FOR all Wanderers’ well-documented problems off the pitch, it’s those on it that look the hardest to sort.

There is no telling how long the boardroom will remain in a continuous state of flux.

Eddie Davies has at least two offers on the table but on this evidence, it will take more than a set of smiling businessmen with good intentions to stop this club sliding into League One.

January looms and whomever new ownership wants at the helm, someone is going to need quite a lot of money to spend when the transfer window creaks open.

Just as his predecessor Dougie Freedman stood red-eyed at the Madejski Stadium and said his players “were not good enough” for the Championship after an embarrassing 7-1 hammering nearly two years ago, Neil Lennon was forced to admit the truth after a narrower but no-less-damaging 2-1 defeat on Saturday.

“I’m looking at some senior players when we go a goal down to manage the team and they don’t,” said the Northern Irishman. “And that’s been the problem at this club for the last three years.”

It is no great surprise to those who have followed the accounts since Wanderers dropped out of the Premier League to know financially, the problems ran deep.

Trevor Birch’s appointment may yet uncover more – but for now let’s hope he manages to broker a deal with someone who has pockets deep enough to fix this.

The last 17 games have highlighted just what a paucity of quality Lennon has at his disposal.

The first 25 minutes against Reading showed he has a side that can create chances when given encouragement to do so.

Reading were terrible, and after Steve Clarke’s dalliance with the manager’s job at Fulham an early goal would have brought the fans’ ire crashing down on the pitch.

As it turned out it was a blast from a much happier past who ensured Wanderers were kept at bay.

Ali Al-Habsi, a contender perhaps for the nicest person in football, and the scourge of Bayern Munich that wonderful night at the Allianz Arena, stood defiant as the Whites threw everything at him early on.The Oman international pulled off saves from Mark Davies, Shola Ameobi and Darren Pratley to keep the scores level.

Wanderers’ football hadn’t been particularly fluent but the home side were even worse.

Completely out of the blue a terrible attempted clearance from Prince-Desire Gouano allowed Lucas Piazon to race in on Ben Amos, bundle the ball over the on-rushing keeper, and give his side a thoroughly undeserved lead.

The Frenchman had been in Paris with his heavily-pregnant partner during the international break and was clearly emotional as the two teams paid tribute to the 130 killed in the atrocities.

Lennon said his defender was “fine” in the build up – but such a lack of concentration makes you wonder whether his preparation really was right.

It was there things started to fall apart. Davies and Jay Spearing failed to get a grip of the game, forcing passes and conceding possession with alarming regularity.

Ameobi was isolated while Pratley found himself hopelessly lacking support whenever he broke through.

It was no surprise Reading added a second six minutes later.

Davies played a poor pass in midfield and then went chasing the ball, Reading moved it quickly through Orlando Sa and Danny Williams waltzed towards the edge of the box before firing brilliantly past Amos.

Lennon maintained Wanderers improved in the second half but you feel it was only because Reading allowed them to.

The Royals effectively declared at half time and became gradually more defensive as the second half wore on.

Ameobi hit the bar with a header before the Whites finally got a slice of luck – referee James Linnington spotting a shove on Pratley by Oliver Norwood and pointing to the spot.

Feeney deserved his fourth goal of the season, if only for having the guts to step up.

Gary Madine, Emile Heskey and Max Clayton all came off the bench to add more attacking threat but was no coherency about Wanderers’ late onslaught.

It was hit and hope for the best.

You can imagine Lennon feels thoroughly let down by his experience at Wanderers thus far.

Judging by his comments over the last few weeks he has not been made aware of the full scale of the club’s financial problems, and allowed on what amounted to fool’s errands in pursuits of Joao Teixeira and Rajiv van la Parra.

Now on the pitch, he is being thoroughly failed by some of his senior players – those who many purport should be playing at a higher level than the Championship.

Lennon has every right to be annoyed.

Down at the bottom of the table the least he should expect is a bit of scrap.

But there is something seriously worrying about the lack of competitiveness Wanderers are showing right now – they are effectively going through the motions.

There are a few minor selection gripes that you could aim towards the manager with hindsight – should Prince have started, given the week he has had?

Should the Whites be getting more than a cameo from young Clayton.

And you can ask whether enough work was done over the international break, given the results were so erratic and haphazard?

Somewhere someone is taking notes. But after watching him work through this living nightmare there will be plenty of fans who hope Lennon gets given a chance to succeed by new ownership, without the shackles.