Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

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Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by windermereROYAL » 24 Nov 2021 07:22

Taking the long cold disappointing walk home last night (and it`s happening far too frequently now for my liking)after whatever that was I got a lot of time to take stock of what I want to do regarding my support for this club.
Seriously I`ve been a fan for longer than I care to remember, 30 years at old Elm park, yes it was a dump but it was our dump with it`s very own unique atmosphere, especially under the lights, lots of those noisy buggers on the bus last night only know this shiny newish bowl with no character,
I`m a nostalgic old fool but I prefer the good time at the old place, stood behind both goals before settling under the clock, great atmosphere when the place was full crammed together.
We had some success, promotions and dancing on the pitch, and dropping down to the old division 4. I remember the sad walk back home across Prospect park and kicking the cat when I got through the front door.
The Simod cup in 88 and of course the bone crushing disappointment of what turned out to the first of many play-off defeats.
We all fought and won the Maxwell plan, before eventually SJM came in to rescue us, I was has excited as anyone when he unveiled plans for a spanking new state of the art stadium, and I watched it as it grew in the distance from my bedroom window from my then home in Southcote.
The big day arrived and the walk down Bennett road thinking this was a new dawn beating Luton 3-0 and thinking the sky is the limit, we soon got promoted to the second tier where we have been ever since except for two brief spells in the top flight,
Nobody can forget the 106 season, that will stay entrenched in my memory till my dying day but sadly now that`s all it is..a memory.
What we have now is a million miles from that team and has been since our second relegation, manager`s come and go but apart from the play-off season when we embarrassed ourselves on national tv , it`s been dreadful for want of a better word.
I woke up early today with what is now an oh too familiar feeling, how much longer can I let this club rule my head in this way?
I`ve said it before since we`ve been a fortress madstad that I might not renew but always have.
That long walk up Bennett road chuntering to myself or to anyone that`s cares to listen is such a predictable reality in the new world of my Reading football club.
Will I renew whatever division we are in? of sodding course I will, we can dream the dream that there are better days on the horizon.

But maybe not!!!
Last edited by windermereROYAL on 24 Nov 2021 09:31, edited 3 times in total.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Stranded » 24 Nov 2021 07:28

You've essentially just described getting older and the process of deciding what is still important to you.

Everything was better in the old days as we were all younger and had no responsibility.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by LUX » 24 Nov 2021 07:31

I will always continue to support RFC, but yes, there are frequently disappointing moments. Very frequent.

But I guess that makes the good days better.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Snowflake Royal » 24 Nov 2021 08:30

LUX I will always continue to support RFC, but yes, there are frequently disappointing moments. Very frequent.

But I guess that makes the good days better.

What are good days, they ring a bell from the distant past...

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Stranded » 24 Nov 2021 08:33

Snowflake Royal
LUX I will always continue to support RFC, but yes, there are frequently disappointing moments. Very frequent.

But I guess that makes the good days better.

What are good days, they ring a bell from the distant past...


And they will come back at some point.


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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Snowflake Royal » 24 Nov 2021 08:35

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LUX I will always continue to support RFC, but yes, there are frequently disappointing moments. Very frequent.

But I guess that makes the good days better.

What are good days, they ring a bell from the distant past...


And they will come back at some point.

Will it beat climate devastation and the next 7 managers and 2 owners though.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Stranded » 24 Nov 2021 08:41

Snowflake Royal
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Snowflake Royal What are good days, they ring a bell from the distant past...


And they will come back at some point.

Will it beat climate devastation and the next 7 managers and 2 owners though.


Probably, they normally arrive when you least expect it - no-one saw the 106 coming (or even promotion that season) coming. At some point, something will just click - may be a few years away but we won't recognise it as a good time until it is nearly over.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by NathStPaul » 24 Nov 2021 08:56

I have certainly had enough of going to games. Went to the Forest match for the first time since the restrictions had been lifted and didn't enjoy my experience. Game was decent enough but everything else was just awful. Beer was crap, food was shocking and obscenely expensive, the match day experience was dull and uninspiring much like the football most of the time. I won't be back for a while.

That being said, I am not going to just stop supporting the club. I still care very much about the teams success and will go out of my way to watch our games on TV or listen on the radio. I have just fallen out of love with the live experience I guess, can't justify spending that sort of money on the garbage currently being served up.
Last edited by NathStPaul on 24 Nov 2021 09:10, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Zip » 24 Nov 2021 09:09

Games like last night have happened too frequently for too long. It’s a bit of a slog to get to the game after work and then the wait for the bus back to Mereoak before the 70 mile drive home.

I will always support the club but may quit on the season ticket and pick and chose my games because nights like last night are just not worth the time and expense.


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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by BraisingsteakRoyal » 24 Nov 2021 09:28

Yep - happened to me after the PO final - even the preceding season was an unbearable slog at times. The quality of football (and match day value/experience) has deteriorated over that sort of period IMHO - and therefore so did any 'connection' i ever felt to the club.

Coincided with moving further south, a couple of Braisers Jnrs getting to the age where they were more interested in doing other things on Saturdays - just meant that on balance i can't be @rsed any more. I'll listen on the radio or half heartedly search for an illegal live stream now and again - but thats about it.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by The Green Programme » 24 Nov 2021 09:44

NathStPaul I have certainly had enough of going to games. Went to the Forest match for the first time since the restrictions had been lifted and didn't enjoy my experience. Game was decent enough but everything else was just awful. Beer was crap, food was shocking and obscenely expensive, the match day experience was dull and uninspiring much like the football most of the time. I won't be back for a while.

That being said, I am not going to just stop supporting the club. I still care very much about the teams success and will go out of my way to watch our games on TV or listen on the radio. I have just fallen out of love with the live experience I guess, can't justify spending that sort of money on the garbage currently being served up.


I travel from East Sussex for every home game. I am a season ticket holder.

I have supported the Club since aged 7 in 1970/71. I moved to Sussex in the 1980s.

Leaving home at 10.30am and returning at 10pm on a Saturday and getting back between midnight and 1am for a midweek game makes it a time consuming exercise.

I do think that in the past when in the lower leagues, the Cup games (for example) meant a lot more; just the chance of getting a draw against a ‘big Club’ was so exciting (Arsenal at home in 1972, Wolves at home and Southampton home and away in 1978 all treasured memories)

Wealdstone away in 1977 was not so much fun!

The Cup games added glamour to the season.

Now (apart from 2015) the cup games get in the way of our chase for the Prem and when we’re not chasing the Prem, the season becomes so flat.

Last night was really awful. One of the worst games I have seen for years and Saturday was only marginally better.

I cannot put my finger on what it is.

The 106 season (what a team, what a squad, every position taken by a top, top footballer and many positions covered by more than one) which was made all the sweeter by the heartbreak of the Walsall defeat at Cardiff that preceeded our rise with Pardew’’s and then Coppell’s team and (from Jamie Cureton, Martin Butler and John Salako to Kitson, Doyle, Lita et al)

They were (thus far - I am a believer) the pinnacle and it was so just that SJM was at the helm in those glory days. We can all have a moan about the Club and those involved but if we just take a step back and stop and think about what SJM did for the Club; it is beyond dreams.

We won the Championship twice. We broke the all time points record in doing so the first time and we finished 8th in the Prem.

This is Reading Football Club we are talking about.

When SJM took over, we were a basket case. And look what was achieved.

We had a soul throughout those glory days partly because of the painful ones that preceded them (I still run through the Rougier (I think) own goal at Cardiff in my head; watching the ball sail back and in - that was unjust, unfair and torturous)

Bolton at Wembley was even worse; with our special, special team that could really play and should’ve won the league that year (Osborne, Gooding and Nogan et al)

Today, for whatever reason, there is something missing; even though the quality of the players is right up there; and our owners are committed; and our manager is, on the whole, of good quality; it all seems so soulless and directionless right now.

Some of our football yesterday was just awful. The atmosphere, despite the seemingly endless enthusiasm (almost passion) of Club 1871, was often drab and grey and nondescript.

We need something; but I am not sure what it is that we need.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Norfolk Royal » 24 Nov 2021 09:48

There's been more disappointment than good times following Reading for sure, but there's a certain nobility about it which you can play on with fans of other teams, that's the way I play it anyway.

Latest kick in the teeth, as if I needed one, was noting that the Sheffield full back Bogle - by some way the best player on the pitch last night - was released from the Reading academy when he was 14. Ffs.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by windermereROYAL » 24 Nov 2021 09:49

The Green Programme
NathStPaul I have certainly had enough of going to games. Went to the Forest match for the first time since the restrictions had been lifted and didn't enjoy my experience. Game was decent enough but everything else was just awful. Beer was crap, food was shocking and obscenely expensive, the match day experience was dull and uninspiring much like the football most of the time. I won't be back for a while.

That being said, I am not going to just stop supporting the club. I still care very much about the teams success and will go out of my way to watch our games on TV or listen on the radio. I have just fallen out of love with the live experience I guess, can't justify spending that sort of money on the garbage currently being served up.


I travel from East Sussex for every home game. I am a season ticket holder.

I have supported the Club since aged 7 in 1970/71. I moved to Sussex in the 1980s.

Leaving home at 10.30am and returning at 10pm on a Saturday and getting back between midnight and 1am for a midweek game makes it a time consuming exercise.

I do think that in the past when in the lower leagues, the Cup games (for example) meant a lot more; just the chance of getting a draw against a ‘big Club’ was so exciting (Arsenal at home in 1972, Wolves at home and Southampton home and away in 1978 all treasured memories)

Wealdstone away in 1977 was not so much fun!

The Cup games added glamour to the season.

Now (apart from 2015) the cup games get in the way of our chase for the Prem and when we’re not chasing the Prem, the season becomes so flat.

Last night was really awful. One of the worst games I have seen for years and Saturday was only marginally better.

I cannot put my finger on what it is.

The 106 season (what a team, what a squad, every position taken by a top, top footballer and many positions covered by more than one) which was made all the sweeter by the heartbreak of the Walsall defeat at Cardiff that preceeded our rise with Pardew’’s and then Coppell’s team and (from Jamie Cureton, Martin Butler and John Salako to Kitson, Doyle, Lita et al)

They were (thus far - I am a believer) the pinnacle and it was so just that SJM was at the helm in those glory days. We can all have a moan about the Club and those involved but if we just take a step back and stop and think about what SJM did for the Club; it is beyond dreams.

We won the Championship twice. We broke the all time points record in doing so the first time and we finished 8th in the Prem.

This is Reading Football Club we are talking about.

When SJM took over, we were a basket case. And look what was achieved.

We had a soul throughout those glory days partly because of the painful ones that preceded them (I still run through the Rougier (I think) own goal at Cardiff in my head; watching the ball sail back and in - that was unjust, unfair and torturous)

Bolton at Wembley was even worse; with our special, special team that could really play and should’ve won the league that year (Osborne, Gooding and Nogan et al)

Today, for whatever reason, there is something missing; even though the quality of the players is right up there; and our owners are committed; and our manager is, on the whole, of good quality; it all seems so soulless and directionless right now.

Some of our football yesterday was just awful. The atmosphere, despite the seemingly endless enthusiasm (almost passion) of Club 1871, was often drab and grey and nondescript.

We need something; but I am not sure what it is that we need.


Kudos, top top post and so true.


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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by NathStPaul » 24 Nov 2021 09:58

I don't want to speak for anyone but I think the majority can accept losing games of football, we have all been around long enough to understand you cannot win every game and some seasons your team can lose far more than they win. What is hard/impossible to stomach is a lack of determination and effort. There has been a real lack of passion at our club for a number of seasons now, very rarely will you see us giving it a good go in games and camping in our opponents box. If we had thrown the kitchen sink at Sheffield United last night then none of us would be sitting here slagging off the team, we'd have been unlucky against what is a decent opposition. The fact is we played like getting the equaliser wasn't that important, that then causes the frustration amongst the supporters and rightly so.

Last night is the classic example of a lack of passion and commitment for me, the players didn't really look too concerned about being a goal down and neither did the manager. Sometimes in games of football you just have to go for it, we showed no sign of going for anything last night. It was drab, dour and uninspiring which is seemingly the new norm for the club. Look at our attendances, look how many never came back to watch football after the restrictions were lifted. People didn't and don't miss it, the players and club have to make the stay away supporters miss it and they just aren't.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Millsy » 24 Nov 2021 10:14

When I used to get thousands of people to sing "Reading Till I Die" I f**king well meant it, or I'd have never done it and noone would've joined in.

Born here. End of story.

BUT I'm fed up with football in general, with zero loyalty players, increasing wealth gap, ridiculous power of agents, stupid wages, cheating footballing cultures etc etc and so it's become less important, but will I ever stop supporting my LOCAL CLUB. F**k no.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Zip » 24 Nov 2021 10:16

NathStPaul I don't want to speak for anyone but I think the majority can accept losing games of football, we have all been around long enough to understand you cannot win every game and some seasons your team can lose far more than they win. What is hard/impossible to stomach is a lack of determination and effort. There has been a real lack of passion at our club for a number of seasons now, very rarely will you see us giving it a good go in games and camping in our opponents box. If we had thrown the kitchen sink at Sheffield United last night then none of us would be sitting here slagging off the team, we'd have been unlucky against what is a decent opposition. The fact is we played like getting the equaliser wasn't that important, that then causes the frustration amongst the supporters and rightly so.

Last night is the classic example of a lack of passion and commitment for me, the players didn't really look too concerned about being a goal down and neither did the manager. Sometimes in games of football you just have to go for it, we showed no sign of going for anything last night. It was drab, dour and uninspiring which is seemingly the new norm for the club. Look at our attendances, look how many never came back to watch football after the restrictions were lifted. People didn't and don't miss it, the players and club have to make the stay away supporters miss it and they just aren't.



Agreed.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by Snowflake Royal » 24 Nov 2021 10:21

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And they will come back at some point.

Will it beat climate devastation and the next 7 managers and 2 owners though.


Probably, they normally arrive when you least expect it - no-one saw the 106 coming (or even promotion that season) coming. At some point, something will just click - may be a few years away but we won't recognise it as a good time until it is nearly over.

I saw promotion coming that season, thanks

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by genome » 24 Nov 2021 10:22

BraisingsteakRoyal Yep - happened to me after the PO final - even the preceding season was an unbearable slog at times. The quality of football (and match day value/experience) has deteriorated over that sort of period IMHO - and therefore so did any 'connection' i ever felt to the club.


Yeah, I'd echo that. The 2017/18 season was where I think apathy started setting in for a lot of supporters.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by genome » 24 Nov 2021 10:25

Zip
NathStPaul I don't want to speak for anyone but I think the majority can accept losing games of football, we have all been around long enough to understand you cannot win every game and some seasons your team can lose far more than they win. What is hard/impossible to stomach is a lack of determination and effort. There has been a real lack of passion at our club for a number of seasons now, very rarely will you see us giving it a good go in games and camping in our opponents box. If we had thrown the kitchen sink at Sheffield United last night then none of us would be sitting here slagging off the team, we'd have been unlucky against what is a decent opposition. The fact is we played like getting the equaliser wasn't that important, that then causes the frustration amongst the supporters and rightly so.

Last night is the classic example of a lack of passion and commitment for me, the players didn't really look too concerned about being a goal down and neither did the manager. Sometimes in games of football you just have to go for it, we showed no sign of going for anything last night. It was drab, dour and uninspiring which is seemingly the new norm for the club. Look at our attendances, look how many never came back to watch football after the restrictions were lifted. People didn't and don't miss it, the players and club have to make the stay away supporters miss it and they just aren't.



Agreed.


Actually, I'd say Carroll looked like he gave a fcuk last night. The rest didn't seem to, but I don't really think footballers tend to not care, they just looked a bit clueless and shot of confidence.

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Re: Do you sometimes think you`ve had enough.

by LUX » 24 Nov 2021 10:28

Norfolk Royal There's been more disappointment than good times following Reading for sure, but there's a certain nobility about it which you can play on with fans of other teams, that's the way I play it anyway.



lol, I try that one too.

ps I'm older the The Green Programme, and been a supporter since 1968/69 (aged 7/8).

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