The record books show an improvement of one place under Pardew the following season but the reality is that nine years ago today we were slap bang in the middle of a fourth relegation battle in five seasons, as it was only the open-cheque-book approach of Mr Mad and the arrival of an inspired (and perhaps otherwise limited) motivator ontot he coaching staff that gave us the momentum to pull well clear in the end. A tenth place finish maybe, but 99/00 had Pants Day and then a series of fan-driven theme days which coincided with a genuine upturn in the fortunes of a club which had been depressed for the previous 4 and a half seasons. 99/00 actually remains, strangely, one of my favourite seasons following RFC; in the days of pre-plasticity (other than the empty seats) we still had a small but loyal fanbase who were beginning to enjoy their football again.
Since then, every season bar one has been determined by the last ninety minutes of football. In 00/01 play off dispair, 01/02 promotion with 13 minutes left, 02/03 play off despair, 03/04 & 04/05 despiar at not even reaching the bloody play offs. In 06/07 we should have qualified for bloody europe of all things and last season even the STG's amongst us were beginning to have hope on the final day until Murphy's Law became Sod's Law. The only season since 99/00 were we had nothing to play for on the final day was 05/06. Nothing to play for other than a record points tally and one hundred league goals of course. Most of us had been too drunk on success for several weeks as to be in party mode rather than familiar nail-biting territory anyway.
Why are Reading supporters largely such a miserable and pessimistic bunch? Fans of other clubs have similarly poor play off records (Leeds and Preston spring to mind), but can any other club have put its supporters through such gut-wrenching showpiece final heartache as we endured late on at Wembley in 95 and even later on in Cardiff in 01? Sure, it's only a game, one shouldn't take it so bloody seriously. But nobody likes to be associated with disappointment and failure and I think that sums up perhaps some of the fear on the terraces at the moment. The fear of f*cking up when well placed as we did in 2001, 2003, 2004, 2005, as close as dammit in 2002 and to some extent in 2007. Oh, not to mention 2008 (we were 6 points clear of the drop with 6 games left and the RTG's already had the bunting up, as many of them do now).
Don't get me wrong, we are having a bloody excellent season; 58 goals and 59 points, a goal difference which looks like Microsoft's profit margin rather than the third world debt. But it is that fear again; we all know that Reading won't win the play offs don't we? If Reading do actually win on the big day, say 4-0 for instance, then we all know a short-@rsed scouser will rain on our parade elsewhere and that pictures of goons with stains of tear-drenched facepaint running down their cheeks will adorn the front and back pages of the local rag the following Monday. And Steve Coppell's previous hardly helps.
His record of having things go wrong for him is as bad as ours. His Palace team remarkably led an FA Cup final in 1990 deep in extra time and ended up losing the replay. Three years later his Palace team secured a record points tally for a side relegated from the Premier League as they were relegated on the final day. Coppell's side repeated final day heartbreak last year of course, and four years ago his side went from a similar position to where we are now to an almost improbable seventh place by recording a sensationally awful (not to mention uninspiring!) 12 games without a win! Four years ago Coppell stoutly, almost cheerfully, refused to change a non-winning side during that run and last season as we recorded the run of 8 losses on the giddying spin which ultimately took us down he was almost protective of his beloveds.
A genius in many senses of football management and by a country mile this door old club's best ever manager, he won't make the same, time-honoured mistakes again will he? A Reading player hasn't scored in the last 6 dull and uninspiring hours of football. Kneejerk! I hear you scream, but we have endured a similar kind of barren run at this stage before! Be brave this time, Steve, and use a handy two week break to take stock and enforce one or two changes (we can debate those changes elsewhere, I suggest as a starting point perhaps Jimmy Kebe is a good player, sign in - in thread title only, rather than concept of course, you understand
). Lets come back strong, give those Bristolian yokels another thrashing which they always so richly deserve and kick-start this thing again. Promotion this season, ironically, doesn't seem as urgent as it was in 05/06. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. But as the parachute unfurls, will we ever have a better chance to get back to where we once (sort of) belonged? I say ironically it doesn't seem as urgent, because of course in 05/06 in reality we were so far clear of the chasing pack we were like Linford Christie racing against Douglas Bader. But having failed for, ooh, around 135 years we were all nervously anticipating the job finally getting done, as we eventually did so, a mere 6 furlongs clear of the others. This time out we are, let us be honest, far inferior in terms of playing personnel to that great since of 05/06 and the fear must be that - given we don't have and never have had the momentum we had back then - Coppell's at times parochial attitude towards his team selection might cost us. The third placed team in the Championship has actually gone on and won the last three or four play-off finals. You can guarantee that dear old Reading - the only team in over one hundred years not to get promoted from this level by finishing 2nd, you will recall - would be the club which bucks that trend!
All that said, I fancy a trip to Wembley. An 80,000 crowd watching Reading, on a hot day hopefully. A few beers at Paddington en route, scores of folk bedecked in blue and white waving flags on Wembley Way and lets face it the only chance we will get to play a major 'final' there. This time I might just leave 15 minutes before the end though.
, but very true, we certainly get value for money!
