SPECULATION - Simon Cox

[Royal Rother]

When he played for the first team he looked decent, but then against Spurs, at a time when our senior pros were failing to produce adequate performances, he was our best player for the 45 minutes he was on the pitch

You could say the same about Church against Burnley.

You could, you would just be talking rubbish of course

Church did ok, but apart from some strong running he didnt actually have any end product. He did cause the left back problems

Certainly not rubbish. (Re End Product - did Cox score against Spurs?)

Look, Church did very well in one half of football for RFC in a big pressure match, having barely seen any of his team mates for months I should imagine - Cox did very well in one half of football in what was, in the scheme of things, a low pressure match etc. etc. etc.

The comparison of Cox's and Church's contributions in those 2 games is perfectly valid and, weighing up all the factors, Church put in an equally impressive performance as Cox.

[Southbank Old Boy]

Firstly, nto sure what relevance Church v Burnley has on the Cox scenario a couple of years ago

Secondly, in my opinion Church gave the left back a hard time but only really through some powerful running. He touched the ball rarely and didnt do much on the few times he did. He did have an impact on the game though because he still caused them problems with his running but he didnt look to have much to trouble them when he actually got the ball

He still did well and I hope he gets his chance, you can probably tell me what difference that makes to the Cox situation two years ago?????

Against Spurs Cox got on the ball much more, beat his man a number of times and, from what I remember, got some good balls into the box. Most importantly, compared to the performances of the other midfielders and forwards around that time it was significantly better and showed a confidence and willingness to try things that was sadly lacking from the so called first team players

[Royal Rother]

Just read your and WR's previous posts on the thread and I'm confident you'll see why I extended the Church / Cox "comparison".

(That's a lie by the way.)

[Wycombe Royal]

This belief that Cox was a fantastic player before he left us is quite frankly ludicrous. He had done very little to suggest he would be a good player in the Premiership (although some people seem to think a decent 45 minutes in one match which wasn't in the Premiership and was basically our second string) and even now his £2.5m move is not going to take him there despite two full seasons of regular football which he would not have got with us.

[Royal Lady]

I would suggest that he has a better chance of getting into the Premiership with West Brom he would have had, had he been with us right now.

[Wycombe Royal]

I would suggest that he has a better chance of getting into the Premiership with West Brom he would have had, had he been with us right now.

I'mnot putting him down I just down understand all the hype around him now. There was very little when he was with us.

As for being in the Premiership, if you believed some on here we would never have been relegated had Coppell played him regularly in the first team.

[Royal Lady]

There was very little hype about Cox because not many people were aware of his talents. He made more people aware with his 45 minutes against Spurs imo, and then we let him go elsewhere, when we, ourselves were struggling and he *might* have made a difference. He might not have, but we didn't give him a chance and yet he was desperate to play for his home town club and do well for us. As it happens, selling him for £200k and us getting a % of his sell-on fee was good business, but doesn't necessarily mean that it was the right decision at that time.

[Wycombe Royal]

Yes he might have made a difference but there is no evidence to suggest that he would have. If he could have made a difference in the Premiership over 2 seasons ago then why, over 2 years later has he still not made it to the Premiership?

Surely he should have improved over the last two years (which he obviously has)?

[Dirk Gently]

It was the right decision for us and him at the time. When he was sold was before we really slumped, and at the time - from what I rememebr - I don't think anyone in the club really believed we were going down.

Derby were as good as down thwn and Fulham looked dead and buried and we just had to finish ahead of Birmingham to stay up - and everyone was confident we'd do that. (And we did, of course - no-one factored in Fulham's revival!)

If we had stayed up then no-one would be having these conversations now - but hindsight's a wonderful thing.....

[Hoop Blah]

Yes he might have made a difference but there is no evidence to suggest that he would have. If he could have made a difference in the Premiership over 2 seasons ago then why, over 2 years later has he still not made it to the Premiership?

Surely he should have improved over the last two years (which he obviously has)?

I've said it all before about my views on the shame of Cox leaving without getting a decent crack of the whip under Coppell, but there are plenty of good players who have made a short term impact in the Premiership without ever going on to get another chance to do it, or to perform at that level consistently.

I agree with AP and SOB that Cox could've been the catalyst to make something happen at the time. I'm sure he wasn't ready to be a regular starter and force his way in upfront ahead of our other forwards at the time, but, I do believe he'd made a decent case for his talents and should've been made to feel like he would get a chance at that time.

As Dirk says, the move was right for Cox at the time. The club weren't too bothered about losing his talents because Coppell was so entranched in his loyalty to his experienced and proven established first teamers.

It's a real pity he didn't get a decent chance at Reading and that he had to go elsewhere to further his career and I do think it was another one of Coppell's mistakes from that period that just taint all the good memories of the promotion and challengin for Europe blah blah blah...

[Royal Rother]

I wonder if Chelsea and Man Utd's fans memories of Mourinho's and Ferguson's management of their clubs are tainted by the obvious (and not so obvious) mistakes they made during their tenures.

[russyb]

i was dissapointed to see cox go and thought he could do a job for us, thought he would have stayed and Long at the time would have been the one to go out on Loan or leave, but so be it.

As for Church he did a good job, people have to remember that in the Burnley game he was played out of position too on the wing but still didn't do too badly.

[Hoop Blah]

I wonder if Chelsea and Man Utd's fans memories of Mourinho's and Ferguson's management of their clubs are tainted by the obvious (and not so obvious) mistakes they made during their tenures.

I should think a lot of them have some form of regret over certain episodes yes.

I don't think Fergie has got too much wrong on balance, but if I were a Utd fan I would've been disappointed by the way he got distracted by the problems with his horses and the way he lost a bit of control by announcing he was going to retire at the end of whichever season it was.

I don't think bringing success to a club means your beyond reproach for mistakes made. I wouldn't have sacked Coppell for the mistake of not giving Cox a chance though....getting us relegated and seemingly not having a clue how to prevent it maybe though...

[Royal Rother]

Whether the handling of Cox was a mistake or not, nobody's perfect, and everybody makes them, but I wouldn't let them taint the good memories.

[Wantage Royal]

Looks like the move to WBA is finally going to happen.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/footbal ... 124817.stm

[Arch]

Looks like the move to WBA is finally going to happen.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/footbal ... 124817.stm

At last. This seemingly interminable transfer saga has been going for nearly a week now.

[loyalroyal4life]

how much is the sell on fee?

[gazzer, loyal royal]

how much is the sell on fee?

about 40%, so we're due about 800,000

[specialjon]

BBC reporting it's gone through for 1.9 mill so thats 760,000 big ones to us! Easiest money brendan will bring into the club.

[Wantage Royal]

Swindon supporting colleague reckons it's 1.5 mill upfront with 400k add-ons.