The inevitable poll for the next Reading manager

[Armadillo Roadkill]

I mean, it isn’t particularly cultist to believe the owners, privy to 99% more information than the average fan while wanting pretty much the same thing in terms of success, might sign a decent candidate.

If that’s Leam Richardson, fine. I get that what the owners want/can spend doesn’t always align with what the fans demand we spend, but it’s not really in their best interests to sign any old oxf*rd just because they are cheap. There must be something about him. I’m sure his record came up in conversation, and perhaps the owners think the some eras are more relevant than others.

The charge that people are “brainwashed” in favour of Couhig seems conversely applicable to those who preemptively insist he can do no right.

Just out of interest what has he done right.? Not trying to be contrary, but in his first 6 months what’s he done right?. And I get all the steadying the ship financially, I’m not interested in all that, that’s a given and something any new owner would have done. I’m on about the day to day operational decisions of running a football club. What are his achievements so far.

New CEO is inexperienced and not up to the job imo. Was naive to bring in someone like that with the club on its knees.

Weaker squad than last season. Over hyped expectations in the transfer market and where we would finish

Spent all his time going on about how the beer should be cold and the hot dogs hot. But here we are 6 months in nothing has changed on the match day experience and if anything his flagship policy of getting a good tannoy system has got worse

He’s fired a manager and looking to replace him with someone who looks like won’t be any sort of upgrade.

We’ve lost the greyhound car park

Match day tickets have increased

We’ve lost paper tickets

Car parking prices have increased

Ticket office opening hours have reduced

Can’t order tickets from the ticket office anymore.

Lots of redundancies

Stadium still looks run down

Royals TV is worse than having bbc berks as the official commentary


If someone could provide a list things he’s improved I’d be keen to know.

Everyone is getting paid on time.

No danger of points deductions or administration.

Just those two are enough.

[Royalwaster]

Biggest achievement he talks like a human being and has kept the academy going and generally ensured we still have a team - which he deserves tons of credit for.

[Brogue]

Well steadying the ship was 100% the most impt thing to do - must be joking if you think ‘any owner would have done that’ looking at the mess at certain clubs

We made plenty of signings. Just not the right ones. Not Couhigs fault - JJ/Hunt/Carey must take responsibility there

JJ is learning hopefully. I don’t think he was nec a bad appointment buy definitely needs to learn lessons: the club wasn’t on its knees at that point either

Suggesting a manager who took a team bottom of L1 to the title the following season isn’t an upgrade on Hunt is way off as well

No owner would have been allowed to buy us without a water tight finical plan to show the efl. We have been watched, and have had every single transfer scrutinised by the EFL. Any owner who was approved by the EFL to buy us would have had to have sorted us out finically. That’s why I’m saying it’s a given. That’s not a win for couhig. that’s the bear minimum expected of any new owner coming in a buy a club in our situation.

[Brogue]

I mean, it isn’t particularly cultist to believe the owners, privy to 99% more information than the average fan while wanting pretty much the same thing in terms of success, might sign a decent candidate.

If that’s Leam Richardson, fine. I get that what the owners want/can spend doesn’t always align with what the fans demand we spend, but it’s not really in their best interests to sign any old oxf*rd just because they are cheap. There must be something about him. I’m sure his record came up in conversation, and perhaps the owners think the some eras are more relevant than others.

The charge that people are “brainwashed” in favour of Couhig seems conversely applicable to those who preemptively insist he can do no right.

Just out of interest what has he done right.? Not trying to be contrary, but in his first 6 months what’s he done right?. And I get all the steadying the ship financially, I’m not interested in all that, that’s a given and something any new owner would have done. I’m on about the day to day operational decisions of running a football club. What are his achievements so far.

New CEO is inexperienced and not up to the job imo. Was naive to bring in someone like that with the club on its knees.

Weaker squad than last season. Over hyped expectations in the transfer market and where we would finish

Spent all his time going on about how the beer should be cold and the hot dogs hot. But here we are 6 months in nothing has changed on the match day experience and if anything his flagship policy of getting a good tannoy system has got worse

He’s fired a manager and looking to replace him with someone who looks like won’t be any sort of upgrade.

We’ve lost the greyhound car park

Match day tickets have increased

We’ve lost paper tickets

Car parking prices have increased

Ticket office opening hours have reduced

Can’t order tickets from the ticket office anymore.

Lots of redundancies

Stadium still looks run down

Royals TV is worse than having bbc berks as the official commentary


If someone could provide a list things he’s improved I’d be keen to know.

Everyone is getting paid on time.

No danger of points deductions or administration.

Just those two are enough.

All standard things that any new owner buying us would have had to have proved to the efl before buying us. So that’s not a win for couhig. That’s the bear minimum expected of any owner buying a club in Readings position.

[Hound]

Well steadying the ship was 100% the most impt thing to do - must be joking if you think ‘any owner would have done that’ looking at the mess at certain clubs

We made plenty of signings. Just not the right ones. Not Couhigs fault - JJ/Hunt/Carey must take responsibility there

JJ is learning hopefully. I don’t think he was nec a bad appointment buy definitely needs to learn lessons: the club wasn’t on its knees at that point either

Suggesting a manager who took a team bottom of L1 to the title the following season isn’t an upgrade on Hunt is way off as well

No owner would have been allowed to buy us without a water tight finically plan to show the efl and we have been watched and has every single transfer scrutinised by the EFL. Any owner who was approved by the EFL to buy us would have had to have sorted us out finically. That’s why I’m saying it’s a given. That’s not a win for couhig that’s the bear minimum expected of any new owner coming in a buy a club in our situation

To an extent - but that financial plan could have included shutting the academy and selling Bearwood off for example.

The absolute main failing for me was the transfer window. Not that I think the players brought in are necessarily bad (even DK), just no clear plan, team set up, philosophy etc in mind. And far too many of them pushing out academy players and those who have done ok for us before (Craig, Wareham, Garcia, Abrefa, Rushesha and no doubts more)

Lost what we were about and Hunt I think was pretty clueless about how to create a successful team. Sounds like team spirit affected also.

Cant blame Couhig too much for that. He supplied the budget, Hunt, JJ and Carey spaffed it

[Brogue]

Well steadying the ship was 100% the most impt thing to do - must be joking if you think ‘any owner would have done that’ looking at the mess at certain clubs

We made plenty of signings. Just not the right ones. Not Couhigs fault - JJ/Hunt/Carey must take responsibility there

JJ is learning hopefully. I don’t think he was nec a bad appointment buy definitely needs to learn lessons: the club wasn’t on its knees at that point either

Suggesting a manager who took a team bottom of L1 to the title the following season isn’t an upgrade on Hunt is way off as well

No owner would have been allowed to buy us without a water tight finically plan to show the efl and we have been watched and has every single transfer scrutinised by the EFL. Any owner who was approved by the EFL to buy us would have had to have sorted us out finically. That’s why I’m saying it’s a given. That’s not a win for couhig that’s the bear minimum expected of any new owner coming in a buy a club in our situation

To an extent - but that financial plan could have included shutting the academy and selling Bearwood off for example.

The absolute main failing for me was the transfer window. Not that I think the players brought in are necessarily bad (even DK), just no clear plan, team set up, philosophy etc in mind. And far too many of them pushing out academy players and those who have done ok for us before (Craig, Wareham, Garcia, Abrefa, Rushesha and no doubts more)

Lost what we were about and Hunt I think was pretty clueless about how to create a successful team. Sounds like team spirit affected also.

Cant blame Couhig too much for that. He supplied the budget, Hunt, JJ and Carey spaffed it

Couhig appointed JJ… I’m really not trying to be a dick here. But I’m yet to see things couhig had actually done right in his first 6 months in charge. Aside from paying the bills. Which he had to.

[Stranded]

Win % of his past five seasons:

8.7% - 2 wins in 23
25% - 5 wins in 20
58.7% - 27 wins in 46
32% - 11 wins in 34
27% - 9 wins in 33

if we win 30% of our remaining fixtures (which is his average win % over his last 5 seasons) there are 32 games remaining, that's 9 wins. 27 points. we are on 15 points - gives 42 points. we'd be looking for another 8 draws to get to the magic 50 from the remaining 21 games. of course the 30% is vastly swayed by his one good season. any less than 30% and we are in deep shit.

The last 2 of those seasons of course being at a higher level with a) a Wigan team having cash issues and b) a Rotherham squad that was nowhere near good enough for the division it was in - still a poor record there of course.

This can of course also be split as:

League 1 - 47.5% - 37 wins in 80
Championship - 16.3% 7 wins in 43

Based on that win record at this level, most people would be falling over themselves to employ a manager with that record.

So why haven't they? Why has he been unemployed for ages?

Who knows? His choice? Recency bias? He's actually shit?

We'll find out soon enough.

[Hound]

No owner would have been allowed to buy us without a water tight finically plan to show the efl and we have been watched and has every single transfer scrutinised by the EFL. Any owner who was approved by the EFL to buy us would have had to have sorted us out finically. That’s why I’m saying it’s a given. That’s not a win for couhig that’s the bear minimum expected of any new owner coming in a buy a club in our situation

To an extent - but that financial plan could have included shutting the academy and selling Bearwood off for example.

The absolute main failing for me was the transfer window. Not that I think the players brought in are necessarily bad (even DK), just no clear plan, team set up, philosophy etc in mind. And far too many of them pushing out academy players and those who have done ok for us before (Craig, Wareham, Garcia, Abrefa, Rushesha and no doubts more)

Lost what we were about and Hunt I think was pretty clueless about how to create a successful team. Sounds like team spirit affected also.

Cant blame Couhig too much for that. He supplied the budget, Hunt, JJ and Carey spaffed it

Couhig appointed JJ… I’m really not trying to be a dick here. But I’m yet to see things couhig had actually done right in his first 6 months in charge. Aside from paying the bills. Which he had to.

Yeah I get it with JJ. He has to learn from this summer and hopefully having ‘his’ man in place he will. But last summer wasn’t good enough from him

[morganb]

The last 2 of those seasons of course being at a higher level with a) a Wigan team having cash issues and b) a Rotherham squad that was nowhere near good enough for the division it was in - still a poor record there of course.

This can of course also be split as:

League 1 - 47.5% - 37 wins in 80
Championship - 16.3% 7 wins in 43

Based on that win record at this level, most people would be falling over themselves to employ a manager with that record.

So why haven't they? Why has he been unemployed for ages?

Who knows? His choice? Recency bias? He's actually shit?

We'll find out soon enough.

If it was his choice to remain out of football for so long I wonder what it was about Reading that convinced him to join us?

[Lower West]

I mean, it isn’t particularly cultist to believe the owners, privy to 99% more information than the average fan while wanting pretty much the same thing in terms of success, might sign a decent candidate.

If that’s Leam Richardson, fine. I get that what the owners want/can spend doesn’t always align with what the fans demand we spend, but it’s not really in their best interests to sign any old oxf*rd just because they are cheap. There must be something about him. I’m sure his record came up in conversation, and perhaps the owners think the some eras are more relevant than others.

The charge that people are “brainwashed” in favour of Couhig seems conversely applicable to those who preemptively insist he can do no right.

Just out of interest what has he done right.? Not trying to be contrary, but in his first 6 months what’s he done right?. And I get all the steadying the ship financially, I’m not interested in all that, that’s a given and something any new owner would have done. I’m on about the day to day operational decisions of running a football club. What are his achievements so far.

New CEO is inexperienced and not up to the job imo. Was naive to bring in someone like that with the club on its knees.

Weaker squad than last season. Over hyped expectations in the transfer market and where we would finish

Spent all his time going on about how the beer should be cold and the hot dogs hot. But here we are 6 months in nothing has changed on the match day experience and if anything his flagship policy of getting a good tannoy system has got worse

He’s fired a manager and looking to replace him with someone who looks like won’t be any sort of upgrade.

We’ve lost the greyhound car park

Match day tickets have increased

We’ve lost paper tickets

Car parking prices have increased

Ticket office opening hours have reduced

Can’t order tickets from the ticket office anymore.

Lots of redundancies

Stadium still looks run down

Royals TV is worse than having bbc berks as the official commentary


If someone could provide a list things he’s improved I’d be keen to know.

Everyone is getting paid on time.

No danger of points deductions or administration.

Just those two are enough.

EFL clubs are now under continual financial scrutiny. Spending money that isn't there is no longer an option.

[Brogue]

Just out of interest what has he done right.? Not trying to be contrary, but in his first 6 months what’s he done right?. And I get all the steadying the ship financially, I’m not interested in all that, that’s a given and something any new owner would have done. I’m on about the day to day operational decisions of running a football club. What are his achievements so far.

New CEO is inexperienced and not up to the job imo. Was naive to bring in someone like that with the club on its knees.

Weaker squad than last season. Over hyped expectations in the transfer market and where we would finish

Spent all his time going on about how the beer should be cold and the hot dogs hot. But here we are 6 months in nothing has changed on the match day experience and if anything his flagship policy of getting a good tannoy system has got worse

He’s fired a manager and looking to replace him with someone who looks like won’t be any sort of upgrade.

We’ve lost the greyhound car park

Match day tickets have increased

We’ve lost paper tickets

Car parking prices have increased

Ticket office opening hours have reduced

Can’t order tickets from the ticket office anymore.

Lots of redundancies

Stadium still looks run down

Royals TV is worse than having bbc berks as the official commentary


If someone could provide a list things he’s improved I’d be keen to know.

Everyone is getting paid on time.

No danger of points deductions or administration.

Just those two are enough.

EFL clubs are now under continual financial scrutiny. Spending money that isn't there is no longer an option.

Yep.

[Vision]

Well steadying the ship was 100% the most impt thing to do - must be joking if you think ‘any owner would have done that’ looking at the mess at certain clubs

We made plenty of signings. Just not the right ones. Not Couhigs fault - JJ/Hunt/Carey must take responsibility there

JJ is learning hopefully. I don’t think he was nec a bad appointment buy definitely needs to learn lessons: the club wasn’t on its knees at that point either

Suggesting a manager who took a team bottom of L1 to the title the following season isn’t an upgrade on Hunt is way off as well

No owner would have been allowed to buy us without a water tight finically plan to show the efl and we have been watched and has every single transfer scrutinised by the EFL. Any owner who was approved by the EFL to buy us would have had to have sorted us out finically. That’s why I’m saying it’s a given. That’s not a win for couhig that’s the bear minimum expected of any new owner coming in a buy a club in our situation

To an extent - but that financial plan could have included shutting the academy and selling Bearwood off for example.

The absolute main failing for me was the transfer window. Not that I think the players brought in are necessarily bad (even DK), just no clear plan, team set up, philosophy etc in mind. And far too many of them pushing out academy players and those who have done ok for us before (Craig, Wareham, Garcia, Abrefa, Rushesha and no doubts more)

Lost what we were about and Hunt I think was pretty clueless about how to create a successful team. Sounds like team spirit affected also.

Cant blame Couhig too much for that. He supplied the budget, Hunt, JJ and Carey spaffed it

I do think part of the blame for recruitment does lie with Couhig to an extent. Him and JJ thinking they're somehow smarter than everyone else with their 3 levels of transfer window nonsense whilst the other teams that had large player turnover got most of it done before the season. Couhig says the problem with Hunt was we didn't have a coherent plan on the field (he's not wrong) but it's hard to have a plan when you don't know what you're going to be working with.

That said, all this "bodies in the building" bullshit that Hunt and others continually spouted, suggests we weren't targeting specific areas that needed improvement just fleshing out the playing numbers. It also always smacks to me of telling the existing players they're not good enough, IE we want anyone but you lot.

On the face of it there's a lot to be optimistic about in Richardson's League 1 record. Rotherham were 8 points adrift when he took over there with a divided dressing room in a Division they've perennially struggled in so the optimist in me says his Wigan record is what we should be looking at which is very good. Hopefully he's not here just because he's JJ's mate.

[morganb]

I wonder how the January window will go?

What's Leam's network like and what "pull" does he have with players as he's not exactly a big name and has been out of the game for a while

[Stranded]

So why haven't they? Why has he been unemployed for ages?

Who knows? His choice? Recency bias? He's actually shit?

We'll find out soon enough.

If it was his choice to remain out of football for so long I wonder what it was about Reading that convinced him to join us?

Working with his mate Joe?

[MR. CYNICAL]

I mean, it isn’t particularly cultist to believe the owners, privy to 99% more information than the average fan while wanting pretty much the same thing in terms of success, might sign a decent candidate.

If that’s Leam Richardson, fine. I get that what the owners want/can spend doesn’t always align with what the fans demand we spend, but it’s not really in their best interests to sign any old oxf*rd just because they are cheap. There must be something about him. I’m sure his record came up in conversation, and perhaps the owners think the some eras are more relevant than others.

The charge that people are “brainwashed” in favour of Couhig seems conversely applicable to those who preemptively insist he can do no right.

That was a hard read.

[Snowflake Royal]

christ, you lot really have been brainwashed by Couhig haven't you? this is a disaster of an appointment - the cheapest available option. We are now in a very real battle against relegation. He will be gone by February/March

The only one being brain washed is you, by your mate at the club.

[Snowflake Royal]

I mean, it isn’t particularly cultist to believe the owners, privy to 99% more information than the average fan while wanting pretty much the same thing in terms of success, might sign a decent candidate.

If that’s Leam Richardson, fine. I get that what the owners want/can spend doesn’t always align with what the fans demand we spend, but it’s not really in their best interests to sign any old oxf*rd just because they are cheap. There must be something about him. I’m sure his record came up in conversation, and perhaps the owners think the some eras are more relevant than others.

The charge that people are “brainwashed” in favour of Couhig seems conversely applicable to those who preemptively insist he can do no right.

Just out of interest what has he done right.? Not trying to be contrary, but in his first 6 months what’s he done right?. And I get all the steadying the ship financially, I’m not interested in all that, that’s a given and something any new owner would have done. I’m on about the day to day operational decisions of running a football club. What are his achievements so far.

New CEO is inexperienced and not up to the job imo. Was naive to bring in someone like that with the club on its knees.

Weaker squad than last season. Over hyped expectations in the transfer market and where we would finish

Spent all his time going on about how the beer should be cold and the hot dogs hot. But here we are 6 months in nothing has changed on the match day experience and if anything his flagship policy of getting a good tannoy system has got worse

He’s fired a manager and looking to replace him with someone who looks like won’t be any sort of upgrade.

We’ve lost the greyhound car park

Match day tickets have increased

We’ve lost paper tickets

Car parking prices have increased

Ticket office opening hours have reduced

Can’t order tickets from the ticket office anymore.

Lots of redundancies

Stadium still looks run down

Royals TV is worse than having bbc berks as the official commentary


If someone could provide a list things he’s improved I’d be keen to know.

Everyone is getting paid on time.

No danger of points deductions or administration.

Just those two are enough.

Proactive and open communicator.

And it's not like all our signings have been shit.

Williams, O'Connor, Marriott all doing their job well on the pitch. Most of the others a bit hit and miss, but could easily come good and not actively bad.

Only Burns and MOM have been especially poor imo.

Clearly trying to make the matchday experience better. Whether he's doing the right things or not - he's trying.

I for one vastly prefer no Dellor on RoyalsTV. That's just a personal preference thing.

[windermereROYAL]

14 away wins when Wigan got promoted, if our form picks up on the road that can only be a good thing.

[Esteban]

Just out of interest what has he done right.? Not trying to be contrary, but in his first 6 months what’s he done right?. And I get all the steadying the ship financially, I’m not interested in all that, that’s a given and something any new owner would have done. I’m on about the day to day operational decisions of running a football club. What are his achievements so far.

New CEO is inexperienced and not up to the job imo. Was naive to bring in someone like that with the club on its knees.

Weaker squad than last season. Over hyped expectations in the transfer market and where we would finish

Spent all his time going on about how the beer should be cold and the hot dogs hot. But here we are 6 months in nothing has changed on the match day experience and if anything his flagship policy of getting a good tannoy system has got worse

He’s fired a manager and looking to replace him with someone who looks like won’t be any sort of upgrade.

We’ve lost the greyhound car park

Match day tickets have increased

We’ve lost paper tickets

Car parking prices have increased

Ticket office opening hours have reduced

Can’t order tickets from the ticket office anymore.

Lots of redundancies

Stadium still looks run down

Royals TV is worse than having bbc berks as the official commentary


If someone could provide a list things he’s improved I’d be keen to know.

Everyone is getting paid on time.

No danger of points deductions or administration.

Just those two are enough.

Proactive and open communicator.

And it's not like all our signings have been shit.

Williams, O'Connor, Marriott all doing their job well on the pitch. Most of the others a bit hit and miss, but could easily come good and not actively bad.

Only Burns and MOM have been especially poor imo.

Clearly trying to make the matchday experience better. Whether he's doing the right things or not - he's trying.

I for one vastly prefer no Dellor on RoyalsTV. That's just a personal preference thing.

The jury is definitely still out on Couhig and it's fair to say he hasn't achieved everything he said he would. Not yet at least. But it's a bit early to be getting the pitchforks out. Pragmatism is king, for the time being.

[rabidbee]

We made plenty of signings. Just not the right ones. Not Couhigs fault - JJ/Hunt/Carey must take responsibility there

As I’ve posted before, and maybe I’m naive, but I assume at well-run clubs planning for the transfer window and identification of potential replacements should we lose key players would ideally begin long before the summer, but last year we were busy spending that time circling around the toilet. No wonder we ended up scrambling for whatever was still left, and no wonder we weren’t a particularly appealing prospect for potential signings.