[Pedalo_menders]

I thought our general play was pretty good. We had our predictably poor start with MacIntyre determined to gift them a goal. We then grew into the game and easily deserved our opener. 

We then continued where we left off and were close to getting that all important second goal. That is until some really really poor defending allowed Windass to poke in. How the fook does a centre back get out jumped for a header in his box that he has all the time in the world to set up for? And then how the fook do 3 more players sit with their thumbs up their arse not seeing a giant orange blob (the only orange blob in the whole area) running towards the easily idenfifiable knockdown? I agree with Moose, that shows a real lack of quality. 

The second goal we concede though i dont think anyone in the stadium thought that could happen? How the fook does smudge ping that in from there?! Keeper had absolutely no chance. It looked even better in slow mo; starting outside the post and dipping inside at the last second. A contrasting real moment of quality.

Opposing teams can smell blood on us.

Moose IN. He's got us through a sticky patch before and he can do it again. 

The crowd sounded fantastic on the telly, as always. Really glad fans are sticking by the team still. We have our reality check and we're up for the fight. RELE-SCRAP 2025 is on!

[Prickles]

I hope you're right about Mousinho

[Hammie]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

[farq2]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

I feel a bit sorry for the manager, yes he's made some mistakes, but he's been dealt a piss poor hand by the recruitment team and owners

[Hammie]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

I feel a bit sorry for the manager, yes he's made some mistakes, but he's been dealt a piss poor hand by the recruitment team and owners

I'd be interested to know who's decision it was to completely dismantle the side that won the title, there were some players with attitude at least who would have made our squad stronger than currently. For comparison, Og is steadily improving given the chance. Others that we kept that hardly played last season are looking less mentally strong (both centre halves for instance)

[Prickles]

Being delt a piss poor hand does not excuse indecision and ignoring the tactical side of the game going on in front of him. That's what has angered me about last night's defeat. Mousinho and Harley are not reading games.

[firqdays]

First time I have said this but Mr Eisner's naivety coming into this campaign is difficult to believe .... and not a dicky-bird from Stateside.

[DeepBlue]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

Only marginally taller.  Macintyre is 1.85m. Towler 1.86m  .  Not sure than one centimetre makes that much difference.

And I don't understand why the criticism of MacIntyre is so intense. Yes, like everyone else he has made some mistakes but I think he looks a classy defender, very comfortable with the ball at his feet.

[Hammie]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

Only marginally taller.  Macintyre is 1.85m. Towler 1.86m  .  Not sure than one centimetre makes that much difference.

And I don't understand why the criticism of MacIntyre is so intense. Yes, like everyone else he has made some mistakes but I think he looks a classy defender, very comfortable with the ball at his feet.

I'm not overwhelmed by the current fad for defenders who are pretty footballers, I want one of the two in the middle to be an out and out stopper who can give the ball to someone else to do the fancy stuff, ditto in midfield.

[DeepBlue]

First time I have said this but Mr Eisner's naivety coming into this campaign is difficult to believe .... and not a dicky-bird from Stateside.

Do you not count the quotes from Eric Eisner ?

[Rocketman]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

Only marginally taller.  Macintyre is 1.85m. Towler 1.86m  .  Not sure than one centimetre makes that much difference.

And I don't understand why the criticism of MacIntyre is so intense. Yes, like everyone else he has made some mistakes but I think he looks a classy defender, very comfortable with the ball at his feet.

I'm not overwhelmed by the current fad for defenders who are pretty footballers, I want one of the two in the middle to be an out and out stopper who can give the ball to someone else to do the fancy stuff, ditto in midfield.

For example someone like Raggetinho!

[DeepBlue]

Can you imagine the stick the recruitment team would have got if we had given Raggett a new contract and still had this disastrous start.  

It would all have been 'why didn't we replace him with championship class' ,'it was obvious he was league one quality through and through and wasn't good enough to make he step up' etc etc. 

And as for Rafferty we made the same judgement that Preston made when he was two years younger. You can argue whether Williams is any better on the evidence so far, but that does not mean Rafferty would have been any better.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing but I'm not going to criticse the management for thinking they needed to improve the quality they had to compete at the higher level. 

I can honestly say that the only out of contract player we had last season that I would have wanted to give a new contract to at championship level was Morrell.

[FiftyYearsOn]

I would agree with all that, and even Morrell after a long injury would have been risky. It's been the choice of replacements that's been the problem.

[exterminator]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

Only marginally taller.  Macintyre is 1.85m. Towler 1.86m  .  Not sure than one centimetre makes that much difference.

And I don't understand why the criticism of MacIntyre is so intense. Yes, like everyone else he has made some mistakes but I think he looks a classy defender, very comfortable with the ball at his feet.

McIntyre made at least 3 mistakes in the 1st half plus the two that resulted in the goals in the 2nd. One by losing his man in the box & a powder puff tackle on the half way line for the 2nd. 

He is littered  with mistakes, a defenders 1st skill is being able to defend, the distribution is the cream on top. 

He was part of a very poor Reading team in the Championship, that tells you everything you need to know, replace him with Towler who is a defender 1st.

[DeepBlue]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

Only marginally taller.  Macintyre is 1.85m. Towler 1.86m  .  Not sure than one centimetre makes that much difference.

And I don't understand why the criticism of MacIntyre is so intense. Yes, like everyone else he has made some mistakes but I think he looks a classy defender, very comfortable with the ball at his feet.

McIntyre made at least 3 mistakes in the 1st half plus the two that resulted in the goals. One by losing his man in the box & a powder puff tackle onvthe half way line for the 2nd. 

He is littered  with mistakes  & a defenders 1st skill is being able to defend, the distribution is the cream on top. 

He was part of a very poor Reading team in the Championship, that tells you everything you need to know, replace him with Towler who is a defender foremost.

Sorry, but trying to blame McIntyre for Smith's goal is pure desperation, and trying to blame him just weakens your argument against him because it shows how biased you are are against him. 

As for the first you could argue he and Ogilvie both let Windass go because he was running into an offside position - maybe a misjudgement but not a terrible error.  More blame IMO goes to whoever did not close Bannan down, or to Devlin for a very half-hearted jump to challenge Smtih.

[briefcase_wanchor]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

Only marginally taller.  Macintyre is 1.85m. Towler 1.86m  .  Not sure than one centimetre makes that much difference.

And I don't understand why the criticism of MacIntyre is so intense. Yes, like everyone else he has made some mistakes but I think he looks a classy defender, very comfortable with the ball at his feet.

McIntyre made at least 3 mistakes in the 1st half plus the two that resulted in the goals. One by losing his man in the box & a powder puff tackle onvthe half way line for the 2nd. 

He is littered  with mistakes  & a defenders 1st skill is being able to defend, the distribution is the cream on top. 

He was part of a very poor Reading team in the Championship, that tells you everything you need to know, replace him with Towler who is a defender foremost.

Sorry, but trying to blame McIntyre for Smith's goal is pure desperation, and trying to blame him just weakens your argument against him because it shows how biased you are are against him. 

As for the first you could argue he and Ogilvie both let Windass go because he was running into an offside position - maybe a misjudgement but not a terrible error.  More blame IMO goes to whoever did not close Bannan down, or to Devlin for a very half-hearted jump to challenge Smtih.

At the time I blamed Ogilvie for the second goal as he was caught too far infield and had not covered their right winger (he needn’t have moved across as Poole was coming to deal with whoever it was that had the ball). In hindsight we were just a mess from the moment they played the ball forward.

[dsmg]

Fair enough Deep, but Devlin is about a foot smaller than Smith.

[exterminator]

We did have a defender who loved winning headers, we probably still have one and desperately need to get him fit, for attacking corners too.
In the mean time, Towler might not be as bad as Macintyre and is at least taller.

Only marginally taller.  Macintyre is 1.85m. Towler 1.86m  .  Not sure than one centimetre makes that much difference.

And I don't understand why the criticism of MacIntyre is so intense. Yes, like everyone else he has made some mistakes but I think he looks a classy defender, very comfortable with the ball at his feet.

McIntyre made at least 3 mistakes in the 1st half plus the two that resulted in the goals. One by losing his man in the box & a powder puff tackle onvthe half way line for the 2nd. 

He is littered  with mistakes  & a defenders 1st skill is being able to defend, the distribution is the cream on top. 

He was part of a very poor Reading team in the Championship, that tells you everything you need to know, replace him with Towler who is a defender foremost.

Sorry, but trying to blame McIntyre for Smith's goal is pure desperation, and trying to blame him just weakens your argument against him because it shows how biased you are are against him. 

As for the first you could argue he and Ogilvie both let Windass go because he was running into an offside position - maybe a misjudgement but not a terrible error.  More blame IMO goes to whoever did not close Bannan down, or to Devlin for a very half-hearted jump to challenge Smtih.

So you're eyesight is dodgy as well - the ball was cleared out by Sheff Wed - McIntyre then makes a weak & half hearted tackle on the half way line well  before it is played to Smith for his worldie. 

As for the 1st as  the left sided central defender it was McIntyre's job to track Windass & he didn't. 

Have a look at previous games he is a liability & keeps making mistake after mistake. I'm not biased against him, but he is just pants as a defender.

[Cunninglinguist]

TBH, on reflection, I find it difficult to target any of the defence in particular. When put under that much constant pressure, mistakes will always be made.

The best form of defence is always attack and we are atrocious. The opposition don’t need to worry about conceding.

[Smirnoffexpress]

TBH, on reflection, I find it difficult to target any of the defence in particular. When put under that much constant pressure, mistakes will always be made. 

The best form of defence is always attack and we are atrocious. The opposition don’t need to worry about conceding.

Spot on, if football was a boxing match, attacking wise we are about as much use as boxer with his hands tied behind his back! And that gives the opposition the psychological advantage. Needed to spend real money on real forward players. But hey ho.

[exterminator]

You could have the 1970 Brazil forward line of Jairzinho, Gerson, Tostao, Pele & Rivelino but if you haven't got a solid defence that doesn't sieve goals it means nothing.

[BabaOReally]

TBH, on reflection, I find it difficult to target any of the defence in particular. When put under that much constant pressure, mistakes will always be made. 

The best form of defence is always attack and we are atrocious. The opposition don’t need to worry about conceding.

Spot on, if football was a boxing match, attacking wise we are about as much use as boxer with his hands tied behind his back! And that gives the opposition the psychological advantage. Needed to spend real money on real forward players. But hey ho.

In  boxing terms, we struggle to lay a glove on an opponent whilst continuously walking onto punches.

[Prickles]

I don't understand the admiration for McIntyre. He's gone from being a bottom of the Championship defender to a bottom of the Championship defender and given plenty of demonstrations as to why.

[DeepBlue]

I don't understand the admiration for McIntyre. He's gone from being a bottom of the Championship defender to a bottom of the Championship defender and given plenty of demonstrations as to why.

I'm not saying he hasn't made mistakes but I think he has a touch of class about him and I love the way he goes past players when taking the ball out of defence. He is also likely to still be improving after such a long time out injured, and coming back into the side in these dire circumstances after such a long time out is very much being thrown in at the deep end. 

If I was making a list of the top under-performers in the side this year he would not be in my top five.

[bluetagagain]

TBF he does have a lot of competition