Reading win 3-1 at Rotherham and move up to third place in the table. Martin Butler, Jamie Cureton and Jim McIntyre get the goals. Adrian Williams starts the match to make his return from injury and Keith Jones comes on as a late substitute to make his Reading debut. For a match report, click here.
And the wins just keep coming, as in the Academy, the U-19s beat Peterborough 2-1 and the Under-17s beat Millwall 3-0, both at home. Click on the results for match details.
Reading look forward to the game against Rotherham tomorrow. Barry Hunter is suspended, so presumably either Adrian Williams or John Mackie will replace him. Adie came back to his best fairly slowly after his last injury but I still think we'll see him tomorrow. I would expect Alan Pardew not to make any other changes to the starting line-up. Academy player and England U-15 squad member, Simieon Howell, is apparently travelling with the team to Rotherham but will not be in the named 16 players.
Rotherham meanwhile are playing the "injury crisis game", claiming that they may not have 16 players to name in a squad. I remember Millwall saying that, and almost all of their injured players miraculously regained fitness just before we played at their ground. In particular, their leading scorer (and Reading reject) Mark Robins missed their last game through injury and is described as doubtful.
Some people have been using a lot of time to go on (and on and on and on) about how bad we are away from home. Well, in the last month, we've only played two away games - we won one of them and we only lost the other one to a last-minute penalty after dominating the second half. That's not bad away form, although obviously we all want more!
Keith Scott is currently training with Leyton Orient. This would explain why he wasn't in the squad for Wednesday's reserve game despite having featured regularly in the reserve team this season (except when suspended!). Bearing in mind how Orient played in the Worthington Cup tie against Reading, though, this must rank as something of a surprise.
Academy Under-16 player Simieon Howell is called up for the England Under-15 squad. The midfielder was called up to the Under-15 squad last season, but did not actually play for the team. The Under-15s play in the Victory Shield against Northern Ireland (away on 20/10/2000 at Windsor Park), Wales (away on 3/11/2000 at Newtown AFC) and Scotland (home on 1/12/2000 at Deva Stadium, Chester). The games are normally covered live on Sky Sports.
The referees for this week's Academy games are J Pearce (Under-19s) and D Lovegrove (Under-17s). OK, so it's not interesting but I thought I'd share the news anyway.
The reserves draw 1-1 with Cambridge at Farnborough. As expected, the match saw the return of Adie Williams and Keith Jones from injury. Both they and Graeme Murty played the full 90 minutes. For a match report, click here.
Reading announce that the home games against Oxford, Millwall and Bristol Rovers will be reserved seating in the East Stand. This is undoubtedly the correct decision, but the netting at the southern end of the stand will not be moved for that game. So what happens to the season-ticket holders who will be unable to take their seats? Or did the club have the foresight to move them all over the summer? If that did happen, why not tell everyone in advance of the season starting?
Convicted criminal Gerard Lavin gets away with a £1,000 fine for kicking the ball at fans in the East Stand during the opening game of last season. He also had to pay the fan concerned £300. In court, Lavin admitted aiming the ball at the crowd, whilst at the time he claimed to have been aiming at an advertising hoarding. Now if you or I had committed the same sort of assault at the MadStad we would have been banned from attending all football grounds for at least a year. Was Lavin? No, of course he wasn't. We wait to see if Reading ban him for life from Madejski Stadium. Note: Reading visit Bristol City in less than four weeks' time. (PS As far as RFC websites go, you read it here first, or at least you could have done.)
Millwall announce that their new manager is ex-Royal Mark "Fat Scottish Bastard" McGhee. Note: Reading are at home to Millwall on January 6th, unless the FA Cup 3rd round or the weather get in the way.
Rather surprisingly, ex-Reading player Stuart "Archie" Lovell gets called up to the Australia squad for a tournament in Dubai, despite now plying his trade for a sixth-rate club in a fifth-rate league. Archie got called up to training squads for Australia whilst at Elm Park but didn't get to play for the team.
Time to reflect on yesterday's comfortable victory - for a start, I still don't think we played as well as we can, so to come away with a 5-1 win is extremely encouraging. Swansea had conceded three goals in their previous seven games, and we managed to put five past them in 90 minutes! Cureton and Butler are now first and third in the top scorers charts, something of a rarity for Reading players in recent years. Phil Whitehead had his best game for Reading, and I don't think it was a coincidence that Scott Howie has just come back to fitness.
Reading beat Swansea 5-1 and move up to 4th in the table. Martin Butler gets a hat-trick - that's the first Reading player to score a hat-trick for all of two weeks! Jamie Cureton and Lee Hodges get the other two goals. Graeme Murty plays for 15 minutes, apparently without getting injured again. The only slightly black spot on the day was that Jamie Cureton picked up his fifth yellow card of the season, and so will be suspended for the home game against Wycombe. For a match report, click here.
Not such a good day in the Academy, where the U-19s lose 3-1 away to Watford and the U-17s lose 1-0 at home to Tottenham. Click on the Under-19 result for match details and the Under-17 result for a brief match report.
Reading prepare for the visit of Swansea (and Thames Valley Police "prepare" for the visit of the Swansea fans). After scoring one, two, three, four and then five goals in our last five league games at home, we will all be looking for six on Saturday. However, Swansea have a good defensive record, and it will be interesting to look at the performance of centre-back Matthew Bound who Reading were linked with over the summer. In fact this game probably sees the best attack in the division against the second best defence.
Alan Pardew will almost certainly stick to the team he put out against Peterborough last Saturday, but with either Neil Smith or Jim McIntyre replacing the injured Sammy Igoe. I think he'll choose Smith. It's possible that Graeme Murty will fill the spot on the bench (conditional on getting to the stadium in one piece, of course).
The referee is Raymond Olivier, who last took charge of Reading in our trip to Blackpool last season. He also refereed in the home games against Blackpool and Northampton the previous season. Now let's journey back in time together to that midweek home game against Blackpool. The away team came for a 0-0 draw and wasted time all through the match without ONCE getting a caution or even a warning. Then Martin Williams scored a spectacular late goal for us to make it 1-0, and we started wasting time. In particular, Chris Casper received a second booking for carrying the ball away after conceding a throw and so was sent off. Then Blackpool equalised in injury time. In the last seconds one of their players kicked the ball away to waste time and still did not get punished. We all know that Swansea are coming for a 0-0 draw tomorrow - let's see how the referee copes this time.
According to the Daily Record, Dundee are currently engaging in a Tommy Burns-style freeze-out of certain players. Notts County may pick up one of their defenders, another defender has gone to St. Mirren, and they are "also set to allow Dutchman Frank van Eijs to join Reading on trial". Well, how generous of them! He's a 29-year-old right-sided defender or midfielder, so I don't really see why we would need him. In any event he's not good enough to get into their first team and they let in 13 goals in his last two appearances (six months or so ago).
Futbol Mondial (on Sky Sports) includes a fleeting glimpse of Tony Rougier as they show some action from Trinidad & Tobago's World Cup qualifying win in Canada in July. The feature was actually concentrating on a Canadian player.
Now I'm not sure whether the Worthington Cup second round draw is based on alphabetical order of team names, or if it is based on tie number from the first round. If it is the latter, and if Reading had managed to get past Orient, we would have been playing away to Newcastle tonight. So which is better for our chances of promotion - a 600-mile round trip getting home in the early hours of Thursday morning or two full days' training? Assuming that none of our players picked up any injuries whilst training (!), then it has to be the second choice. I still wish we'd beaten Orient, though.
Reading's reserves win 2-1 at home to Southend. For match details, click here. Still no sign of Keith Jones, but the expected comeback of Graeme Murty actually took place! Scott Howie also returned from injury. Both played the full 90 minutes. The Reading line-up also included trialist Ernie Cooksey from Bromley FC.
Meanwhile Grimsby's reserve game with Scunthorpe this evening has been postponed because of a waterlogged pitch. As this was meant to be Sean Evers' trial match with them, he has now returned to Reading (according to Grimsby Town).
Reading confirm that Sean Evers has gone on trial to Grimsby, stating very diplomatically that he has "failed to fulfil his potential" at Madejski Stadium. Grimsby obviously aren't keen on even taking him on loan straight off and intend to look at him in their Avon Insurance League First Division game at home to Scunthorpe on Wednesday. Alan Pardew says that if the trial is successful he may stay on a month's loan, but that he will expect a fee if there is a permanent move.
Incidentally, you may have seen another (supposedly RFC) website claiming to have been the first to break the "Evers at Grimsby" story. They are lying - it was first on the HNA? messageboards, and the first website to post it as a news item was this one. I got the information from a Grimsby website, incidentally, which is why I used the phrase "according to reports from Grimsby" because I didn't know whether I could trust them.
According to reports from Grimsby, Sean Evers has signed for them on a month's loan. The current Grimsby manager is Lennie Lawrence who in his previous incarnation as Luton manager sold Evers to us in the first place. Lawrence presumably therefore values Evers at £500,000 (if not more) although somehow I don't think that Grimsby will want to buy him.
Sammy Igoe is expected out for "at least six weeks" with ankle ligament damage following the Peterborough assault that he found himself on the end of on Saturday. In an aside we learn that Rougier is out for another three or more weeks, which doesn't agree too well with the initial diagnosis that he would be back around now.
Rather surprisingly, Stoke draw with Port Vale so Reading remain fifth in the Division 2 table. Other divisional news is that Millwall have sacked their joint managers with Ray Harford taking over as caretaker. Wonder how long it will be before Teamtalk link Alan Pardew with the vacancy?
Sport First name Darren Caskey in their Team of the Week, which I think proves that they have yet to find a way of accurately monitoring every game in a week to sort out the best 11 players.
Reading lose 1-0 to a combination of Peterborough United and Clive Wilkes, the referee. (Wilkes is responsible for not awarding two clear penalties to Reading, for not booking or sending off the defender who injured Sammy Igoe, for not sending off or even booking the Peterborough player who deliberately handled the ball outside the area and stopped a goalscoring chance, for awarding a goal-kick when a defender blocked Cureton's goal-bound shot, and he has asked for 4,728 separate offences to be taken into account.) The result means that we drop to fifth in the table. Barry Hunter is sent off and Sammy Igoe stretchered off. For a match report, click here.
It is revealed that there were two groups of people annoyed when Reading introduced a membership scheme for the South Bank in the bad old days of the late 1980s, and two groups happy when the scheme was removed. The first group are obviously the loyal South Bankers. The second group were the East German secret police (known as the Stasi), who recommended the use of terraced areas in football grounds for meetings between their agents. This was on the basis that it would be difficult for anyone following the Stasi agent to see who they were talking to. The Stasi were even more worried about the introduction of all-seater stadia, possibly meaning that the MadStad has yet to see any espionage activity.
The team news for Reading's game at Peterborough is that Martin Butler will have a fitness test before the match. I'm certain that Alan Pardew will field an unchanged team if he can, but if Butler doesn't make it then Jim McIntyre will step in. Stuart Gray is apparently available for selection but it's difficult to see how he can be chosen for the bench ahead of or as well as Alex Haddow.
The referee for the game is Clive Wilkes from Gloucester. For those that don't remember him (and that can't be many), previous matches he has taken charge of include the 5-3 defeat at Wycombe last season (four Reading players booked and one sent off) and the 3-0 defeat at home to Bradford two years earlier. Before that there were many instances of his inability to control games involving Reading.
Swindon's game at home to Cambridge on Saturday has been postponed. Although it's officially due to petrol shortage, this decision obviously has absolutely nothing to do with any fuel crisis and everything to do with the fact that Swindon do not want to face an in-form team this weekend. I think they should be heavily fined. What it does mean, though, is that Reading will overtake Cambridge if we win our game at Peterborough.
Also the entire Academy programme for the weekend has been called off. More teams afraid to take on Reading, I think.
Reading play Peterborough tomorrow. The Football League have stated that any club who thinks that their fixture can't go ahead this weekend has until this morning to let them know. Assuming that our game remains on (and there is absolutely no reason to call it off), then let's have none of this whining from people about being unable to get there due to not being able to use a car. For details of how to get to Peterborough using public transport, click here.
Nationwide Building Society announce a competition to find the
greatest goal ever scored at Wembley. Do they include any of
Reading's seven in their top ten? Of course not, even though Lee
Nogan's was better than any of the ones they have chosen. The
prize for managing to choose the most popular top three is a
place in a draw for two tickets to the England-Germany game (which
is another way of saying that it will be nowhere near a true vote).
Also, there is a space on the entry form to add a great goal that
they have missed. So, follow the link below, enter the
competition, and add Lee Nogan's goal to your entry.
Nationwide
Top Wembley Goals Competition
And, incidentally, if you didn't know about the competition until
you read this, and if you win, then I expect to be the person you
take to Wembley!
Trinidad & Tobago announce that they will not select two Hibernian players for their remaining two World Cup semi-final round qualifying matches. Previously Dwight Yorke has stated that he will not be playing in those games, either. There are several other English-based players, including Tony Rougier (assuming that he's fit by then), who may get called up. However, I think it's pretty safe that this will also apply to him. The matches concerned are to be played on 8th October and 15th November this year.
Reading's reserves beat Colchester 2-1, with Darius Henderson getting both goals. For match details, click here. Neil Smith and Jamie Ashdown both played the full 90 minutes, despite appearing as subs on Tuesday night, whilst Stuart Gray made his comeback from injury.
Former Arsenal player and Woking manager Brian McDermott is the man with the unenviable task of filling the shoes of both Maurice Evans (as Chief Scout) and Steve Kean (as Under-17 coach). Kevin Dillon fills the other gap left by Kean as Assistant Academy Director.
Reading beat Oldham 5-0 and climb to 4th in the table. Nosebleed time. Butler, Igoe (2), Hodges and McIntyre get the goals. For a match report, click here. Jamie Ashdown comes on as sub for the last 15 minutes to make his debut. More records - it's the first time Reading have scored five goals since the 6-4 win at Exeter in 1993/94, and the first time at home since the 6-1 win over Torquay in 1992.
Nationwide League Extra had a 4 minutes and 15 seconds feature on Reading's win over Brentford, focusing in particular on Jamie Cureton. The most interesting part was where Jamie talked - well, let's be honest, rambled - about the attitude that Bristol Rovers had towards him. He said that his agent had not been looking for him to move, and suggested that he got more stick because Jason Roberts had already gone. Yet again, we are no closer to knowing the reasons behind the level of his transfer fee. Alan Pardew and Martin Butler are also interviewed on the programme.
The mystery of the TV camera crew filming Jamie Cureton moments after the final whistle on Saturday is over. Although press reports on Sunday referred to a local television programme, it was in fact coverage for Nationwide League Extra, the ITV programme. It's broadcast at 12:30 Monday night (i.e. early Tuesday morning) and 3:05 Wednesday night (i.e. early Thursday morning), apparently at the same time in all ITV regions.
Continuing the media's fascination with all things Reading FC, this week's "Brian Moore Interviews..." features former manager Charlie Hurley. It's on Sky Sports 3 at 11pm tonight (and repeated at 3pm on Tuesday, also on Sky Sports 3). If previous programmes in this series are anything to go by, it will consist of mind-numbingly bland questions following strict chronological order of Hurley's career. Time will be allocated in proportion to the "size" of the clubs he was at, rather than his achievements whilst with them. Fortunately I don't believe Hurley was ever at Manchester United, but if he did play one trial game for them then that's what the programme will be about.
Neville Stamp did indeed play for York reserves on Thursday night. Some reports state that he has now left Reading completely, and is on trial with York rather than on loan. What is certain is that Reading will allow him to leave for any club that wants him.
Jamie Cureton is one of the guests on Sky Sports' Soccer Extra this morning. He was questioned (although not exactly in Jeremy Paxman style) over why his transfer fee was so low. His best answer was that having already received £2m for Jason Roberts, Bristol Rovers could afford not to wait for a higher bid for him. I don't buy that at all. Jamie also gave away his goalscoring secret - "I just tend to stand around the box, and the ball just drops to me". Finally, the presenters asked Jamie to give them a call in the future to let them know what song the Reading fans sang for him. So if you want to hear Jamie Cureton sing, it's time to think up something original and get it adopted.
Reading beat Brentford 4-0 and move up to 5th in the table. Jamie Cureton gets a hat-trick and Darren Caskey the other goal from the penalty spot. For a match report, click here.
It's a day of records at Madejski Stadium. It's the first time Reading have scored four goals since the Yeovil FA Cup match in October 1999, and the first time in the League since Wrexham in January 1999. The 4-0 win also equals that Wrexham game as our best result at our new home. Jamie Cureton gets a hat-trick, the first by a Reading player since Trevor Morley against Bolton in February 1997. It's the first time a Reading player has scored a hat-trick at Madejski Stadium and only the second time anyone has done it there, the first time also being Jamie Cureton (whilst playing for some other club).
What's more, Jamie's three goals take him into a clear lead of the Division 2 scorer's charts, both for league goals and total goals. That's the first time any Reading player has managed that since Jimmy Quinn in 1994 (probably).
The attendance exceeds 10,000 for the 11th consecutive home game, for the first time since the 1958/59 season. And 5th place is our highest position in a division this late (!) in the season since 1994/95.
After all the injury speculation of the previous week, Hunter, Newman, Caskey and Mackie all take part in the game. However Matthew Robinson does not, despite being included in the line-up read out at 2.20pm. Andy Gurney plays at left-back for most of the game, until replaced late on by Alex Haddow.
Some changes at the MadStad before the game - large posters of former Reading heroes have appeared in the East Stand concourse (and hopefully elsewhere in the stadium, too). One of those inflatable Euro 2000 player-thingies is in place at the North-East corner. I kept meaning to check if it inflated when we scored a goal but despite four opportunities to look, I forgot to do so each time. Also the URZ flag makes its return.
Not such a good day in the Academy, where the U-19s lose 3-0 at home to Ipswich and the U-17s lose 4-0 away to Coventry. Click on the result for match details.
Matthew Robinson and Barry Hunter are now considered likely to be available for the home game against Brentford on Saturday. Ricky Newman has recovered from either a slight back injury or a bruised leg, depending on which press release you read, and should also play.
Stan James' latest Division 2 odds look interesting. Walsall are now favourites with Wigan second, followed by Stoke, Millwall and Reading. Odds for the 23 most probable victors of the division range from 5/2 to 80/1. Then there is Oxford United. If you think that Oxford are going to win the division you can get 500/1. However, if you are going to give your money away there must be a more worthy cause than a bookie.
Matthew Robinson and Barry Hunter are both doubtful for Saturday's game against Brentford. Robinson has an Achilles injury and Hunter a groin injury which forced him off at half-time on Tuesday. Hunter's obvious replacement would be John Mackie, but he also picked up an injury on Tuesday, described as a gash.
Neville Stamp is on trial with York, and scheduled to play in their reserve game away to Sheffield United tonight. York lost 1-0.
It seems that the UK-based Trinidad & Tobago players all came back late from their World Cup qualifier on Sunday. So if Tony Rougier had been fit to play, this might well have led to a row. On the other hand, maybe it was the loss of Rougier's steadying influence that allowed the others to start thinking about taking a few extra days off.
Former Football League referee Gurnam Singh continues his case against the Football League, Premier League and the FA in an industrial tribunal. He is claiming racial discrimination in being overlooked for promotion to the Premiership, and (this being the interesting part) for not being the referee at the Division 1 playoff final in 1995, despite finishing top of the referees' merit list for that season. So if he had been the referee on that fateful day, what might have been different? Would he have sent off McAteer when he committed his second bookable offence instead of bottling out? Would he have disallowed the first Bolton goal for climbing (a bit harsh but possible)? Would he have disallowed the fourth Bolton goal for handball? And would he have sent off Jimmy Quinn for headbutting a Bolton defender?
Reading lose 2-0 at home to Leyton Orient to go out of the Worthington Cup 3-1 on aggregate. For a match report, click here.
According to ITV teletext, Joe Gamble could start the game against Orient on Tuesday. It would be his first start for the club. Teletext also states that Neil Smith and Keith Jones are both back in contention for a place.
The Football League look to bring in a series of rules to curb the behaviour of club mascots. In particular, they will not be allowed to enter the field of play, taunt opposition fans or act in a vulgar fashion. Fortunately Kingsley Royal has nothing to fear from these restrictions. Because Reading play in the Royal County of Berkshire, and because our mascot is a lion, the king of all beasts, the rules do not apply. In any event, Kingsley never acts in a vulgar fashion. The Kingsley Royal section of this site will cover this issue in more detail.
Trinidad & Tobago beat Canada 4-0 in their latest World Cup qualifier (match played on Sunday). This means that they have now qualified for the final round of the CONCACAF qualifying tournament, which will consist of ten games between March and November 2001. However, it might mean that they will not require the services of Tony Rougier for their remaining two semi-final round games, to be played on 8th October and 15th November this year.
Barry Hunter, Adi Viveash and Sammy Igoe make it into Sport First's Team of the Week for Division 2. I think we have to assume that Sport First didn't bother to cover the Stoke game.
Jamie Cureton is top of the Division 2 goalscorers chart. Four goals (the first one for Bristol Rovers) are enough to put him equal first, and his surname puts him right at the top. Reading reject Mark Robins is one of the other two players with four goals.
Reading beat Port Vale 1-0 and move up to 10th place in the table. Cureton gets the goal. For a report, click here. Joe Gamble comes on as a substitute to make his League debut.
The Academy sees Reading up against Middlesbrough. The Under-19s win 3-2 away but the Under-17s lose 3-0 at home. Click on the result for match details.
Reading are the featured team on the "Getting to Know You" section of Soccer AM on Sky Sports. The idea is that presenter Tim Lovejoy is now taking an interest in what he refers to as "the lower leagues". Players are filmed walking up to the camera and saying something like "Hello, Tim. You've probably never heard of me, but I'm such-and-such, and I play at right back for whoever." Featured Reading players, filmed at the training ground, were Andy Gurney, Matthew Robinson, Phil Whitehead, plus anyone who was on after I'd left to go to the Port Vale game.
Reading prepare for the trip to Port Vale. If you look at the League table you might think that Port Vale have started off reasonably well, but when you allow for the fact that they have already played the season's two easiest games at home to Oxford and Swindon (and, to be fair, won them both) that puts things into context. Alternatively I could point out that they have yet to take a point off any team outside the bottom two.
Port Vale play in Burslem, which is one of the six towns that make up Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire. In today's world, it's not always easy to tell where one of the towns finishes and the next begins, as they have effectively all merged together. Burslem was the most important of the six, but people now always refer to the area as Stoke - this must REALLY annoy the Port Vale fans. (There are always people asking where Port Vale is, so I thought that the short history and geography lesson was appropriate.)
Kingsley Royal responds to the great "pig as mascot" controversy. Go to Kingsley's home page for more details.
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