Match Thread Reading (21 Viewers)

[Liquid Gold]

I hate the way that some teams play, the blatant frustrating time wasting,, the idea of rotation fouling, the take one for the team mentality. Forest, Barnsley and Reading are all guilty of this and I really feel something has to change to stop teams ‘managing games’. Let’s not kid ourselves but we do this to, maybe not as blatantly as the three teams mentioned, but we do.

One suggestion I have heard is that as soon as the ball goes out of play, the clock stops and only re-starts when play resumes. Timekeeping would be the responsibility of someone other than the referee. This may need the time given to the duration of the game having to be adjusted. At present I believe that in most games the ball is in play less than 60 mins. Maybe games could be 60 or 70 min duration. If that is pure game time we would probably see more football.

With regard to ‘professional ‘ fouls, the yellow card system doesn’t deal with this adequately, as could be seen at Barnsley. On a lot of occasions it is clear that the defender has taken an opponent out, not in a valid attempt to win the ball, but simply to halt a dangerous attack. In cases such as these, some form of sin bin would surely be a more appropriate and telling punishment for what is an act of blatant cheating.

With regard to Reading, I understand the feelings to the current punch of players and particularly the management team who dictated the negative, time wasting tactics, even the supporters who held on to the ball. ( remember Preston fans doing the same a few years ago when Joe Murphy had to go into the stand to retrieve the ball and Kama happened there too when Moussa equalised in the last minute).
However Reading as a club are a long standing institution, in no way compatible to MK. I’ve just looked up their history and they were formed 12 years before we were and have only been a member of the FL for one season less than us. Yes, most of their existence has been in the lower leagues, with smaller crowds than us, but some of the comments levelled at Reading FC are untrue and just plain daft. They are no more a tin pot club than we are and no doubt mean as much to their group of hard core fans as City do to all of us
.

It's interesting the three teams you mention there are Championship regulars and the other team we've played that you didn't mention as practicing the dark arts are recently promoted.

I think there is a hell of a lot more of it in the Championship than any of us expected and it's something we still have to adjust to.

Take it as a compliment though that they don't think they can beat "tinpot" Coventry City with their football ability alone.

 

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[Irish Sky Blue]

It's interesting the three teams you mention there are Championship regulars and the other team we've played that you didn't mention as practicing the dark arts are recently promoted.

I think there is a hell of a lot more of it in the Championship than any of us expected and it's something we still have to adjust to.

Take it as a compliment though that they don't think they can beat "tinpot" Coventry City with their football ability alone.

I agree, I think we can take it as a compliment. We have players who are comfortable on the ball and who can hurt teams. It stands to reason that we will suffer above average amounts of ‘treatment’ than a team like Barnsley perhaps who get the ball forward more quickly. The only reason I think Blackpool played it differently to the others is that we took the lead. No point in them timewasting. They still managed to take out O’Hare a couple of times which resulted in bookings. However, we do this too. Two of O’Hare’s bookings and at least two of Maatsen’s bookings have been professional fouls.
For the good of the game and for the game as a spectacle teams ‘managing a game ‘ through time wasting and deliberate fouls needs to be made a thing of the past.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

I agree, I think we can take it as a compliment. We have players who are comfortable on the ball and who can hurt teams. It stands to reason that we will suffer above average amounts of ‘treatment’ than a team like Barnsley perhaps who get the ball forward more quickly. The only reason I think Blackpool played it differently to the others is that we took the lead. No point in them timewasting. They still managed to take out O’Hare a couple of times which resulted in bookings. However, we do this too. Two of O’Hare’s bookings and at least two of Maatsen’s bookings have been professional fouls.
For the good of the game and for the game as a spectacle teams ‘managing a game ‘ through time wasting and deliberate fouls needs to be made a thing of the past.

How?

 

[HuckerbyDublinWhelan]

How?

I agree with @Irish Sky Blue - fifa suggested the stop clock and the game shortened to 60 mins, apparently that’s the length of time the ball is in play.

Traditionalists kicked off about it though, I was all for it, even pushing it to 70 or 80 mins like rugby

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

I agree with @Irish Sky Blue - fifa suggested the stop clock and the game shortened to 60 mins, apparently that’s the length of time the ball is in play.

Traditionalists kicked off about it though, I was all for it, even pushing it to 70 or 80 mins like rugby

Timing is sortable - cautions not so much

 

[Irish Sky Blue]

Timing is sortable - cautions not so much

Timing is sortable - cautions not so much

Why not a sin bin idea for deliberate fouls? Remove the offender for a period of the game as in rugby Union.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

Why not a sin bin idea for deliberate fouls? Remove the offender for a period of the game as in rugby Union.

Not a bad shout. Deliberate foul to stop an attack 5 mins off the pitch

 

[larry_david]

Just watching the game back on ifollow. Gotta say the dacosta hate shows the bias of opinions. I'd say he made two mistakes in the time he was on the pitch. Falling over the ball and a misplaced pass.

He's won several tackles, beat his man two or three times and put in some very dangerous crosses and recieved the ball from players alot. Someone on here was claiming the players didn't trust him, don't think that's the case at all. He's not the finished article or is he consistent but there's a player there somewhere and MR needs to keep working on it rather than scrap him for the bin. He has a shit load of energy too.

Must say at this point I've paused to post,waghorn just been subbed and for me did very little at all.

 

[Liquid Gold]

Just watching the game back on ifollow. Gotta say the dacosta hate shows the bias of opinions. I'd say he made two mistakes in the time he was on the pitch. Falling over the ball and a misplaced pass.

He's won several tackles, beat his man two or three times and put in some very dangerous crosses and recieved the ball from players alot. Someone on here was claiming the players didn't trust him, don't think that's the case at all. He's not the finished article or is he consistent but there's a player there somewhere and MR needs to keep working on it rather than scrap him for the bin. He has a shit load of energy too.

Must say at this point I've paused to post,waghorn just been subbed and for me did very little at all.

It's not just mistakes though, it's basics that he didn't do correctly.

If you'd were at the game you'd have seen Dabo absolutely raging at him to get out wide and push up when Moore had the ball and DaCosta looking lost. You'd have seeen him pick the ball up with loads of space to run into and put his foot on to go backwards.

We looked miles better with Dabo on the right. Wingbacks are THE key to the way we play, they should be one of most important attacking players always offering an outlet and running the line relentlessly. DaCosta just doesn't do it. It might not be fair to criticise him for not being Dabo but we need someone of a much better quality than him there or we're just not enough of an attacking threat.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

It's not just mistakes though, it's basics that he didn't do correctly.

If you'd were at the game you'd have seen Dabo absolutely raging at him to get out wide and push up when Moore had the ball and DaCosta looking lost. You'd have seeen him pick the ball up with loads of space to run into and put his foot on to go backwards.

We looked miles better with Dabo on the right. Wingbacks are THE key to the way we play, they should be one of most important attacking players always offering an outlet and running the line relentlessly. DaCosta just doesn't do it. It might not be fair to criticise him for not being Dabo but we need someone of a much better quality than him there or we're just not enough of an attacking threat.

Yep bias

 

[Liquid Gold]

Yep bias

None of that is bias, that was an accurate reflection of the impact his lack of quality has on our attacking play.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

None of that is bias, that was an accurate reflection of the impact his lack of quality has on our attacking play.

The bias is instead of looking at his performance you and many others are comparing him against probably the most important member of our first team.

 

[Liquid Gold]

The bias is instead of looking at his performance you and many others are comparing him against probably the most important member of our first team.

Because that's the other player that plays in his position. If he can't play the role correctly then he's not good enough for it.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

Because that's the other player that plays in his position. If he can't play the role correctly then he's not good enough for it.

He’s not Cafu. To be fair the majority of our fans saw it for what it was a 6/10. Some saying he can’t play football are just rude

 

[Liquid Gold]

He’s not Cafu. To be fair the majority of our fans saw it for what it was a 6/10. Some saying he can’t play football are just rude

This is your bias Pete, you think an objective criticism that a player doesn't look up to the standard expected is a personal attack on them. It isn't. DaCosta may not have made glaring errors but he didn't contribute positively, if that happens enough times then you have to say you need better.

The guy was playing in his supposed preferred position but when he was substituted and we had a CM in at CB the whole team was more cohesive.

 

[larry_david]

Thought he did okay and was sacrificed to put our first choice rwb in his preferred position. He's still clearly a work in progress and tbh to LG above, he's right, in the first 35 min he looked nervous to fuck up so kept playing it safe and backwards but something woke him up and he was just getting going as he went off. I don't think he's as hopeless as people are making out.

I must say again though, waghorn I don't think touched the ball till 33rd min which is unbelievably worrying considering we had about 68% possession first half

 

[HuckerbyDublinWhelan]

Timing is sortable - cautions not so much

Not a bad shout. Deliberate foul to stop an attack 5 mins off the pitch

Problem is that becomes subjective because you have to accurately judge what the players mindset is. “Taking one for the team” isn’t always obvious. Then you get into the realm of goals being conceded becuase a player wasn’t o n the pitch unfairly

 

[SkyBlueCharlie9]

Payback for the Simod Cup semi-final.....

 

[robbiethemole]

Payback for the Simod Cup semi-final.....

Bloody hell, lost in the mists of time that bugger

 

[rhino1002]

Payback for the Simod Cup semi-final.....

that takes me back a few years
i remember going to elm park to watch that
dismal night
was it 1988

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

I hate the way that some teams play, the blatant frustrating time wasting,, the idea of rotation fouling, the take one for the team mentality. Forest, Barnsley and Reading are all guilty of this and I really feel something has to change to stop teams ‘managing games’. Let’s not kid ourselves but we do this to, maybe not as blatantly as the three teams mentioned, but we do.

One suggestion I have heard is that as soon as the ball goes out of play, the clock stops and only re-starts when play resumes. Timekeeping would be the responsibility of someone other than the referee. This may need the time given to the duration of the game having to be adjusted. At present I believe that in most games the ball is in play less than 60 mins. Maybe games could be 60 or 70 min duration. If that is pure game time we would probably see more football.

With regard to ‘professional ‘ fouls, the yellow card system doesn’t deal with this adequately, as could be seen at Barnsley. On a lot of occasions it is clear that the defender has taken an opponent out, not in a valid attempt to win the ball, but simply to halt a dangerous attack. In cases such as these, some form of sin bin would surely be a more appropriate and telling punishment for what is an act of blatant cheating.

With regard to Reading, I understand the feelings to the current punch of players and particularly the management team who dictated the negative, time wasting tactics, even the supporters who held on to the ball. ( remember Preston fans doing the same a few years ago when Joe Murphy had to go into the stand to retrieve the ball and Kama happened there too when Moussa equalised in the last minute).
However Reading as a club are a long standing institution, in no way compatible to MK. I’ve just looked up their history and they were formed 12 years before we were and have only been a member of the FL for one season less than us. Yes, most of their existence has been in the lower leagues, with smaller crowds than us, but some of the comments levelled at Reading FC are untrue and just plain daft. They are no more a tin pot club than we are and no doubt mean as much to their group of hard core fans as City do to all of us
.

Agree wholeheartedly about an hour game with a stopped clock with a timekeeping official in charge.

I'm also open to the idea of a sin bin for yellows, esp if done alongside a stopped clock otherwise teams could try and time waste until their player was back on the field. If that were to happen you could have the mythical 'orange' card for those incidents which are not quite worthy of a red but more than a yellow. Say yellow = 10mins, orange = 30mins, red = expulsion for entire game,

Other thing I've never been happy about is suspensions for red cards being for the following games. That could work against the team that has been wronged.

Let#s say Cov are going for promotion and are playing a team who have the league's top scorer (for arguments sake let's say it's Mitrovic) Mitorvic is sent off in injury time against us and we get a minute playing against 10 men. Mitrovic then misses the next three games against West Brom, Bournemouth and Stoke who are all in the promotion race along with us.

Those teams get to play an entire game without having to worry about Mitrovic whereas we only get an advantage for a minute. The team that were wronged end up being disadvantaged because their rivals get a bigger overall benefit. So for me red card suspensions should be served against the team that they got the red card against, even if said player moves teams and the suspension takes years to serve fully.

 

[SeaSeeEffCee]

I noticed a lot of their fans talking about how they always go 1-0 up away at Coventry and then lose but can anyone actually relate to that? In my memory we usually lost to Reading when we were both in the Championship, but I'm only mid-20s so don't remember much pre-2004.

 

[PVA]

Dacosta is OK as back up and MR clearly has faith in him or he wouldn't keep picking him over Pask, or even Rowe and Burroughs if he's as bad as some make out.

Don't get me wrong, he makes some stupid errors and drives me crazy at times - the mistake that nearly cost us in the last minute at Blackpool was awful.

 

[Hobo]

It's not just mistakes though, it's basics that he didn't do correctly.

If you'd were at the game you'd have seen Dabo absolutely raging at him to get out wide and push up when Moore had the ball and DaCosta looking lost. You'd have seeen him pick the ball up with loads of space to run into and put his foot on to go backwards.

We looked miles better with Dabo on the right. Wingbacks are THE key to the way we play, they should be one of most important attacking players always offering an outlet and running the line relentlessly. DaCosta just doesn't do it. It might not be fair to criticise him for not being Dabo but we need someone of a much better quality than him there or we're just not enough of an attacking threat.

Dabo wasn't "absolutely raging at him" at all. Yes there were times when he was telling him where he wanted him to be... but we all know he needs a bit of help with his positional play. That is how he will learn.

I thought he did okay over all. It was noticeable a few, and it was a few fans, are on his case straight away. A couple of times when he turned and played it back to Dabo - but there really was nothing ahead of him.

To me his biggest problem seems to be lacking confidence. But he was actively looking for directions from the likes of Dabo and Sheaf which is no bad thing. He seems fit enough and willing enough and it seems like he wants to learn.

Perhaps why he seems to be ahead of Pask and Bright when it comes to selection?

How he does between now and January will be key.

PS Moore was their ball player out from the back and playing in the centre of their defence. Not sure why you think it is Da Costa's job to press him as a wing back?

 

[SlowerThanPlatt]

I thought Da Costa did okay on Saturday, certainly one of his better games. He did need a lot of talking through the game from his teammates, is his English still not great? Remember Robins saying it was difficult for him to communicate

 

[Frostie]

Dacosta clearly has some good attributes, strong in the tackle, decent enough on the ball & loads of energy & enthusiasm. The problems he has are all tactical & positional really which can be coached over time.

He's had a really difficult time of it with the condensed season last time out meaning less time to work on things in training (which he desperately needs) & being in & out of the team with Dabo's & his own injury problems. I don't believe he speaks English well either which is always going to make his learning process harder. I'm convinced there's a player in there, question is can we afford to carry him at times whilst also needing to give him that experience? If he starts costing us points MR will lose patience pretty quickly.

 

[PUSB-We_are_going_up]

Dacosta clearly has some good attributes, strong in the tackle, decent enough on the ball & loads of energy & enthusiasm. The problems he has are all tactical & positional really which can be coached over time.

He's had a really difficult time of it with the condensed season last time out meaning less time to work on things in training (which he desperately needs) & being in & out of the team with Dabo's & his own injury problems. I don't believe he speaks English well either which is always going to make his learning process harder. I'm convinced there's a player in there, question is can we afford to carry him at times whilst also needing to give him that experience? If he starts costing us points MR will lose patience pretty quickly.

He seems lazy as he never takes players on

 

[SlowerThanPlatt]

He seems lazy as he never takes players on

Lol that’s not being lazy, more lack of confidence in his ability

 

[PUSB-We_are_going_up]

Lol that’s not being lazy, more lack of confidence in his ability

Im just saying it seems and I think everyone can see he has potential to reach the levels needed to succeed at this level, I believe Robins will be able to get the confidence into him at some stage but imo whats the point in wasting Dabo at RCB, wouldnt it be better if Dacosta came into a winning team after 60/70 mins

 

[Colin Steins Smile]

The issue I see with Dacosta is his positioning when we are out of possession. He leaves the RCB having to cover runners and a CF.
On Saturday Maatsen was very quickly back into a defensive position, whilst Dacosta was still 20m further up the pitch.

 

[kg82]

I noticed a lot of their fans talking about how they always go 1-0 up away at Coventry and then lose but can anyone actually relate to that? In my memory we usually lost to Reading when we were both in the Championship, but I'm only mid-20s so don't remember much pre-2004.

There were 2 games in early 2000’s (something like 2002 and 2004) where we went 1 down and won 2-1… but they were both at the Madejski.

 

[SlowerThanPlatt]

 

[Legia Sky Blue]

On the matter of persistent fouling where players take turns to foul, football could perhaps take a leaf out of basketball's rules where a player can be taken out of the match for persistent team fouling.

The equivalent in football could be worked in so that for the 5th booking onwards each player booked has to be taken out of the game, so subbed if the teams still have subs to use, if not they play with 10 men etc. Such a scenario would have made the Barnsley game very interesting, and most likely put a stop to the persistent 'team fouling' of O'Hare, which seems to be used by every team we play.

 

[Greggs]

did fuck all

Thought their number 8 was decent

 

[aloisijohnnyaloisi]

Just watched the second half back with the Reading commentary on. They thought it was hilarious when their assistant was getting booked and wasting time, a minute later they we're furious with the extra minute the referee allowed.

Lovely stuff