Next Season

[savage 4 england]

IF we go up. I think we will need:
- A footballing centre back to play alongside Bikey
- A centre midfielder to play alongside Cisse
- A proven striker, who can also hold the ball up
- A winger

[Dirk Gently]

But, in SC's own words, any team would need to invest £100M to be competitive in the PL.

For that to happen there would need to be either a change of owner or a substantial change in football financing/hierarchy.

If the former happened, and money was thrown at the team, we would most probably turn into a very different club to the one we are now - and a lot of the reason that many of us love the club would diminish.

Talk about a rock and a hard place.

[brendywendy]

Seriously, no-one will want to buy us.

no one would want to buy a team that gets promoted from the championship, has a low wage bill, rapidly receding debt burden, planning permission for ground extension, with a proven track record of improving players and selling at huge profits?

why not?

[brendywendy]

Reading need to sign pretty much an entire new team minus three or four players (goalkeeper, Pearce, Bikey and Doyle) in order to have a side capable of establishing itself in the Premiership. This is why for all the bluster, I still don't see that any improvement whatsoever has been made in the last three years - if anything we've gone backwards.

what a surprise!

i think 3 players is being a little bit hard, but thats just my optimistic opinion

before the last time we went up, many of us have said ingi, murts, hunt, etc wouldnt cut the mustard either !

id give karacan and pearce outside chances at making it, and with cisse and kebe full of confidence/experience, coming into the prem anew, theyve still a chance to prove last season a one off
matejovski/armstrong also with potential, and a point to prove
as would lita, and nhunt

we will need at least 1 new CB, 1 new winger, 1 new striker in the summer-plus replacements for any others leaving, and some proven competition for some places
with more brought in in jan if the above list of current players doesnt prove themselves
though, tbf, im totally agreed that this team is a shadow of the 05/06 team, and should therefore be treated a little harder than their predecessors on promotion(if it happens)

so in terms of three years we may have gone backwards as a squad, but forward massively as a club in terms of profile and respect in the game etc
since last year however, i think we have made a pretty significant step forward in terms of transition, whilst maintaining a hugely competetive team for this league,
no mean feat, considering the graveyard for ex prem teams that is currently the bottom of the championship

[Archie's penalty]

Great thread

[Royalee]

But, in SC's own words, any team would need to invest £100M to be competitive in the PL.

That's bullshit - to challenge for Europe consistently maybe, but certainly not to consolidate, it's just another excuse he's preparing for next year. It's ironic that the more Coppell spends on a player, the worse they turn out to be - perhaps this has more to do with his man-management skills when it comes to bigger egos rather than investment levels.

[Ian Royal]

FWIW I completely agree. But you'll be shot down by people who are so blinkered they think we're playing fantastically well and won't struggle at all.

I'm convinced Coppell will leave at the end of the season, whether we go up or not and that's going to be another major factor. I'd like to see us have Curbishley in his place, if he does go, as he's a similar sort of manager. We NEED to invest in the team, but I doubt we will.

I think you've probably got it nailed on there. Except about us not investing. I doubt we'll invest nearly as much as many want. But I think we'll see a bigger and more expensive influx of players than we did when we were promoted a couple of years ago.

At the moment I think it's 50/50 whether Coppell would leave when we get promoted. And tbh, I think you can argue both him staying as a good thing, and also him leaving as one... provided we get the right replacement.

[SteveRoyal]

This is insane

You can't start complaining about next season already

+1

[rabidbee]

Please, not Curbishley.

[Royalee]

Reading need to sign pretty much an entire new team minus three or four players (goalkeeper, Pearce, Bikey and Doyle) in order to have a side capable of establishing itself in the Premiership. This is why for all the bluster, I still don't see that any improvement whatsoever has been made in the last three years - if anything we've gone backwards.

what a surprise!

i think 3 players is being a little bit hard, but thats just my optimistic opinion

before the last time we went up, many of us have said ingi, murts, hunt, etc wouldnt cut the mustard either !

id give karacan and pearce outside chances at making it, and with cisse and kebe full of confidence/experience, coming into the prem anew, theyve still a chance to prove last season a one off
matejovski/armstrong also with potential, and a point to prove
as would lita, and nhunt

we will need at least 1 new CB, 1 new winger, 1 new striker in the summer-plus replacements for any others leaving, and some proven competition for some places
with more brought in in jan if the above list of current players doesnt prove themselves
though, tbf, im totally agreed that this team is a shadow of the 05/06 team, and should therefore be treated a little harder than their predecessors on promotion(if it happens)

so in terms of three years we may have gone backwards as a squad, but forward massively as a club in terms of profile and respect in the game etc
since last year however, i think we have made a pretty significant step forward in terms of transition, whilst maintaining a hugely competetive team for this league,
no mean feat, considering the graveyard for ex prem teams that is currently the bottom of the championship

I agree about the reputation within the game, but that was always going to happen with more resources at the club these days thanks to Madejski. However, that doesn't guarantee you Premiership football, the quality of the players you put on the pitch and how you use them does.

Ingimarsson got found out even in the first season in the Premiership to be fair - we were just lucky at how well Sonko played before his injury - after then we conceded more goals. He certainly won't be good enough if we go back up again.

Kebe's too weak for me and relies on pace - he hasn't exactly exploded this year in the way Little and Convey did in 05/06 and neither of those two exactly set the Premiership alight. Cisse I think will be alright as long as he's deployed as a defensive midfielder and sticks to his strengths, Armstrong's only had one season up there which ended in relegation so he's hardly proven and Lita was dreadful in that division apart from the little run he had in January '07.

The concern for me in particularly is that the main weak areas still appear to be right through the middle of the park, which is where the team was most easily exposed last year. This is the hardest place to strengthen and it's going to be extremely difficult to put in place a full functional partnership in midfield and at the back in the space of one pre-season.

[Royalee]

Please, not Curbishley.

Martinez - his teams play good football, he's good at dealing with the media and embraces it and is multi-lingual and has links abroad which is vital in the Premiership when you can't rely on bringing in British players,

[IMAMATEOFJOVSKY]

Please, not Curbishley.

Hopefully Steve Clarke or Martinez

[Horsham Royal]

Assuming the obvious happens and we do go up...

[Kitson12]

Please, not Curbishley.

Hopefully Steve Clarkeor Martinez

Sorry, he has pedigree as an assistant ONLY!
Martinez however is a great, young manager.

[IMAMATEOFJOVSKY]

Please, not Curbishley.

Hopefully Steve Clarkeor Martinez

Sorry, he has pedigree as an assistant ONLY!
Martinez however is a great, young manager.

Mourinho was assistant to Booby Robson at Barcelona - didnt seem to do him any harm! - I guess you are using Donkey Adams as an example when it doesnt work!!

[Ian Royal]

Royalee, the man who thought Derby would win the title this season, when in fact they have been utter dog shite and are in a relegation fight. Not only that, but a man who thinks Coppell - widely recognised as our best ever manager - is useless.

Why on earth would anyone pay any attention to what he thinks we need to do?

[Royal Lady]

Seriously, no-one will want to buy us.

no one would want to buy a team that gets promoted from the championship, has a low wage bill, rapidly receding debt burden, planning permission for ground extension, with a proven track record of improving players and selling at huge profits?

why not?

umm because no-one wanted to buy us the whole of last season when we WERE a prem team, albeit we were relegated at the death.

[Ian Royal]

Seriously, no-one will want to buy us.

no one would want to buy a team that gets promoted from the championship, has a low wage bill, rapidly receding debt burden, planning permission for ground extension, with a proven track record of improving players and selling at huge profits?

why not?

umm because no-one wanted to buy us the whole of last season when we WERE a prem team, albeit we were relegated at the death.

So your whole reckoning is based on that no one has bought us yet, so no one will buy us in the future. That is pretty lame.

[Archie's penalty]

Royalee, the man who thought Derby would win the title this season, when in fact they have been utter dog shite and are in a relegation fight. Not only that, but a man who thinks Coppell - widely recognised as our best ever manager - is useless.

Why on earth would anyone pay any attention to what he thinks we need to do?

Beats me.

[Bristol Paul]

This is insane

You can't start complaining about next season already

I'm not complaining, I'm asking whether others think we have enough strength to survive the Premiership, and if not whether the club is likely to spend heavily or not to keep there, to which the answer looks like no. Stating an opinion that isn't 100% behind the club isn't complaining, it's called having a discussion.

I think the manager has done and is still doing a fantastic job. However, this doesn't mask the fact that SC has some obvious weaknesses such as

1. Tactically not good at changing the pattern of a game, bit of a one-trick pony
2. Too loyal
3. Doesn't seem to learn from past mistakes

I'm confident we'll go up, however I'm also confident that we won't have learned from our mistakes and will struggle like hell unless we invest heavily in better players. For me, Fulham have learned lessons, spent reasonable money on experience, and look like staying up easily. We should be looking at doing the same.