How would you react IF SC turned Reading down

[Brady's Old Lady]

So I'd be pleased - waffled on so much I forgot to answer the question

 

[Brovion]

Timmy baby, what would you have liked SC to have said when we asked him to stay?

"No, sorry, if I get offered a job in division one next season I'll think about it so I'm not going to stay here, I'm just going to sit on my arse doing sod all and wait for the phone to ring"?

DK didn't seem to think Coppell was something 'really special' last year otherwise he wouldn't have given the job to Gimpshelwood first.

xx

Basically yes! That nice, honourable, decent Peter Taylor did exactly the same thing. Good point on Gimpshelwood though.

And DON'T call me 'Timmy baby' in public! (Smiley face)

 

[SiNZ]

I would be delighted and relieved.

I would also feel glad that I didn't join the "SC can sod off if he wants to manage anyone but Brighton we don't want him" bandwagon..... especially as most of it has been fuelled by media speculation.

I prefer to take more notice of actual statements and can easily accept SC being torn.

How many of the "disloyal" accusers will stay in one job their whole life? In my own job I came close to joining a competitor. Not because I am disloyal, but because the competitor could offer me where I wanted to be now, instead of waiting. If there had been uncertainty about the viability of where I am now, say dependent on a pending decision, I would most likely have jumped to somewhere safe.

We are the only ones tied to the club for life. We can only expect club staff, managers and players to do a job whilst they're with the club. We cannot expect them to declare a lifelong love for a club that is merely their bread and butter..... that's why WE exist.

 

[Yorkie]

I would be delighted and relieved.

I would also feel glad that I didn't join the "SC can sod off if he wants to manage anyone but Brighton we don't want him" bandwagon..... especially as most of it has been fuelled by media speculation.

I prefer to take more notice of actual statements and can easily accept SC being torn.

How many of the "disloyal" accusers will stay in one job their whole life? In my own job I came close to joining a competitor. Not because I am disloyal, but because the competitor could offer me where I wanted to be now, instead of waiting. If there had been uncertainty about the viability of where I am now, say dependent on a pending decision, I would most likely have jumped to somewhere safe.

We are the only ones tied to the club for life. We can only expect club staff, managers and players to do a job whilst they're with the club. We cannot expect them to declare a lifelong love for a club that is merely their bread and butter..... that's why WE exist.

Great post. I would applaud you if the smilies were working.

 

[Brovion]

Nope sorry still don't agree. You are obviously correct about the transient nature of the 'hired help' and if Coppell was rubbish we'd sack him so why shouldn't he look around for a better job?

Well for the same reason that a football club isn't a business. A football manager isn't just somebody doing a normal job; he's somebody who holds all our hopes and dreams, we are uplifted or depressed as a direct result of his actions. Don't think of it as a man changing jobs, a better analogy is that of a man about to leave his adoring wife and children to shack up with the rich tart up the road. How many would condone that?

Football is so much more than jobs and money.

 

[Trigger]

Great post. I would applaud you if the smilies were working.

They are for some of us...

I think Coppell would have to earn back some of that respect he's already earned from us but lost in all this mess, i still think he'll be off though.

 

[SiNZ]

Nope sorry still don't agree. You are obviously correct about the transient nature of the 'hired help' and if Coppell was rubbish we'd sack him so why shouldn't he look around for a better job?

Well for the same reason that a football club isn't a business. A football manager isn't just somebody doing a normal job; he's somebody who holds all our hopes and dreams, we are uplifted or depressed as a direct result of his actions. Don't think of it as a man changing jobs, a better analogy is that of a man about to leave his adoring wife and children to shack up with the rich tart up the road. How many would condone that?

Football is so much more than jobs and money.

To us, yes - no question.

But to the people employed in the game? Not on the evidence. People within the game do not treat their clubs as "adoring wife and children." For them it is a job. Otherwise we wouldn't see the things we do.

As I say, we are the only ones for whom the club is the adoring wife and children. We are the only ones for whom football is not a business, because we can't change clubs like we would, say pubs or the supermarket in which we shop.

 

[FamilyGuy]

He (still) hasn't gone yet !

and the longer this goes on, the more likely he is to stay.

 

[Lady Bracknell]

I dont agree with that, dude.

It was an easy decision for Taylor to make. He's got loadsa money, a fantastic stadium and a great team at Hull, so by saying no to Reading all he did was make the fans love him. It wasn't a hard decision. He could quite easily take Hull up this season and next season. Hull are a massive sleeping giant that has finally risen, the job at Reading is risky and demands at least the playoffs in a division full of quality teams.

Coppell by contrast has not built his team here, does not have loads of money and does not have a great stadium which is the key to money and therefore potential. He'll get it in 2 or 3 years but that's a long time in football.

f*** am I making sense?

xx

Everyone is making sense on this, no matter which "side" of the debate - although I'd suggest that Taylor's decision was made more on the basis of his over-inflated ideas of his own worth. He might be at Hull now but he was holed up in Kent sitting next to a phone that didn't ring for a good while after he left us.

I still wonder whether the fans' hopes expectations of a manager are always going to be at odds with that of the manager so far as heads ruling hearts though. And perhaps it's right that it is. Fans bring the real heart into the game and an emotional involvement isn't supposed to be rational. Managers are doing a job. And probably do it better by putting rationality first. Which is why you should expect them to behave as anyone else would if offered a job that gave them promotion, more money and a potentially more secure future. We still greet Micky Adams as a hero but what did he do that's so very different to Coppell? And remember, he was another Brighton manager who'd just signed a contract with DK!

That's not to say that the ringmaster of Madejski's Circus is going about things the right way, or that Steve Coppell won't just end up as another clown who dumped Brighton for all the wrong reasons. But to expect Coppell to take on all our hopes and dreams at the expense of his own just 'aint realistic. Or fair on the bloke.

So if he stays, I'll be glad. But I can't say I've got 100% trust in him not to do the same again the next time there's a Div. 1 re-shuffle.

And if there is a next time it'd be helpful it wasn't conducted with the sort of indecision, rumour and lack of sensible information from either Club that we've seen this time. Just how long does it take to "think things over"?

 

[Brovion]

SiNZ you're correct, to the people in the game it is 'just a job'. To the shareholders of the PLCs it is 'just a business'. But not to me. To me Steve Coppell isn't just a bloke doing a job, he's an integral part of my life, as was Taylor, Adams, Hortonj etc before him. Without emotion and feeling football really IS just twenty two men trying to kick a ball into two string bags.

That's why I feel the way I do, it probably isn't rational but there you go.

 

[SiNZ]

SiNZ you're correct, to the people in the game it is 'just a job'. To the shareholders of the PLCs it is 'just a business'. But not to me. To me Steve Coppell isn't just a bloke doing a job, he's an integral part of my life, as was Taylor, Adams, Hortonj etc before him. Without emotion and feeling football really IS just twenty two men trying to kick a ball into two string bags.

That's why I feel the way I do, it probably isn't rational but there you go.

Sounds like we are exactly the same really. That's why I spend so much more time than is healthy doing the football spreadsheets. That's why I cried when Brazil knocked us out of the World Cup, as did an unknown girl at the table next to us that my wife told to give me a hug (!). That's why I flew back home to England from NZ for a weekend for the Port Vale away game in 2002. And the year before, although got a few weeks of work to do that one properly. And the season before that went straight from my mate's stag do to Brighton Station for the train to Plymouth (God I was ill all the way down).

Oh great, now you've got me homesick again.... must check when I can put my career needs aside and come back home!

It's funny, every now and then I remind myself that football is as you say, only "twenty two men trying to kick a ball into two string bags." But then normality kicks in and I realise it's the one constant that always matters, aside from wife and child. Probably.

God, I love this game and this club.

 

[Bwian]

God, I love this game and this club.

At the moment I fcuking hate this club. For the third day in a row I have customers to visit but sit here on nsc dreaming up my excuses for not seeing them whilst awaiting news about Steve prevaricator extraordinaire Coppout.

"Eh, y'alright la?" "Calm down, calm down-it's only a game" "250k? Sound!" "Eh, Eh, Dick-can you top 250k? Eh?"

 

[Brovion]

Well I've enjoyed the discussion anyway, I can see and sympathise with all the points of view expressed. I suppose basically I do hope he stays despite everything I've said. If he does I shall clap and cheer him on Saturday as loudly as anyone who hasn't slagged him off. Perhaps my 'friends' on Always-Skint are correct, I AM a hypocrite.

 

[chemical brother]

You are lovely Tim.

It's been a properly loved up thread and will inspire me to put in a good performance on the wing for Dresden this afternoon. Cheers.

xx

 

[Captain Sensible]

If he stays the Skipper will be pleased.