1871 - the ultimate Reading FC website

2001/02 Reports

Match facts:

Reading goal: Leon Bird (46 minutes)
Assist:
Opposition goals: After 6 and 94 minutes, the latter in second-half injury time
Half-time: Reading 0 West Ham United 1
Gamebreaker: Final whistle
Attendance: About 70, plus 50 Soccer School children in the first half
Referee: G O'Sullivan
Linesmen: R Welch, S Cook
Weather: Dry, sunny

Reading line-up: 1 Simon Cox; 2 Mark Boddy (14 Adam Campion, 56 minutes), 5 Adam Theo (12 Ahmet Rifat, 77 minutes), 6 Gary Middleton, 3 Callum Earl; 7 Chris Davies, 8 Simieon Howell, 4 John Mullins, 11 Steven Laidler; 10 Nathan Bailey, 9 Leon Bird
Sub not used: 15 Jamie Young
Reading yellow cards: None
Reading red cards: None

Match report:

At the start of this game it looked as though Reading might be overrun, and in the opening minutes West Ham took the lead with a strong header placed over Simon Cox in the Reading goal. Ten minutes later another header landed on the top of the Reading crossbar, but after that Reading came back into the game strongly.

We had an attack where Leon Bird almost released Steve Laidler but a defender just managed to get in an interception. Laidler dispossessed him anyway, and then shot just wide. Nathan Bailey had a couple of long shosts at goal, one well over and the other saved comfortably by the keeper.

Cox kept the score down to 1-0 by just managing to tip an attempted lob wide of the post, but that was in a rare attack from the away side. Soon after, Callum Earl had a free-kick tipped over the bar (although I think it was going over anyway). From the corner, Adam Theo hit the bar with a far post header, whilst Simieon Howell got to the rebound first and had his shot cleared off the line. The ball was still in the danger area but none of the Reading players could reach it before it was properly cleared. The final decent chance of the half came when a Reading cross was almost turned into his own net by a defender - he was fortunate to see it hit the side netting instead.

At the beginning of the second half, Reading equalised almost immediately, with a shot hammered home by Bird after a corner was not cleared. A few minutes later, another Reading corner was won at the far post by Theo, and his header went to Howell who headed over.

The game had started to get nastier in midfield with the referee continually penalising Reading for miniscule or non-existent offences whilst allowing West Ham to get away with some dreadful challenges. One of these was on Mark Boddy, and although he carried on for a few minutes, he soon was substituted by Adam Campion. Hopefully, this was not a recurrence of the injury that has kept him out for a year.

Campion played as a right-winger with Chris Davies dropping back to right back, and soon Campion had put in a couple of great crosses that came to nothing.

Reading's period of superiority had more or less ended by this stage, not helped at all by the succession of free-kicks awarded to the away team. As the game wore on West Ham had more chances, and hit the inside of the post about halfway through the half. Fortunately, the ball came back out and no-one could get on the rebound. Later, Reading were lucky to escape after failing to clear a corner - this time the final shot deflected off a Reading defender on the goal-line and away for another corner.

John Mullins had a shot that went just over, before in the fourth minute of injury time, West Ham got a thoroughly undeserved winner. At least the goal came from a move rather than from yet another dubious free-kick. Reading gave the ball away in midfield, failed to clear the initial attack and West Ham scored with a shot just inside the post.

There were seven minutes of injury time in total, almost all of which were for injuries to Reading players that did not even gain us a free-kick, but we were unable to draw level again.

Match notes:

Ahmet Rifat played as a substitute in this match, presumably still on trial.

Nathan Bailey and Leon Bird tried to confuse everyone by wearing different shirts compared to those listed in the teamsheet!

Mark Boddy made his first start since his knee ligament injury.

Match preview:

None.

Ticket information:

None.

Home . Academy Index

News . First Team . Opposition . Reserves . Where Are They Now? . Columns . Kingsley . MadStad . Interactive . Links . Site Map