a squad player
McAnuff is a mercenary who only plays well for six games, takes the money, moves on
Rasiak is gash, lazy, useless
Williams is the worst player ever to wear the Reading shirt (fight with Cummings, Marc)

What is the f-cking point of buying no-hopers from Cork?


The list is endless. And don't forget Armstrong was a cripple dumped on us by Sheffield United.

Earlier this year it was "Karacan and HRK will never be good enough" GET RID


I just despair at the nastiness, the stupidity, the denial of reality, the failure to SUPPORT.

Do people not think some of this stuff gets back? Do you not think it can affect players' morale?

BOOING Long as he came off? Disgusting. It's not as if he had a bad miss like some there have been,
Howard, Church, HRK.

Internet Warriors, bullies, generally failures who big themselves up at a distance.

[Snowball]

And with this useless pile of manure, we are SIXTH.

(With Long starting 13/14 of those games)

Madjeski OUT!

McDermott OUT!

[Hoop Blah]

seeing as no one can get past their own preconceptions and predjudices on here

Agreed,

LONG has had a whipping,
Kebe cannot EVER be a player,
Bikey is a joke,
Howard is a fat w-nker,
Cummings is the worse player ever to wear a Reading shirt,
Harte is a thousand years old, too slow, will get rinsed every week, and will get us relegated,
Pearce is SH!T and has the turning circle of a tanker
Mills is a liability and we should get rid.
Griffin is old and slow, why did we bring HIM in?
Federici is "rubbish", useless on the near-post, makes camera saves
Harper is gash and just waves his arms around
Tabb is too small and will never be more than a squad player
McAnuff is a mercenary who only plays well for six games, takes the money, moves on
Rasiak is gash, lazy, useless
Williams is the worst player ever to wear the Reading shirt (fight with Cummings, Marc)

What is the f-cking point of buying no-hopers from Cork?


The list is endless. And don't forget Armstrong was a cripple dumped on us by Sheffield United.

Earlier this year it was "Karacan and HRK will never be good enough" GET RID


I just despair at the nastiness, the stupidity, the denial of reality, the failure to SUPPORT.

Do people not think some of this stuff gets back? Do you not think it can affect players' morale?

BOOING Long as he came off? Disgusting. It's not as if he had a bad miss like some there have been,
Howard, Church, HRK.

Internet Warriors, bullies, generally failures who big themselves up at a distance.

These are all opinions that people are allowed to have. A lot of them aren't too far wide of the mark either really but you have to accept that in the real world people make judgements on what they see and base that on what they want to see.

You spam does very little to address any of the opinions people have because they don't often relate to any of the views people express and even when they are they're so poorly presented people lose the will to live, let alone read them!

More and more your stats are shown up to be inaccurate or selective in order to support your agenda. More importantly football is a team game that just can't be meansured or judged by such limited stats as the ones available. Players performance within that team is even more difficult to measure so your stats are usually meaningless.

[SLAMMED]

BOOING Long as he came off? Disgusting.

FYI, we didn't boo him off, we cheered his substitution. And thank god Brian had the sense to take him off. Hunt was on the pitch for about 5 minutes and created our second goal.

[Ian Royal]

Snowballs obsession with Long is beginning to be a bit worrying.

Plain and simply, he just isn't that good.

Simon Church and Noel Hunt are both better strikers. I just don't understand how you can't see that.

Watching how they play and think on the pitch shows a lot more about a player than a few stats thrown together.

On average humans have less than 2 legs. That's a completely correct stat, but also worthless, much like your stats.

his stats are about as reliable as any one person giving his opinion on the matter- seeing as no one can get past their own preconceptions and predjudices on here

Yeah, but everyone else is openly posting based on their perceptions (which are based on observation and statistics) and aren't trying to dress it up as incontravertable fact by using really quite limited statistics.

[Ian Royal]

seeing as no one can get past their own preconceptions and predjudices on here

Agreed,

LONG has had a whipping,
Kebe cannot EVER be a player,
Bikey is a joke,
Howard is a fat w-nker,
Cummings is the worse player ever to wear a Reading shirt,
Harte is a thousand years old, too slow, will get rinsed every week, and will get us relegated,
Pearce is SH!T and has the turning circle of a tanker
Mills is a liability and we should get rid.
Griffin is old and slow, why did we bring HIM in?
Federici is "rubbish", useless on the near-post, makes camera saves
Harper is gash and just waves his arms around
Tabb is too small and will never be more than a squad player
McAnuff is a mercenary who only plays well for six games, takes the money, moves on
Rasiak is gash, lazy, useless
Williams is the worst player ever to wear the Reading shirt (fight with Cummings, Marc)

What is the f-cking point of buying no-hopers from Cork?


The list is endless. And don't forget Armstrong was a cripple dumped on us by Sheffield United.

Earlier this year it was "Karacan and HRK will never be good enough" GET RID


I just despair at the nastiness, the stupidity, the denial of reality, the failure to SUPPORT.

Do people not think some of this stuff gets back? Do you not think it can affect players' morale?

BOOING Long as he came off? Disgusting. It's not as if he had a bad miss like some there have been,
Howard, Church, HRK.

Internet Warriors, bullies, generally failures who big themselves up at a distance.

These are all opinions that people are allowed to have. A lot of them aren't too far wide of the mark either really but you have to accept that in the real world people make judgements on what they see and base that on what they want to see.

You spam does very little to address any of the opinions people have because they don't often relate to any of the views people express and even when they are they're so poorly presented people lose the will to live, let alone read them!

More and more your stats are shown up to be inaccurate or selective in order to support your agenda. More importantly football is a team game that just can't be meansured or judged by such limited stats as the ones available. Players performance within that team is even more difficult to measure so your stats are usually meaningless.

All of those views are also not the the views of the majority on here. snowball seems incapable of separating out the postings of a few individuals from HNA as a whole and goes completely the wrong way about challenging the less reasonable posts, by spamming very limited statistics and alienating the majority of those who would otherwise help make intelligent arguments against such opinions.

All to often the reality is that the majority on here, whilst harbouring doubts about many of those players, do not subscribe to those statements yet snowball treats it as some sort of crusade against everyone where he is the sole voice of reason.

[Snowball]

Long has started so few games, because he has been diabolical in pretty much every single one. He has a much much better record as a sub. But not exactly great. His sub appearances are always going to inflate his quality, because he is quick and comes on against tiring defences. Quite often defences who have already lost the game.

[Snowball]

Long grabs the odd goal. When he comes on as a sub and doesn't score, the impact of him not doing so is less.

You make this statistical claim that Long scores a goal every 2.2 games he plays, yet your own stats show that his rate is 1 goal every 4 games when he has started for Reading. And that's the crux of it. When he has started, Long has proven, in the main, to be relative ineffective.

Does that 'prove' he plays worse when he starts? No, it doesn't, but it illustrates the impact that is relatively poor scoring record can have on the team as a whole.

[Snowball]

He scores headers from set pieces mostly, and this is often a result of lack-luster defending/an excellent delivery.

He's not strong or pacey at all, he gets muscled off the ball easily because he's built like a 12-year old. Just watch him next time he's on the ball; he won't have the confidence to shoot himself, if he has the pace to beat defenders, I have never seen him use it.

[Snowball]

Snowball is on a roll. I like Shane Long too, but think he is in the correct role right now. Impact sub.

[Snowball]

I agree the stats are interesting but even the goals per minute do not show the full picture.

A lot of Long's goals have been in minutes where he is coming on fresh to play against tiring defences this would have an impact on those figures.

[Snowball]

Even with snowball's great stats, I don't rate Long as a starter. But coming off the bench I think he can do more damage and change the game far more than Lita could hope of doing

[Snowball]

Long in the prem? It's just doesn't bare thinking about.


I'd agree with you. And I'd be shifting Long to make room for him.

[Snowball]

For those of you who are so keen to slag off members of our team such as Long, without any proper evidence, have a look at the clip of the work done by him to set up the third goal at Wolves. Shown for free on the official site at the moment. Take your blinkers off and watch the header to start the move and the speed of movement by both him and Cisse who is another deemed not good enough by some. Watching games without preconceived views would be a new experience to certain posters.

[Snowball]

Long is the worst of our strikers though, not by a long way because Lita isn't a lot better, and your facts and stats aren't measure of his ability. They're just a measure of how well he's performed in terms of goals and assists (mainly coming off the bench where I would say he's a player more adept at playing that role than Lita).
.

[SLAMMED]

Resorted to spamming?

[cmonurz]

Yes Snowball, how dare these people have opinions.

[Snowball]

Yes Snowball, how dare these people have opinions.

It's not the opinions, Gwathoppa, it's the hypocrisy and/or double-standards, when put alongside current threads.

But it would require a moderate IQ and some subtle insight to see that.

How are YOU doing?