BFTG - Brentford

[Victor Meldrew]

As I stated - he has a bad 12-18 months and the time was right for him to come out of the team. What I completely disagree with is that he has been rubbish for years.

He has been a steady performer who has slipped from those standards and was rightly dropped. He could easily have had a strop at that but has clearly worked hard and taken his chance when presented with it. If he is back in team long term remains to be seen but he has shown in the last week that he is a good option on the right of our defence, as he always has been.

It is the case though that Clement wanted a new right-back to play ahead of him and Gomes has not been quick to pick him either which to me means that Denver, Ian etc may not be wrong in their assessment.
BTW does his ridiculously long contract run out this year or next?

They are due to their timescale.

As I have stated twice now, he has had a noticeable downterm in form over the past 12-18 months (as per the rest of the team) and it was right that he was dropped when he was. Prior to this he was a consistant performer at right back both during good and bad seasons. If you think he has been bad rather than good for the majority of the 350+ games he has played for Reading then I'm sorry, I just can't agree with that.

This is an open forum where nobody has to agree or disagree-we see what we see or want to see.
I already posted that Gunter was o.k. for these past two games for the most part but, with all that experience, the player does so little in terms of marking a player or stopping crosses which IMHO are prerequisites for full-back play and he never learns.

[Stranded]

It is the case though that Clement wanted a new right-back to play ahead of him and Gomes has not been quick to pick him either which to me means that Denver, Ian etc may not be wrong in their assessment.
BTW does his ridiculously long contract run out this year or next?

They are due to their timescale.

As I have stated twice now, he has had a noticeable downterm in form over the past 12-18 months (as per the rest of the team) and it was right that he was dropped when he was. Prior to this he was a consistant performer at right back both during good and bad seasons. If you think he has been bad rather than good for the majority of the 350+ games he has played for Reading then I'm sorry, I just can't agree with that.

This is an open forum where nobody has to agree or disagree-we see what we see or want to see.
I already posted that Gunter was o.k. for these past two games for the most part but, with all that experience, the player does so little in terms of marking a player or stopping crosses which IMHO are prerequisites for full-back play and he never learns.

That is fine but as part of a discussion it helps not to ignore a key point of a posters point to try and make a counter point.

[Chameleon]

Gunter always seems to get unfair stick, throughout his time with us he's definitely never been the biggest problem with the team, and has floated between adequate and good, with a couple poor spells, which has theoretically meant that we could focus our transfer budget on other positions.

Also, I'd put it out there that even in the most dire performances and times he's always seemed to care about the club (Stevenage away anyone?), and I will take a less gifted trier over a flashier player who doesn't really give a toss about the club. You could make an argument that the main reason we went up under McDermott was because we had a coach and players who really wanted to do it for each other, on paper no way were we a Championship winning side.

[NewCorkSeth]

They are due to their timescale.

As I have stated twice now, he has had a noticeable downterm in form over the past 12-18 months (as per the rest of the team) and it was right that he was dropped when he was. Prior to this he was a consistant performer at right back both during good and bad seasons. If you think he has been bad rather than good for the majority of the 350+ games he has played for Reading then I'm sorry, I just can't agree with that.

This is an open forum where nobody has to agree or disagree-we see what we see or want to see.
I already posted that Gunter was o.k. for these past two games for the most part but, with all that experience, the player does so little in terms of marking a player or stopping crosses which IMHO are prerequisites for full-back play and he never learns.

That is fine but as part of a discussion it helps not to ignore a key point of a posters point to try and make a counter point.

But the Gunter supporters are the first to ignore key points. In almost every arguement about Gunter someone will state his inability to block crosses, his poor positioning around the box and his frankly appalling man marking. Nobody on the pro Gunter side ever tries to argue against those points. And I dont blame them. The evidence overwhelming supports it.

Gunter is a footballer with premier league level fitness and League 1 ability. He is only consistent in his inconsistencies. 1 game he does the positioning correctly but cant pass the ball forward. The next he is crossing beautifully into the box but leaves his man free at the far post.

In short hes a wing back who has been playing in a team that rarely plays wing backs at a level too difficult for him to cope with.

[URZZZZ]

This is an open forum where nobody has to agree or disagree-we see what we see or want to see.
I already posted that Gunter was o.k. for these past two games for the most part but, with all that experience, the player does so little in terms of marking a player or stopping crosses which IMHO are prerequisites for full-back play and he never learns.

That is fine but as part of a discussion it helps not to ignore a key point of a posters point to try and make a counter point.

But the Gunter supporters are the first to ignore key points. In almost every arguement about Gunter someone will state his inability to block crosses, his poor positioning around the box and his frankly appalling man marking. Nobody on the pro Gunter side ever tries to argue against those points. And I dont blame them. The evidence overwhelming supports it.

Gunter is a footballer with premier league level fitness and League 1 ability. He is only consistent in his inconsistencies. 1 game he does the positioning correctly but cant pass the ball forward. The next he is crossing beautifully into the box but leaves his man free at the far post.

In short hes a wing back who has been playing in a team that rarely plays wing backs at a level too difficult for him to cope with.

Huh? Chris Gunter couldn't do a good cross into the box if his life depended on it. Most of them barely go two feet off the ground and the rest are just floaty balls straight into the goalie's hands

Must admit I find the Gunter debate quite strange. The bloke's just completely average, has no real redeeming factors to his game, is scared to have the ball, but has high levels of concentration and generally tracks his runners well. Guess it depends how people see it in their own way

[NewCorkSeth]

That is fine but as part of a discussion it helps not to ignore a key point of a posters point to try and make a counter point.

But the Gunter supporters are the first to ignore key points. In almost every arguement about Gunter someone will state his inability to block crosses, his poor positioning around the box and his frankly appalling man marking. Nobody on the pro Gunter side ever tries to argue against those points. And I dont blame them. The evidence overwhelming supports it.

Gunter is a footballer with premier league level fitness and League 1 ability. He is only consistent in his inconsistencies. 1 game he does the positioning correctly but cant pass the ball forward. The next he is crossing beautifully into the box but leaves his man free at the far post.

In short hes a wing back who has been playing in a team that rarely plays wing backs at a level too difficult for him to cope with.

Huh? Chris Gunter couldn't do a good cross into the box if his life depended on it. Most of them barely go two feet off the ground and the rest are just floaty balls straight into the goalie's hands

Must admit I find the Gunter debate quite strange. The bloke's just completely average, has no real redeeming factors to his game, is scared to have the ball, but has high levels of concentration and generally tracks his runners well. Guess it depends how people see it in their own way

That's slightly my point. He does sometimes do things very well. There have been games his crossing has been superb. They're rare. And hard to remember. But they exist.

[RoyalBlue]

Maupay was lucky to be on the pitch after not getting booked for a deliberate handball and a high tackle.

Agreed. The handball was a cynical attempt to cheat and score a goal so very definitely should have been a yellow. Plus he twice got involved in nasty 'afters' including grabbing Yiadom by the throat.

[Denver Royal]

Ok so there's no question that this was a good performance by some great players under a very good manager and a system that is working. Rino, Eja, Baker all fantastic, as was everyone else. Good deserved win. Back to Eja - it's amazing how a moment of flair from him can suddenly spur us on out of nothing. We've needed a player like this for ages.
My issue is why aren't we better than we are?
Looking throughout our starting 11 actually I think we have very good players. I can't think of a single position where we'd say we are below average - apart from Meite perhaps... who scored 2 goals!
On paper this team should be a playoff team. I guess beating Brentford at home with a totally dominant first 40mins or so is consistent with that, but now I'd like to see more.
The difficulty will be when some of these players go back to their clubs. If we manage to keep them all I really see them doing good things next season.

This team has only been together since the Bolton game - this was the first game when all the January signings were available.
If you take the Bolton game on January 29th as the start for this team then their record is:
P 14 W5 D6 L3 Pts 21
That is play-off form or close to it, which suggests that this current squad playing for this manager could push for the play-offs. The key will be next year (assuming we do enough over the next 4 games) to push on over 12 months with either these players or others of equal or better quality.
I do not expect us to be near the play-offs next season but I would hope we finally see some progression and a move to finish in that middle third of the table (9th to 16th) would be an excellent move forward,

Why aren't we better than we are? Several reasons...
He hasn't been here long, only arrived late Dec.
It takes time to implement a system, esp in Champ, games come quickly, less time to work on stuff in training.
Given the situation we've been in, he's had to balance that with being pragmatic/get results.
We've had a slew of injuries.
He hasn't had extended pre-season training, camps, tours, etc, with them yet.
He hasn't signed any 'permanent' players yet.
It takes 'years' to build a team (or so I've heard in the past )

[Stranded]

This is an open forum where nobody has to agree or disagree-we see what we see or want to see.
I already posted that Gunter was o.k. for these past two games for the most part but, with all that experience, the player does so little in terms of marking a player or stopping crosses which IMHO are prerequisites for full-back play and he never learns.

That is fine but as part of a discussion it helps not to ignore a key point of a posters point to try and make a counter point.

But the Gunter supporters are the first to ignore key points. In almost every arguement about Gunter someone will state his inability to block crosses, his poor positioning around the box and his frankly appalling man marking. Nobody on the pro Gunter side ever tries to argue against those points. And I dont blame them. The evidence overwhelming supports it.

Gunter is a footballer with premier league level fitness and League 1 ability. He is only consistent in his inconsistencies. 1 game he does the positioning correctly but cant pass the ball forward. The next he is crossing beautifully into the box but leaves his man free at the far post.

In short hes a wing back who has been playing in a team that rarely plays wing backs at a level too difficult for him to cope with.

Of course he has flaws - no-one is making out he is an outstanding player but he simply is not as bad as his detractors want to believe. The problem with a defender who does make mistakes, and Gunter does make them (as all defenders at this level do) is they are so much easier to remember and point out than the multitude of times where he does something well or even adequately. If a RB blocks a cross, then you don't even remember it as nothing of note has happened but when he doesn't do so or is out of position then it sticks in the memory bank esp if it leads to a chance or a goal.

The level of his errors simply haven't been as high as people think over his career here but when they happen they are highlighted because people have this view that he constantly makes errors so it reinforces and backs up this view of him as a player.

It's the reverse of a striker, he can have a couple of awful games, miss some sitters but taps one away to win a game or salvage a point and everyone forgets the free header he put wide earlier in the game. Gunter can have 5 or 6 decent, steady games where he does nothing wrong, then he fails to block a cross, a goal results and he's shit.

[URZZZZ]

That is fine but as part of a discussion it helps not to ignore a key point of a posters point to try and make a counter point.

But the Gunter supporters are the first to ignore key points. In almost every arguement about Gunter someone will state his inability to block crosses, his poor positioning around the box and his frankly appalling man marking. Nobody on the pro Gunter side ever tries to argue against those points. And I dont blame them. The evidence overwhelming supports it.

Gunter is a footballer with premier league level fitness and League 1 ability. He is only consistent in his inconsistencies. 1 game he does the positioning correctly but cant pass the ball forward. The next he is crossing beautifully into the box but leaves his man free at the far post.

In short hes a wing back who has been playing in a team that rarely plays wing backs at a level too difficult for him to cope with.

Of course he has flaws - no-one is making out he is an outstanding player but he simply is not as bad as his detractors want to believe. The problem with a defender who does make mistakes, and Gunter does make them (as all defenders at this level do) is they are so much easier to remember and point out than the multitude of times where he does something well or even adequately. If a RB blocks a cross, then you don't even remember it as nothing of note has happened but when he doesn't do so or is out of position then it sticks in the memory bank esp if it leads to a chance or a goal.

The level of his errors simply haven't been as high as people think over his career here but when they happen they are highlighted because people have this view that he constantly makes errors so it reinforces and backs up this view of him as a player.

It's the reverse of a striker, he can have a couple of awful games, miss some sitters but taps one away to win a game or salvage a point and everyone forgets the free header he put wide earlier in the game. Gunter can have 5 or 6 decent, steady games where he does nothing wrong, then he fails to block a cross, a goal results and he's shit.

Good post

Do think this summer should be time for Gunter here but all in all, he's been a good servant to the club and whilst he isn't exciting to watch, you can always rely on him to do a job, like he did against Norwich and Brentford

[CountryRoyal]

you can always rely on him to do a job, like he did against Norwich and Brentford

Yeah spot on. I'll just casually ignore the countless times we've conceded goals from the right side where he was too weak in the challenge, was no where near stopping a cross or any other combination of utterly substandard defending. He was absolutely reliable you're right, you could always rely on him not really doing his job. Oh but it's ok because he's "such a great athlete".

[URZZZZ]

you can always rely on him to do a job, like he did against Norwich and Brentford

Yeah spot on. I'll just casually ignore the countless times we've conceded goals from the right side where he was too weak in the challenge, was no where near stopping a cross or any other combination of utterly substandard defending. He was absolutely reliable you're right, you could always rely on him not really doing his job. Oh but it's ok because he's "such a great athlete".

Don't get me wrong I don't particularly like Gunter, but he takes so much flak from the majority. I suppose what I was trying to say is you know what you're going to get from Gunter. He'll track his runners well, he'll read the game well, but he'll stand off his man miles too much and has a weird obsession with going backwards every touch he has of the ball

Compare to someone like Richards who can put in really good performances or equally horrific ones. Gunter is just a steady 5 out of 10 each week

If he generally was as bad as people were making out, he wouldn't have been consistently chosen by 6 managers in a row who know a lot more about football than you and me

[NewCorkSeth]

That is fine but as part of a discussion it helps not to ignore a key point of a posters point to try and make a counter point.

But the Gunter supporters are the first to ignore key points. In almost every arguement about Gunter someone will state his inability to block crosses, his poor positioning around the box and his frankly appalling man marking. Nobody on the pro Gunter side ever tries to argue against those points. And I dont blame them. The evidence overwhelming supports it.

Gunter is a footballer with premier league level fitness and League 1 ability. He is only consistent in his inconsistencies. 1 game he does the positioning correctly but cant pass the ball forward. The next he is crossing beautifully into the box but leaves his man free at the far post.

In short hes a wing back who has been playing in a team that rarely plays wing backs at a level too difficult for him to cope with.

Of course he has flaws - no-one is making out he is an outstanding player but he simply is not as bad as his detractors want to believe. The problem with a defender who does make mistakes, and Gunter does make them (as all defenders at this level do) is they are so much easier to remember and point out than the multitude of times where he does something well or even adequately. If a RB blocks a cross, then you don't even remember it as nothing of note has happened but when he doesn't do so or is out of position then it sticks in the memory bank esp if it leads to a chance or a goal.

The level of his errors simply haven't been as high as people think over his career here but when they happen they are highlighted because people have this view that he constantly makes errors so it reinforces and backs up this view of him as a player.

It's the reverse of a striker, he can have a couple of awful games, miss some sitters but taps one away to win a game or salvage a point and everyone forgets the free header he put wide earlier in the game. Gunter can have 5 or 6 decent, steady games where he does nothing wrong, then he fails to block a cross, a goal results and he's shit.

The fact that I am praising him for the closing down he did in the last 2 games should show that I do notice defenders doing their job. Silently or not. I think you can point out how poor Gunter has been in his time here with 1 word. Yiadom.

When you compare the 2 in literally every area other than international caps Yiadom comes out better in every category. If Gunter was ever good for us on a consistent basis then Yiadom must be a leading premier league level RB.

[Stranded]

But the Gunter supporters are the first to ignore key points. In almost every arguement about Gunter someone will state his inability to block crosses, his poor positioning around the box and his frankly appalling man marking. Nobody on the pro Gunter side ever tries to argue against those points. And I dont blame them. The evidence overwhelming supports it.

Gunter is a footballer with premier league level fitness and League 1 ability. He is only consistent in his inconsistencies. 1 game he does the positioning correctly but cant pass the ball forward. The next he is crossing beautifully into the box but leaves his man free at the far post.

In short hes a wing back who has been playing in a team that rarely plays wing backs at a level too difficult for him to cope with.

Of course he has flaws - no-one is making out he is an outstanding player but he simply is not as bad as his detractors want to believe. The problem with a defender who does make mistakes, and Gunter does make them (as all defenders at this level do) is they are so much easier to remember and point out than the multitude of times where he does something well or even adequately. If a RB blocks a cross, then you don't even remember it as nothing of note has happened but when he doesn't do so or is out of position then it sticks in the memory bank esp if it leads to a chance or a goal.

The level of his errors simply haven't been as high as people think over his career here but when they happen they are highlighted because people have this view that he constantly makes errors so it reinforces and backs up this view of him as a player.

It's the reverse of a striker, he can have a couple of awful games, miss some sitters but taps one away to win a game or salvage a point and everyone forgets the free header he put wide earlier in the game. Gunter can have 5 or 6 decent, steady games where he does nothing wrong, then he fails to block a cross, a goal results and he's shit.

The fact that I am praising him for the closing down he did in the last 2 games should show that I do notice defenders doing their job. Silently or not. I think you can point out how poor Gunter has been in his time here with 1 word. Yiadom.

When you compare the 2 in literally every area other than international caps Yiadom comes out better in every category. If Gunter was ever good for us on a consistent basis then Yiadom must be a leading premier league level RB.

Yiadom being better does not mean Gunter is shit. That is stretching a logical argument to it's limits. We're not going to agree on this, so I'm just going to take my leave of this conversation.

[NewCorkSeth]

Of course he has flaws - no-one is making out he is an outstanding player but he simply is not as bad as his detractors want to believe. The problem with a defender who does make mistakes, and Gunter does make them (as all defenders at this level do) is they are so much easier to remember and point out than the multitude of times where he does something well or even adequately. If a RB blocks a cross, then you don't even remember it as nothing of note has happened but when he doesn't do so or is out of position then it sticks in the memory bank esp if it leads to a chance or a goal.

The level of his errors simply haven't been as high as people think over his career here but when they happen they are highlighted because people have this view that he constantly makes errors so it reinforces and backs up this view of him as a player.

It's the reverse of a striker, he can have a couple of awful games, miss some sitters but taps one away to win a game or salvage a point and everyone forgets the free header he put wide earlier in the game. Gunter can have 5 or 6 decent, steady games where he does nothing wrong, then he fails to block a cross, a goal results and he's shit.

The fact that I am praising him for the closing down he did in the last 2 games should show that I do notice defenders doing their job. Silently or not. I think you can point out how poor Gunter has been in his time here with 1 word. Yiadom.

When you compare the 2 in literally every area other than international caps Yiadom comes out better in every category. If Gunter was ever good for us on a consistent basis then Yiadom must be a leading premier league level RB.

Yiadom being better does not mean Gunter is shit. That is stretching a logical argument to it's limits. We're not going to agree on this, so I'm just going to take my leave of this conversation.

The argument I was making was a bit deeper than that. I'm stating that Yiadom has been so much better than Gunter that if Gunter is a championship level RB in your mind Yiadom must be up there with the best in the premier league.

The gulf between the two should, to a reasonable person, at the very least soften their opinion on Gunters ability.

[Stranded]

The fact that I am praising him for the closing down he did in the last 2 games should show that I do notice defenders doing their job. Silently or not. I think you can point out how poor Gunter has been in his time here with 1 word. Yiadom.

When you compare the 2 in literally every area other than international caps Yiadom comes out better in every category. If Gunter was ever good for us on a consistent basis then Yiadom must be a leading premier league level RB.

Yiadom being better does not mean Gunter is shit. That is stretching a logical argument to it's limits. We're not going to agree on this, so I'm just going to take my leave of this conversation.

The argument I was making was a bit deeper than that. I'm stating that Yiadom has been so much better than Gunter that if Gunter is a championship level RB in your mind Yiadom must be up there with the best in the premier league.

The gulf between the two should, to a reasonable person, at the very least soften their opinion on Gunters ability.

Again, you are missing where I said Gunter deserved to lose his place and part of that is Yiadom's form since joining. Gunter is a good Championship RB who has regressed over the past 18 months. Yiadom is a good championship RB who is improving. Can Yiadom play in the PL? Yes I think he has the ability to in the right team - would Gunter be able to play in the PL now, no. Would I play Yiadom over Gunter now - absolutely and have already said, there is no point keeping Gunter unless he is prepared to be back up to Yiadom.

Does Yiadom make mistakes in defence as well - yes he does.

My point is and still remains that I believe outside of the past 12-18 months that it wrong to call Gunter a bad player, he simply hasn't been a bad player for us but he has regressed, deserved to lose his place and over the past 2 games has shown what a good player he can be - these performances were the norm before the past 12-18 months and hopefully the forced omission from the team and the raised level of competition Yiadom offers has helped him rediscover some of what he used to offer us.

[NewCorkSeth]

Yiadom being better does not mean Gunter is shit. That is stretching a logical argument to it's limits. We're not going to agree on this, so I'm just going to take my leave of this conversation.

The argument I was making was a bit deeper than that. I'm stating that Yiadom has been so much better than Gunter that if Gunter is a championship level RB in your mind Yiadom must be up there with the best in the premier league.

The gulf between the two should, to a reasonable person, at the very least soften their opinion on Gunters ability.

Again, you are missing where I said Gunter deserved to lose his place and part of that is Yiadom's form since joining. Gunter is a good Championship RB who has regressed over the past 18 months. Yiadom is a good championship RB who is improving. Can Yiadom play in the PL? Yes I think he has the ability to in the right team - would Gunter be able to play in the PL now, no. Would I play Yiadom over Gunter now - absolutely and have already said, there is no point keeping Gunter unless he is prepared to be back up to Yiadom.

Does Yiadom make mistakes in defence as well - yes he does.

My point is and still remains that I believe outside of the past 12-18 months that it wrong to call Gunter a bad player, he simply hasn't been a bad player for us but he has regressed, deserved to lose his place and over the past 2 games has shown what a good player he can be - these performances were the norm before the past 12-18 months and hopefully the forced omission from the team and the raised level of competition Yiadom offers has helped him rediscover some of what he used to offer us.

Sorry for continually ignoring that. I just thought it would be more interesting to talk about other parts of our respective opinions. You think that other than the last 18 months Gunter has been decent - good, I think hes been bad - poor his entire time with us. I figured both of us wont change our minds on that so I tried to explain why i felt that way rather than whether it was wrong or right.

I wholeheartedly believe that of Gunter wasnt so cheap more people would be on his back. For me hes essentially a cheap Aluko as a RB. Has a lot of good qualities, never combines them well.

[BarryWhiteRFC]

I like Gunter. Never set the world alight but whenever I've watched Reading play and he was in the side, he always seemed to play well. I never understood all the hate for him. I thought maybe he went around Reading sleeping with supporters wives or something.

Anyway, those who wish to say he's rubbish can do. I just don't agree. We're all entitled to our opinions aren't we?

[jar95]

Would be interesting to see a list of how many people who hate Gunter were also on the club 1871 thread moaning about that?*

* If you're on both lists, you're probably just a moany old man with nothing better to do

[morganb]

More importantly, if Gunter scored would you be on the pitch?