It almost feels like a crisis is happening at Reading
READING FC has faced a few crisis moments in the last 20 years.
For example the moment Russian owner Anton Zingarevich disappeared, and thereby stopped paying the bills, is up there. Everything going on now, on and off the pitch, definitely fits in the ‘crisis’ category.
The issue is the transfer embargo placed upon the club by the EFL for breaching financial sustainability and profitability rules.
They now do not have enough players to fill the bench, or to field a proper team in the EFL Cup.
Not having enough players on the opening day of a season to occupy seven places on a bench is embarrassing enough, but not as
embarrassing as fielding a youth team, with the average age of just 19, for the cup game.
The manager, staff, fans and senior players, are the ones being punished here. The overspending chief exec and managers, the self-interested agents offering poor advice and the sub-standard players with ridiculous contracts are long gone and will not be feeling the slightest bruise.
If the EFL wants to clobber teams for financial mismanagement they need to do it instantly, rather than two sets of annual accounts later. Everything changes at every football club in two years.
Besides, this time next year, when the impact of Covid is being accounted for, every club will have broken the rules.
Managers at Championship clubs rely on 20 to 25 quality players over the course of a typical season. Reading only have 14.
Veljko Paunovic, the manager, is doing his best to remain upbeat and positive, but even his cheery demeanour is starting to crack. The situation he currently faces is neither what he signed up for or what he deserves.
He makes no secret of the fact he is desperate to recruit during this transfer window, but time is running out, and even if the EFL give him the go-ahead, if you were a quality footballer with lots of career options, why would you choose Reading at the moment? The matches against Preston and Bristol City at home and then Coventry away in the next few days are crucial.
The 14 first-team players need to settle everyone down.
If it still looks like a crisis after that run of games, Reading fans will be in for a very long winter.