Jaap Stam was a surprise appointment at Reading in the summer, and his deep-lying possession football has its critics, but the Royals find are well in the play-off picture according to David from Royals Rendezvous.
Reading have proved to be a bit of a dark horse this season — assess the campaign so far…
DJ: After a slightly wobbly start the results have been surprisingly good, especially at home but also certainly not a disgrace on the road either.
We have had a few reality checks - such as at Brentford where we were walloped 4-1, Newcastle away the same, and an almost disgraceful 5-0 scoreline away to Fulham in which the team hardly turned up. So our goal difference is unhealthy. However, sounds crazy but these all appeared to be one-offs and in general we have been able to wear teams down with possession football, scoring quite a few goals in the last quarter of an hour. Of course our fans still remember too recently and too well the infamous freefall descent from Steve Clarke so we are not counting on anything at all yet.
Stam bases his play on a passing game, taking all the time he needs to build up play. This can result in us having 70%-75% of the possession. However well over half of this might be in our own half. Unlike Barcelona we haven’t got a Messi or Iniesta to suddenly open up the centre of the field, so sometimes the wait to get to attack is … considerable. And that’s what has displeased some. There have been the ‘boo’ boys; yes, there have been whistles from some of our own fans. But it hasn’t rattled Stam at all, he is sticking to his plan, his philosophy. Whilst we have the ball the other team does the running around.
What sort of manager is Jaap Stam? What sort of football can we expect to see from you guys?
DJ: Although a neutral fan might think this was some mad-cow appointment it didn’t actually come as too much of a surprise to me. Our director of football Nicky Hammond had left, after many a year at the Royals, to do the same responsibility at West Bromwich Albion. In his place we had hired Brian Tevreden as ‘Reading FC Technical Director’ last February - a Dutchman with plenty of connections, a playing career and now making astute financial planning (and just renewed his contract so it’s long term).
I can’t say he’s done badly either, looks quite smart in his moves so far. Jaam Stap’s name immediately sprang up because he had been handling the Ajax U21s successfully. When the Reading job came up he was groomed as the first choice from the beginning. With these Dutchmen in place - and remember Stam also brought across a couple more staff from the continent too - it’s no surprise that we signed principally ‘European’ players this summer and not those from home soil.
Football - very European, lots of possession ‘a la’ Barca … but obviously not as good, hahaha!
What’s the current ownership situation at Reading?
DJ: For me slightly worrying. OK, it’s fine not to be overly interfered with by your board of directors as per a Leeds or Cardiff, but our board tends to the exact opposite - you don’t know they are there. I don’t doubt they mean well, but there is talk of them selling out, to (most likely) Chinese investors. This is obviously a step in the dark. We honestly haven’t been informed.
However, this is some ill-feeling brewing up. Around the new stadium is a rather large area for potential building development and here it seems that the ‘Thais’ are not intending to give up their interest on this part as far as I can perceive. So suspecting fans are beginning to ask - are the board really into it for the football, as per their initial introductions to the club, or are they more thinking of making a good load of bucks with the housing-cum-business developments? This has to be defined at the earliest opportunity …
Best players and weak links in the current side?
DJ: Best performers so far have probably been John Swift (he has even scored for the England U21s this season) and Ali Al Habsi.
For me the midfield is the best of the team. No ‘stars’ but graft well together.
The forwards try hard, there is a good team spirit, but - oh dear - it’s hardly what you could call prolific. If between them they scored just one against the Rangers we’d be happy enough.
Beerens is settling down well though drifts in and out of games, and McCleary shows lots of glimpses and they seem to be becoming more regular.
There are many defenders in the squad, indeed some would say too many — ten of them, but are sometimes a little unstable though. Whilst passing around the back they are fine and enjoy their football, they can be found out amongst fast mischievous attackers (e.g. against Newcastle and Brentford).
Al Habsi is really fine in goal though, indeed he was the Player of the Season last term … has saved us already on countless occasions when the shots on-target count is woefully against us.
Any rumoured January transfer activity?
DJ: Our super transfers thread on "RR” - now running to almost 15,000 posts! - has recently rumours on defenders and midfielders that might be of interest yet precious little of strikers, which is where 90% of fans want to see action.
Liverpool defender Tiago Ilori has joined us for just over £3.5m.
Stam and the management want an attacker or two, they admit it, but who’s there and can we afford them? It’s all guesswork I’m afraid …
Did the Man Utd experience at the weekend make you wonder if you’re ready to go back to the Prem, or do you worry about that if/when you get there?
DJ: Not at all, to be honest it wasn’t as bad as the score line suggested - two early United goals then we held our own most of the game to quite late on and another two came along to see the match out. For most it was just a distraction from the main priority - continuing the league form. If we were to go up then investment would be a must of course …
Will you get there this season?
DJ: General aspirations, as you have probably guessed after two years finishing in the bottom third of the table after a glorious decade (by our standards anyway) were simply to finish top half. Just before the season started I had predicted for an article on Sky Sports for us to be flirting around play-offs, but then when have fans been objective? And yet we are sitting third. It would be difficult to find many Royals fans who think we are perfectly worthy of being there, if I’m honest the majority think we’re well over-achieving. However, none of the other play-off sides are particularly consistent so I feel we will finish fifth to eighth. I think top two is a stretch too far. But once in play-offs - if, that is - who knows?
The manager has talked of a three-year plan to get the club into the Premier. It’s hard to comment on that. Anything quicker would be welcome news, but I get amused by these sort of long-term plans, as the championship is very competitive and it doesn’t just depend on how we ourselves are playing - taking into consideration the other 23 teams that’s an impossibility on long-term thinking - virtually no team will even have the same manager in three years! I’m sure Reading will be again Premier league and even stick there during a number of seasons - historically you can certainly see we are on an upward trend, plus taking into consideration that this is a wealthy affluent zone, has a large catchment area, probably no local rival to oust us as ‘Thames Valley champs’ for many a year, etc. … just that I’d hate to put a date on it!
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