Even *I* am actually quite concerned

[howser]

Sorry SCIAG, your right of course contracts in football taken by players management and thier staff are totally binding and unbreakable should have remembered that !

[Royal Rother]

Don't be so melodramatic. There doesn't need to be a dramatic improvement. Getting (arguably) our 2 best players back in the team should help somewhat wouldn't you say? As should playing 2 hungry strikers who offer something (anything!) to the cause.

If we are not Top 6 by Christmas I should imagine Coppell will go of his own accord but there are enough reasons for optimism if you are prepared to look for them that I doubt that will come to pass.

I didn't say Coppell would be sacked (that would cost Madejski money for starters). I would fully expect him to fall on his own sword.

There doesn't need to be a dramatic improvement from the pile of cack we have witnessed so far this season?!! You're probably right if we don't want automatic promotion this season. Our two best players returning? Which of Sidwell, Kitson, Little and Shorey would that be then?!! We still need a decent replacement for Sidwell, a specialist right winger who will consistently cause other teams problems and create decent chances for our strikers, and a specialist left back. Again that will cost 'ducks arse' money, so what chance that happening?!

As for hungry strikers - well I would be pretty hungry but it doesn't mean I would score any goals! Even far better footballers than me! will still struggle to score in the absence of any decent service.

That's a definite "back from the pub" nonsense post!

[earleyroyal]

As the one who sort of started the Please Stay Steve thing, can I say that I sort of assumed that him staying would have seen changes both to the team and the attitude of his management last season, it appears not to have done so, Pardew said that a manager needs to focus on a goal, SC seems not to be focussing on a goal at the moment, and should things not improve, I expect him to resign in October, and this time for the resignation to be accepted, I then expect Parky to be offered the job.

I think most of us expected changes, even the fans not clamouring for him to stay. He identified where he had gone wrong at the last fans' forum (being too loyal to players and so on) but has still gone down the same blind alleys this year, which is the most frustrating aspect of the situation.

[Alan Partridge]

Don't be so melodramatic. There doesn't need to be a dramatic improvement. Getting (arguably) our 2 best players back in the team should help somewhat wouldn't you say? As should playing 2 hungry strikers who offer something (anything!) to the cause.

If we are not Top 6 by Christmas I should imagine Coppell will go of his own accord but there are enough reasons for optimism if you are prepared to look for them that I doubt that will come to pass.

I didn't say Coppell would be sacked (that would cost Madejski money for starters). I would fully expect him to fall on his own sword.

There doesn't need to be a dramatic improvement from the pile of cack we have witnessed so far this season?!! You're probably right if we don't want automatic promotion this season. Our two best players returning? Which of Sidwell, Kitson, Little and Shorey would that be then?!! We still need a decent replacement for Sidwell, a specialist right winger who will consistently cause other teams problems and create decent chances for our strikers, and a specialist left back. Again that will cost 'ducks arse' money, so what chance that happening?!

As for hungry strikers - well I would be pretty hungry but it doesn't mean I would score any goals! Even far better footballers than me! will still struggle to score in the absence of any decent service.

That's a definite "back from the pub" nonsense post!

Whats nonsense about it?

Apart from the first line of your post Rother Ia gree with both yours and Royalblue's posts. Anyone thinking that a massive improvement isn't needed is living on Pluto. We were absolutely lucky as sin to get away from Forest with a draw, had they had their forwards fit they'd have won that game deservedly comfortably. Reading were abysmal at Dagenham and again were lucky to get through that one, solid and decent at times against a wretched Plymouth, the first opposition they play who will be in the top half of the CCC and they were battered. Massive improvement is needed next week against a shot shy Palace, 0-0 anyone?

[Moderator 5]

You're only as good as the players you have imo and we don't have the right players anymore. Lack of confidence, lack of interest, splits in the dressing room - I don't know what the reasons are - but we haven't looked "up for it" since we kicked off against Forest. We have a week to find 2 maybe 3 more players - players who won't cost the earth in either transfer fees or wages and playes who can do a job for us. I'm not going to hold my breath. You could bring in Sir Alex Ferguson at this point, but I seriously doubt even he'd do any better what with our limitations and all.

[PEARCEY]

Five key problems for me. The squad should be good enough...8 of the starting 11 were in the Championship side of 2005/2006 that walked away with this division. Some of those players are possibly past their best but the likes of Lita, Doyle and Convey should be better now than three years ago when they were still learning their trade. With the likes of Bikey and Matejovsky to come back in and with more promising youngsters than three years ago this squad should be there or thereabouts...but at the moment they are performing way below expectation.
Problem 1..Lack of confidence. Players are under-perfoming and I think the strikers are particularly short on confidence. Its more than that though. Sidwell gave the team that abrasive, cock-sure confidence. Its been missing since he left. He may not be the greatest footballer in the world but without him the team have lost the confidence they had three years ago.
Problem 2 Lack of specialist left back and ball winner in midfield. Its not acceptable to play Hunt at left back in a make ends meet solution to a position that everybody knew would have to be filled twelve long months ago.
The lack of a decent ball-winner in midfield since Sidwell's departure has been glaringly obvious for too long and should also have been sorted out by now.
Problem 3 Coppell's tactics/dressing room.....Surely Coppell can switch from 4-4-2 and move away from playing two widemen all the time. I like Convey but he is not doing enough at the moment and I would rather see a third central midfielder in the side. If that means we play with less width so be it but at the moment playing with two wide players away from home isn't going to work and we will struggle to stop the back four from being exposed.
The lack of effective tactical substitutions isn't helping. Bring on Hunt and Long earlier if need be but give them some time on the pitch Steve.
I also wonder if the likes of Lita and Sonko are really committed to Coppell after last seasons bust-ups.
Problem 4 We need a strong captain. Murts is an excellent captain. Harper isn't. Nor is Ingi. We miss Murt's leadership, his passion, his desire. He really cares for the club. Do some of the others??
Problem 5 The serious lack of investment in the last couple of seasons has meant the club are in danger of going backwards. That lack of investment extends to Madejski's unwillingness to accept that in this day and age modern footballers wages are ridiculous but then again so is the TV revenue coming into the clubs which I'm sure the chairmain isn't complaining about. if we are paying less in wages than other clubs then players wont join will they??

We are in danger of going backwards but the players are primarily culpable. They should be playing a lot better than they are and need to get their backsides in gear because we cannot afford to fall too far off the pace so early on.

[howser]

Spot on Pearcy with all those points, I agree that JM is not going to change the face of football with his one man anti wage and transfer fee views, far from it, we will just get weaker as we buy players of less ability, and as far as the captaincy goes, here is one to get the massses going, Stephen Hunt should take the arm band the one player who displays all the effort and enthusiasm that we expect.

[Plymouth_Royal]

havent been to see reading that much being down here in plymouth but have heard everygame on the radio and watched as many games as i can on the net.
But i can still say that i think ur spot on pearcy. however, alot of these problems can and will change in my opinion.
yea we are a side with a seriuos lack of confidence at the moment especially those players who played nearly every game last season. lita, doyle, ingi, rosenior, harper and hahnemann to a lesser extent all havent been setting the world alight in there first four/three games and im hoping once some of these guys are given a "rest", then the rest of the team will benefit with renewed confidence. look at kebe, he hardly played last season and he's been one of our better players, unfortunatly i cant say the same about cisse.
left back situation is a joke how can you know that your most gifted and important player at the time will be leaving for almost a year and not do anything about it, hunt is wasted back there and leaves us exposed at the back when he bombs forward. but golbourne is coming back and will be given a chance by coppell. Not saying i rate him at all but they way coppell is he would only feel obliged to give the boy a chance and if it doesnt work out i can see us going into the loan market in september.
as for a ball winner, i think coppell has been kidding himself if he thinks that gunnarsson and cisse can play there and its now time to move on. they've been given more than enough chances and have failed to step up to plate. bikey is the only player who could do that role in my opinion but only if he's part of a five man midfield.
as for his tactics im not guna question coppell as we dont have any other options to change them, gunnarsson, MM and karacan have been unavailable in midfield through injuries so he hasnt had a choice really.
were still only 3 league games into the season and we have a few players coming back that definatley will be playin in the startin 11 in doobs, bikey, golbourne/new left back, n.hunt, mooney and MM. I think we have every rite to be concerned with the current 11 but im going to be more worried when these guys are back playing and were still languishing in mid table.

[Arch]

A lot of people have been hoping for a direct Sidwell replacement, or a like-for-like for Kitson or Shorey. I don't think it works that way. We can't hope to take the 05/06 team and simply replace components like doing maintenance on a car. Once Sidwell was gone, we really needed a fundamental rebuild. There's a sense that a new team has to be built around Marek, and certainly it's true that the starting point is to identify where our strengths are likely to be. Still after several months, you have to wonder what chance the Marek-based team has of ever coming together. A serious Plan B wouldn't be a bad idea. That means identifying the players who have the spark to do something different - Pearce, Karacan, NHunt, for example - and letting them do their thing.

[papereyes]

A lot of people have been hoping for a direct Sidwell replacement, or a like-for-like for Kitson or Shorey. I don't think it works that way. We can't hope to take the 05/06 team and simply replace components like doing maintenance on a car. Once Sidwell was gone, we really needed a fundamental rebuild. There's a sense that a new team has to be built around Marek, and certainly it's true that the starting point is to identify where our strengths are likely to be. Still after several months, you have to wonder what chance the Marek-based team has of ever coming together. A serious Plan B wouldn't be a bad idea. That means identifying the players who have the spark to do something different - Pearce, Karacan, NHunt, for example - and letting them do their thing.

I agree but even you would agree that, so far, we have neither replaced the players that fitted the system (ie a like for like Sidwell) or adapted the style to fit the new players that we have brought in.

I think a lot of the comments about the club would be removed if they were a bit more open about this being a transitional season.

[howser]

Spot on Arch, if we arnt going to buy new players to replace the ones that have gone then we should put our trust in the younger lads and those you have mentioned fully deserve their chance to show what they can do, also it would get lots of disgruntled fans of from the management back as we could be seen to be trying to do something, whereas at the moment we seem to be standing still, irrespective of results we get the same team week in week out, this is really begining to sound like "player power" and I wonder just who runs the dressing room, or are there more disruptive voices in there other than Kitson and Shorey as they have now departed and it all seems to be the same ??

[Stranded]

I'm not concerned at the moment as it was one game in isolation - and we did look better going forward but this obviously cost us defensively - we need to find the right balance for us.

The next game against Palace is quite important to see how the squad can now react and to an extent how the fans react. If we pick up 3 points and move on then we can draw a line under the defeat and move on - if however we look like beginning a run like the second half of last year there will be real grounds for concern.

At the moment, it is just one defeat in four games this season - performances need to improve but it is results that matter at the end of it all.

[papereyes]

I'm not really all that sure you can call it 'one game in isolation'.

Taking league games, our strikers haven't scored and in two of them, not really looked like creating much, we've actually only scored from set pieces, we've not looked like we've got a midfield. This was the case in the two games before Charlton and was the case at the Charlton game.

Maybe things will just click, but things rarely 'just happen' in football.

Lastly, performances and results are very, very closely linked. You can play badly and win the odd game, but at some point, you have to start playing well.

[Kes]

at some point you have to be able to string a few passes together.

[papereyes]

at some point you have to be able to string a few passes together.

HOOOOOOOOFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

[Stranded]

I'm not denying that results & performances aren't linked in some way hence why I said performances have to improve and soon.

That's why next week is important. If we can bounce straight back with a win over Palace then 7pts from 12 is not a bad start esp when not playing well. So far we've had two decent defensive performances and one on Saturday where we looked better ie created chances, but lost it a bit at the back - we need to find that little bit of balance and then we can move forward.

I understand some peoples concerns but there are some positives there (along with the negatives). I agree that things rarely just click but there will be hard work going on at the moment and one good performance could make all the difference.

[readingbedding]

Not concerned at all. Charlton really stepped it up after 2-2.
If they played like that all season, they'd be promoted.

[IMAMATEOFJOVSKY]

Not concerned at all. Charlton really stepped it up after 2-2.
If they played like that all season, they'd be promoted.

So on form its them, Brum and Wolves

[Stranded]

Form means nothing at the moment.

If two of our games were against poor sides then at least two of Brums have been - Barnsley & Soton both amongst the favourites to go down. They've also played two at home compared to our two away.

As we all agree, there is need for improvement but there are some decent signs there - we never gave up on Saturday, coming back from 2 down and creating some very decent chances when 4-2 down and with 10 men. It's too early to form any decent judgement on any side.

Come the October international break, if things haven't changed then my tune probably will.

[papereyes]

Form means nothing at the moment.

Totally agree with that and the rest of the post. 4 games is not a statistically significant amount.