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Reading are better equipped for the Premier League than Southampton


Elmore

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Must say this is slightly sobering!

 

http://news.ladbrokes.com/en-gb/football/premier-league/reading-are-better-equipped-for-the-premier-league-than-southampton_109730.html

 

"Nigel Adkins’ men have also climbed two divisions in two campaigns and though Norwich survived such an ascent last term, it was a huge achievement. The last team to try it, Manchester City in 2000/01, went straight back down."

 

I'd like to think our current squad could survive a season in the Prem. Although Reading got the points off us and went on that amazing run, they massively rode their luck. In the Brighton (at Amex) and Saints (at SMS) matches, they would have been dead and buried if we had been clinical in taking our chances. Reading allow other teams to overrun them at times and last season they managed to suck up that pressure and counter attack well, but not sure how successful that style will be against Premiership teams.

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Slightly odd article, based around the single premis that Reading have purchased a striker who has played 12 games in the PL for 1m less than we have paid for a striker who has not played in the PL. Do they really think this is the extent of the business we or Reading will do this summer (Reading have since signed Guthrie of course). And Reading apparently are odds on to go down yet we are evens (and how Wet Sham are 9/4 is beyond me). Lets not forget also that the last Club to win back to back promotions (before Norwich who have done very well) was the crap team Man City who went straight back down (before coming back up and winning the title). So much is written on the web these days that the talent for this writing is spread very thinly indeed, as displayed very well by this article which quite frankly could have been written by a 10 year old. Only time will tell, but I am confident of a mid table finish, and that Reading will stay up as well.

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Never trust an article which suddenly and randomly writes "Dr Oliver Wendt said: “There are maybe a number of reasons why we have decided to move to Reading" despite never mentioning him previously in the piece and leaving the reader with no idea who he is or why he's relevant.

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Personally i think add Buckland a CB RB and a RM and were have a good enough squad of 18 to finish 14th/15th, were signing under 24s and building them into the core of our squad, allowing them to start on the bench and work there way into a team and then allowing them to become the core of the squad and slowly get more and more quality, allow the odds to be crap, if we stay up and progress the youngsters we sign and have next season were be a real force, less pressure on us if bookies have us down as favourites to go down, but you have to imagine the fixtures have made the odds as well, personally i think its good to get 3 of top 5 out the way in 1st 4 games.

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Slightly odd article, based around the single premis that Reading have purchased a striker who has played 12 games in the PL for 1m less than we have paid for a striker who has not played in the PL.

 

To be fair he's also played at the top level in Russia (Zenit, won the league with them) and Germany (VfB Stuttgart). So he has a lot of top level experience, if not being hugely prolific whilst there.

 

Do they really think this is the extent of the business we or Reading will do this summer (Reading have since signed Guthrie of course). And Reading apparently are odds on to go down yet we are evens (and how Wet Sham are 9/4 is beyond me). Lets not forget also that the last Club to win back to back promotions (before Norwich who have done very well) was the crap team Man City who went straight back down (before coming back up and winning the title). So much is written on the web these days that the talent for this writing is spread very thinly indeed, as displayed very well by this article which quite frankly could have been written by a 10 year old. Only time will tell, but I am confident of a mid table finish, and that Reading will stay up as well.

 

The betting markets are open now, so this story reflects the state of play today. Doubtless if we went and signed £50M - £60M worth of players our price would change and a new article would be written. Same for any other team in the league. At this point in time the article is accurate enough.

 

In any case, the bookies got it spectacularly wrong with the 3 promoted teams last year, so I wouldn't hang my hat on anything some random Ladbrokes flunky pens for their website, let alone in late July.

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At the moment the article is correct. Reading have added the Russian, Guthrie and Mcleary and we have added J Rod but we all know or certainly hope there will be 4/5 quality additions to our squad yet and Reading will no doubt add a few more aswell. Hopefully we will add better players than Guthrie and Mcleary.

 

Lets hope some of these growing rumours on Buttner,Davis, Buckland result in a couple of signings shortly.

 

We will probably find out in the next 7/14 days where Clyne,Dann,Michu and Jarvis are all off to. would be happy with a couple of them. Are we actually after any of them?

 

We will be one of the favourites to go down as the promoted clubs always are. With the right signings I'm sure we will prove them wrong

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Let them write us off, i remember reading all of the predictions at the start of last season written by clueless people who had no idea of our abilities; one article had us finishing 17th FFS. We will take everyone by surprise once again. UTS

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Saints will stay up, in spite of that god-awful home kit, this squad is sound and will fair better than reading's in the top flight. The question is, will West Ham do better than us - because they have much greater squad depth and a manager who has been here before and has a very good top flight track record - In adkins we trust of course - Even if it does entail relegation and a second promotion.

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Saints will stay up, in spite of that god-awful home kit, this squad is sound and will fair better than reading's in the top flight. The question is, will West Ham do better than us - because they have much greater squad depth and a manager who has been here before and has a very good top flight track record - In adkins we trust of course - Even if it does entail relegation and a second promotion.

What influence does a kit design have on the team's performance?

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Who does everyone think Will get relegated then? It is going to be a very tough League, there aren't many "weak" teams in it imo.

 

Norwich and Wigan to really struggle. Wolves were weak last season, not sure anyone will bail out so early in the back end of the season this time around.

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What a load of utter cr*p. The likes of Burnley and Blackpool go down straight away - teams that go up but dont really invest in order to stay up as they would then have players on big contracts in the NPC if they were to go down. We have laid down a marker with J Rod and personally I think there's more to follow. Look at the potential plans for the stadium. Clearly our owners mean business and are trying to make us a truly global prem name. And what makes this all the more unbelievable is that we clearly have a manager who has the winning mentality and the ability to transmit it to the players.

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What a load of utter cr*p. The likes of Burnley and Blackpool go down straight away - teams that go up but dont really invest in order to stay up as they would then have players on big contracts in the NPC if they were to go down. We have laid down a marker with J Rod and personally I think there's more to follow. Look at the potential plans for the stadium. Clearly our owners mean business and are trying to make us a truly global prem name. And what makes this all the more unbelievable is that we clearly have a manager who has the winning mentality and the ability to transmit it to the players.

 

With all due respect, thinking about expanding stadium/financial backing/sizable signing/winning mentality could read as a list for SFC or Reading surely?

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Anyone know if odds are available on whether Pompey will get relegated? Can't see any on the Ladbrokes site (the only I have an account with at the moment). I'd like to do a double on Saints to stay up and Pompey to go down, considering Pompey strangely seem to be 12/1 to win League One, or 4/1 to get promoted, I'd imagine their odds for relegation could (bizarrely) be very long.

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Let them write us off, i remember reading all of the predictions at the start of last season written by clueless people who had no idea of our abilities; one article had us finishing 17th FFS. We will take everyone by surprise once again. UTS

 

Was it written by someone with a bog plunger for a hand?

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Who does everyone think Will get relegated then? It is going to be a very tough League, there aren't many "weak" teams in it imo.

 

I fancy Sunderland to struggle. They finished last season weakly after a strong first half.

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Tadanari Lee will seem like a new signing in terms of adding to the squad strength over the course of next season considering how little he played last season due to his injury.

 

Nah, his signing (like the red kit) was just to appeal to the Asian Market.

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So Reading, with a stadium capacity less than Craven Cottage, can outbid Fulham on wages/signing-on fee. Given the experience of our friends down the road, I wonder how sustainable this all is. Fulham, by the way, is one of the most indebted clubs in the Prem, and only gets away with it because it pays negligible interest on £200m or so to Fayed.

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50 quid says we will finish above Reading, West Ham and Wigan.

 

I don't think Reading were the better team in the champ (Jason Roberts got some lucky deal from the ref at the home game) and their signings of Progrebniak and Guthrie are about as inspiring as Jason Roberts in the first place. They will experience the sharpest wake up call of the prem of the 3 sides prior to christmas and McDermott will be THE under pressure manager come the jan transfer window.

 

I trust the management that we are making the right decisions and looking to take the club in the right direction, which has very little to do with the the likes of Reading so far.

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Reading had a VERY high percentage of Goals to Shots on Target or even Attempts at Goal.

IMO they will get no where near that percentage in the PL and if it wasn't for all the other clubs changing managers they would be certain to go down. We will finish above them.

 

The FL stats show that they were 5th from bottom at "Attempts at Goal" with 452 attempts and we had 20% more attempts. Even the Cheats had more attempts at goal.

http://www.football-league.co.uk/page/ClubShooting/0,,10794~20117,00.html

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I've spoken to many supporters of Prem Clubs recently and all are convinced that the way Saints play 'pass the ball and hold onto it' will frustrate the hell out of three or four of the top six. We'll be OK. Stop all this nonsense by not believing the 'London Press'.

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Pogrebniak is an excellent signing who has already proven he can score goals in the Prem (and is better than Jason Roberts), Rodriguez looks promising but we'll see. Guthrie may have slightly improved our midfield but isn't all that great, McCleary is nothing special.

 

I'd like to think our next two signings will be better than theirs, and their defence will be terrible if Alex Pearce is still in it because he just cannot pass a ball.

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