The Summer clearout / Coming in thread. Updated 27/8

[Svlad Cjelli]

I dunno, you either want to take risks in life for what you love or stagnate in limbo. Our promotion push this season was a fluke, and any success we have next season will be an added bonus to being “a stable business” of a player factory for genuine football clubs with ambition.

With every risk there is an impact. If the impact in this case is the club not existing then the risk is too high to take on.

[Barry the bird boggler]

If you want to run a club like the way Reading is run, then the vital ingredients are the management team and scouting network as it is these boys who have to pick exactly the right squad of players that are going to make for a sucessful team.

Success is harder to come by and takes longer going down this route, but it is not impossible.

[roadrunner]

I dunno, you either want to take risks in life for what you love or stagnate in limbo. Our promotion push this season was a fluke, and any success we have next season will be an added bonus to being “a stable business” of a player factory for genuine football clubs with ambition.

With every risk there is an impact. If the impact in this case is the club not existing then the risk is too high to take on.

Agreed, which makes it more frustrating when you see the likes of Leicester and Portsmouth spend money they don't have and carry on after the shite hits the fan as if nothing ever happened. Clubs just don't get punished serverly enough for it.

[Man Friday]

I dunno, you either want to take risks in life for what you love or stagnate in limbo. Our promotion push this season was a fluke, and any success we have next season will be an added bonus to being “a stable business” of a player factory for genuine football clubs with ambition.

With every proposed action there is a potential risk. If the risk in this case is the club not existing then it is too high to take on.

(Impact is one side of the 'Risk Equation', the other side being Likelihood.)

[Svlad Cjelli]

I dunno, you either want to take risks in life for what you love or stagnate in limbo. Our promotion push this season was a fluke, and any success we have next season will be an added bonus to being “a stable business” of a player factory for genuine football clubs with ambition.

With every proposed action there is a potential risk. If the risk in this case is the club not existing then it is too high to take on.

(Impact is one side of the 'Risk Equation', the other side being Likelihood.)

Indeed - I was simplifying....

In this case likelihood increases the more that other clubs are doing the same. With only three promotion places available as soon as six other clubs are spending more than you then the chance of that risk event happening becomes more than evens.

[Extended-Phenotype]

what a lot of rot.

Hardly rot, really. If we were coping with Gylfi, when he is sold for more than we conceived, we would cope with a 4m bump and 3m on replacement.

and JM has absolutely nowt to do with contract renewals, wage structure etc. he puts the management team in place, tells them what the budget is ie-they must live within their means, and the decisions are left totally to hammond and McD.

JM sets the figures, pedantry aside, it’s JM who defines what we can pay a player, sell players, or buy players. Or are we literally going down the line of blaming the postman for delivering the letter that Hammond’s secretary put in an envelope that Hammond signed that…

love it when posters blather on about "no investment" and "having no ambition"; its both inaccurate and lazy and is symptomatic of how those kids (because generally they are kids) view football today; if you aren't in the Premier League, boasting to all your mates at play-time about the latest overseas over-hyped mercenary your club has signed for £Millions, then the club you "support" is nothing.

With all due respect, I did emphasise quite clearly in my post I’m not interested in hurling money around like banks. I’m merely stating that, as a supporter who invests in the club, I’d like to see a fair percentage of any funds gained from player sales, reflected on the pitch.

I’m proud of our academy, but I don’t think even the tightest of supporters would expect a star player to be replaced by a teenage rookie.

you seriously should be following another club.

I’m a little ashamed of myself for rising to such a football forum cliché, but I’m no less a supporter than you for feeling frustrated that our club is becoming a bit of a feeder for those who once were our equals.

If we are to sell anybody who reaches a level of quality which may see us reach a higher tier, are we not allowing ourselves to remain idle with only the luck of unknowns becoming top quality acting as a leverage to higher positions? Even then, they would have to act fast to have any impact before the for sale board is wedged down their shirt neck.

When it comes down to it, clubs DO take risks. I’m just not sure this quest for total stability is actually demonstrating any benefit!

[Svlad Cjelli]

We do take risks. Just not risks that threaten the very existence of the club.

[Extended-Phenotype]

We do take risks. Just not risks that threaten the very existence of the club.

Yeah, because any critic of our operation in the transfer market is demanding we spend 80m on Ozil. It’s telling that in order to win an argument, some people need to take the conflicting opinion to the extreme.


Ok, let’s take a real example as bench test.

In the January window, struggling with strikers, we take the economical route and sign a forward with no record. The other option would have been the impulsive route and fork out more for a proven player.

The economical route landed us with a man who is left panting when he blinks, and missing automatic promotion. There is no supporter of the club who would honestly say we couldn’t have improved our performance with more bollocks in the strike department.

All in all, even the notion that spending more is impulsive, is rather hysterical –money spent on a players transfer is swapping capital for asset, not throwing it away.

And to reiterate, because I think it’s important when people get frenzied about criticism, I’m not asking JM to bankrupt the club by signing Ronaldo. But a bit more financial flexibility may have seen us secure a striker that was useful with immediate effect, rather than the tiresome adage of “one for the future” who has little impact on the campaign at the time.

Now we are at a new crossroad – economical = sell Long for a sackful, stick Simon “can’t score a goal intentionally” Chuch into his boots and see how he gets on. Speculative = reject offers and step outside ourselves to some extent financially to keep Long another season.

I just happen to be one of those supporters that feels the latter is a more effective route to success.

[brendywendy]

what a lot of rot.

Hardly rot, really. If we were coping with Gylfi, when he is sold for more than we conceived, we would cope with a 4m bump and 3m on replacement.

and JM has absolutely nowt to do with contract renewals, wage structure etc. he puts the management team in place, tells them what the budget is ie-they must live within their means, and the decisions are left totally to hammond and McD.

JM sets the figures, pedantry aside, it’s JM who defines what we can pay a player, sell players, or buy players. Or are we literally going down the line of blaming the postman for delivering the letter that Hammond’s secretary put in an envelope that Hammond signed that…


!

its rot because saying we brought in 7 million, therefore we should be able to spend 7 million is daft as it doesnt take into account our outgoings.or the idea that spending every penny we have right now isnt good business.

JM sets the figure as in- this is our predicted revenue. you work your outgoings however you want. just ensure that outgoings does not exceed incoming moneys.
other than you thinking he should somehow give away his own money, im not sure what he can do about any of that.

[brendywendy]

We do take risks. Just not risks that threaten the very existence of the club.

Yeah, because any critic of our operation in the transfer market is demanding we spend 80m on Ozil. It’s telling that in order to win an argument, some people need to take the conflicting opinion to the extreme.


Ok, let’s take a real example as bench test.

In the January window, struggling with strikers, we take the economical route and sign a forward with no record. The other option would have been the impulsive route and fork out more for a proven player.

The economical route landed us with a man who is left panting when he blinks, and missing automatic promotion. There is no supporter of the club who would honestly say we couldn’t have improved our performance with more bollocks in the strike department.

All in all, even the notion that spending more is impulsive, is rather hysterical –money spent on a players transfer is swapping capital for asset, not throwing it away.

And to reiterate, because I think it’s important when people get frenzied about criticism, I’m not asking JM to bankrupt the club by signing Ronaldo. But a bit more financial flexibility may have seen us secure a striker that was useful with immediate effect, rather than the tiresome adage of “one for the future” who has little impact on the campaign at the time.

Now we are at a new crossroad – economical = sell Long for a sackful, stick Simon “can’t score a goal intentionally” Chuch into his boots and see how he gets on. Speculative = reject offers and step outside ourselves to some extent financially to keep Long another season.

I just happen to be one of those supporters that feels the latter is a more effective route to success.

no one is saying you want to sign ozil.
but as a rule we have done far batter with tyhe low cost punts than multi million pound players, and you only have to look around this league to see countless players bought for millions, payed millions, and doing very little in terms of scoring goals and creating goals, so your logic is still flawed.

[nailseabiscuitman]

Added to which is the oncoming UEFA Fair Play rules that come into force shortly; paying over the odds on wages will damage the club in future years.

I love it when posters blather on about "no investment" and "having no ambition"; its both inaccurate and lazy and is symptomatic of how those kids (because generally they are kids) view football today; if you aren't in the Premier League, boasting to all your mates at play-time about the latest overseas over-hyped mercenary your club has signed for £Millions, then the club you "support" is nothing.

Whats the point of having an Academy if those young players coming through the system don't end up playing for you?? I don't see the fact that a growing number of our 1st team squad are from our Academy as anything but a good thing - in fact, I'd go so far as to say it makes supporting RFC more satisfying when 5 or 6 of the starting 11 for a game have come through the ranks, rather than been brought or, even worse (like Cardiff last season) been parachuted into the team on loan.

And yet....... some posters see the emergence of home grown young talent from the Academy graduating into the 1st team as some sort of indication that SJM is a tightwad!



Such a tightwad, that he bankrolled the Academy to the tune of nearly £500k a Year for a number of Years before we starting seeing players come through.

How dare you come on here talking sense!!!
It always appears that the players who come through the system or are local are remembered long after the "big money" signings

[Royal Rother]

The economical route landed us with a man who is left panting when he blinks...

Ok, that made me laugh. You can stay.

[Extended-Phenotype]

its rot because saying we brought in 7 million, therefore we should be able to spend 7 million is daft

Then it isn’t rot, because that isn’t what I said. Again, distorting the opposing view to the extreme isn’t a sound counter-argument. To reiterate, I wasn’t even asking we spend a third of what we brought in at the time. I’d have said a reasonable yet ambitious recycling of the Gylfi money would have been 2m, which would have secured us a player whose impact would have been more immediate than Asda-Price Manset who is exhausted after tying his shoelace.

other than you thinking he should somehow give away his own money

What, investment? What an insane but delicious idea…

countless players [are] bought for millions, payed millions, and doing very little in terms of scoring goals

That’s why I describe it as a risk; I’m not suggesting spending 2m guarantees goals whereas 500k guarantees you an expensive bench weight. However, I’d wager there is a strong coloration between cost and goals. Otherwise football would seem to existing outside universal constants, meaning it was an alternative reality where yes meant no, and people would eat excrement and defecate perfect roast dinners.

So, no – my logic is well, logical. Though I agree the end of the last paragraph may contradict that.

[Red]

Hi Extended-Phenotype, a bel8d welcome to the board.

[brendywendy]

generally there is great correlation- svlad has stats on that i believe
at RFC that correlation does not exist.

regardless of the percerntage of the 7 million you want spent- its impossible to come to a figure without knowing the outgoings, and the state of finances at the club. yes we could spend a 1/3 if thats what we had left, but we dont know that. me may have none left.



if investment means putting money into the club so he can tyake out more when he leaves, id rather he didnt, and we just go on spending what we make cheers.

if by investment you mean giving us money, and not wanting it back, then fair enough, bring it on.

[Svlad Cjelli]

......
Now we are at a new crossroad – economical = sell Long for a sackful, stick Simon “can’t score a goal intentionally” Chuch into his boots and see how he gets on. Speculative = reject offers and step outside ourselves to some extent financially to keep Long another season.

I just happen to be one of those supporters that feels the latter is a more effective route to success.

There are no guarantees, though - that approach increases the likelihood of success, it doesn't ensure it.

And I think you're under costing it, too - because you can't treat players in isolation.

let's say we offered Shane Long an extra £5k a week to keep him (It wouldn't, though - the average salary in the Premier League is 4.5 times greater than in Tier two - and you're also assuming all he cares about is money. How do you know he's not moving because he believes that he can play at a higher level and wants the chance?)

But assuming that £5K a week would do it, it wouldn't just be the extra £260k a year (plus employment costs of about 18%). Because all the player know what all the others earn (and if they don't all their agents do...).

So raise the money of the top earner at the club and you then have a queue of players at the door saying "his money's gone up, mine needs to go up as well" - and before you know it that pay increase has rippled down across the whole squad, and it's not just £260k a year, it's a couple of million across the whole squad.

Oh, and you're competing with clubs who have parachute payments of £16M a year for two years - so the sort of amounts you're talking about won't let us compete with them - we'd have to double the wage bill to do that.

And, of course, the FL TV contract this year is worth £23m less a season - that's about £800k less to each Tier One club before you start raising wage levels.

[Extended-Phenotype]

Hello Red, and thanks for the pat on the back Royal Rother.

It always appears that the players who come through the system or are local are remembered long after the "big money" signings

Yeah! Don’t criticise our approach to signing players, we are SHIT at it! Or is that not what is meant here?

yes we could spend a 1/3 if thats what we had left, but we dont know that. me may have none left.

I’m not sure what makes Reading so much more expensive to run than any other club in the division. I just see us as a standard football club who has tighter purse strings than everyone else, and am speculating where we may be if they were loosed. Some are saying we would explode in a ball of flames and the entire club and it’s supporters would contract HIV. I think that’s a tad hysterical. Some think we might have given ourselves more of a fighting chance for promotion. I think that’s pretty rational.

if investment means putting money into the club so he can tyake out more when he leaves, id rather he didn’t

Are you saying any investment would categorically fail to give a return? Somebody should tell Theo Pafitiititiuisis. Oh and anyone JM wants to sell the club to, because apparently they don’t have to pay him any money for it.

if by investment you mean giving us money, and not wanting it back, then fair enough, bring it on.

Well, it’s actually not unheard of for people to put money into a hobby or something they love for no financial return. Shit, I’ve been doing it with Reading FC all my life.

[Extended-Phenotype]

(apologies for double post - missed out svlad)

“that approach increases the likelihood of success, it doesn't ensure it.”

And I said as much. It’s called ambition.

How do you know he's not moving because he believes that he can play at a higher level and wants the chance

Oh for sure, there is little we can do but try in that circumstance. But our attitude is to bite the offerer’s hand off. Long got back after the Wembley game to find JM packing his bags for him and disassembling his Ikea futon. In another example, Gylfi didn’t want to go and how hard did we try and keep Doyle and co.? Did we fill them with confidence in our ambition and drive, offer competitive new contracts and do our absolute best to keep them on? Or did we send ‘em a google map print-out of how to get to their new clubs and end a farewell text message with a kiss? Meh, I’m speculating I know – but it really doesn’t seem like we try that hard to keep players.

"his money's gone up, mine needs to go up as well"

That too, is speculating. They are just as likely to go “well, he was offered a place at Everton and he did bang in a oxf*rd of goals last season – I think I understand why he was offered a competitive contract.”

And when I talk of competitive contracts – my apologies, I’m not meaning we equal that of others; I mean we are willing along with everything else which may keep them here, to demonstrate that they are valued (along with everything else which may keep them here), not “sorry, there is a line and no matter what you have achieved here, we aren’t going to cross that! Here’s a coffee mug with your face on it, so long and good luck!”

[Svlad Cjelli]

(apologies for double post - missed out svlad)

“that approach increases the likelihood of success, it doesn't ensure it.”

And I said as much. It’s called ambition.

Yes - but the correlation of league table to size of wagebill is 92%. There's no way we can compete with teams who are much, much bigger than us, and the money we'd need to be able to do this is so massive it would ruin us - we're not talking small sums, we're talking about doubling our wage bill.

How do you know he's not moving because he believes that he can play at a higher level and wants the chance

Oh for sure, there is little we can do but try in that circumstance. But our attitude is to bite the offerer’s hand off. Long got back after the Wembley game to find JM packing his bags for him and disassembling his Ikea futon. In another example, Gylfi didn’t want to go and how hard did we try and keep Doyle and co.? Did we fill them with confidence in our ambition and drive, offer competitive new contracts and do our absolute best to keep them on? Or did we send ‘em a google map print-out of how to get to their new clubs and end a farewell text message with a kiss? Meh, I’m speculating I know – but it really doesn’t seem like we try that hard to keep players.

You're looking at the club very harshly. We did manage to keep Doyle & Hunt for a year longer than we should have done, and the talk that "Gylfi didn't want to go" is completely unfounded - he was made a superb offer and he jumped at it.

And the way our release clauses work is that when an offer above a sum agreed with the player is received then we contractually have to accept it - hardly "biting off hands." But it's part of the agreement with players and one reason we do keep them here longer than other clubs might is that the players know we'll be fair to them.

"his money's gone up, mine needs to go up as well"

That too, is speculating. They are just as likely to go “well, he was offered a place at Everton and he did bang in a oxf*rd of goals last season – I think I understand why he was offered a competitive contract.”

You've never met any football agents, have you?

And when I talk of competitive contracts – my apologies, I’m not meaning we equal that of others; I mean we are willing along with everything else which may keep them here, to demonstrate that they are valued (along with everything else which may keep them here), not “sorry, there is a line and no matter what you have achieved here, we aren’t going to cross that! Here’s a coffee mug with your face on it, so long and good luck!”

I think this is terribly naive - one of teh reasons that we regularly overachieve is the whole team ethos and the way the players and their families are looked after and that they do feel so valued and so part of everything at the club. If the only factor is money then we just can't compete with other clubs - but we compete in other ways.

[Extended-Phenotype]

Yes - but the correlation of league table to size of wagebill is 92%...

Let’s not get overly bogged down in statistics here. I’d say it would be hard to disagree that more flexibility in our spending, enabling us to offer those we want to keep more, and increasing the pool of players from which we can enrol, would not be an act of suicide.

"Gylfi didn't want to go" is completely unfounded

Gylfi said himself in an interview if I recall. Apologies if this isn’t correct. Will investigate.

offer above a sum agreed with the player is received then we contractually have to accept it

Not if the player wants to stay, we don’t.

You've never met any football agents, have you?

If a player hasn’t been approached, how exactly is the agent going to manipulate conflict with a colleague who has been approached, and has seen an increase to keep him?

I think this is terribly naïve

Fair enough, I am guilty of oversimplifying in some instances and speculating in others. But if there is, like we both agree, such value coming from other aspects of Reading FC, it would be far from naïve to assume elasticity in the wage bill may help us hold onto players even longer.

Not being able to compete with other clubs financially isn’t a reason to throw monetary incentive out of the window altogether. Taking our plus points and adding flexibility to the wage structure would increase our appeal not harm it.