Butler. Cureton. 2-1. Reading march on with a home victory over Notts County. Adi Viveash makes a return from whateer problems it is that he has had recently, but has to hobble off late in the game. And Nicky Forster is back! Forster was named to the bench and came on for the last ten minutes. For a match report, click here.
With March now over, attention turns to the Nationwide Division 2 Manager of the Month award. In February, the award went to the manager of the team with the greatest number of league points accumulated over the month, with no regard at all paid to the number of games played, the severity of the games, or to any cup results. On that basis, the winner for March should be Alan Pardew, as Reading have 16 points from the month, which is more than anyone else. However, Port Vale have a slightly higher average points per game over March, as well as having reached the LDV Vans Trophy final.
In the FA Premier Academy League, Reading's Under-19s lose 1-0 at home to Queens Park Rangers.
Notts County preview - Notts County arrive in Reading tomorrow for another important match, and a chance to avenge our last minute defeat in Nottingham in December. Alan Pardew has some decisions to make regarding team selection as Anthony Rougier is available again. Also there was some doubt about Phil Parkinson's fitness before Tuesday's game which may well still apply. I think the most likely outcome is Rougier for Henderson on the bench.
Further goalscoring potential might come from Notts County centre-back and number 6 Ian Richardson who scored an own goal in that game in December to add to the classic own goal he managed at Madejksi Stadium two seasons ago.(That's more goals for Reading than Paul Brayson managed in 48 games as a striker, incidentally.) However, unfortunately Richardson picked up an injury in January, which was supposedly going to keep him out for a few weeks, and has not played since.
Notts County are not on a good run at the moment - they've failed to win in their last four games, and have started to slip away from contact with the play-off positions after stringing together some good results between December and mid-February. Another point of interest will be their midfielder and number 7 Andy Hughes, who Reading have made bids for this season, and who is rumoured to be a possible signing over the summer.
The scheduled referee is Trevor Parkes of Birmingham, who took charge of our home win against Brentford earlier this season as well as the defeat to Cardiff City and the away draw at Bury towards the end of last season. Looking back at the match reports I wrote for those games last season, he failed to award Reading a clear penalty in each game (although also failed to give one for Bury). I described his performance for the Cardiff game as "atrocious".
Anthony Rougier played the full 90 minutes at left back in Trinidad & Tobago's 3-0 defeat in San Jose, Costa Rica yesterday. He is expected to arrive in London early Friday morning, so will hopefully be OK for Saturday's game at home to Notts County. However, Rougier did miss one of the practice sessions whilst with his national team, apparently to make sure that he did not worsen his injured ankle.
Anthony Rougier should be in the Trinidad & Tobago side to
take on Costa Rica this evening. The game kicks off at 8pm local
time, which is 2am on Thursday morning BST. No live commentary (as
far as I know) on the web for this game, but you can check the
latest score by following this link
International Livegoal.net CONCACAF
The reserve game against Brighton & Hove Albion is postponed because the Farnborough Town pitch is yet again waterlogged. The Under-17 Academy game at home to Wimbledon is also called off.
Reading beat Swindon Town 1-0 through a goal from Jamie Cureton. We stay in third place in the table. For a match report, click here. The win means that Reading secure top position in the unofficial Didcot Triangle in matches between ourselves, Swindon and Oxford, as well as the first ever Wallingford Quadrangle competition between the three clubs and Wycombe Wanderers. With the imminent relegation of Oxford, hopefully never to return, this should be the last time these two competitions are ever contested!
Not that anyone was worried about this, but the win at Swindon plus other results from Tuesday evening mean that Reading cannot be relegated this season.
Tomorrow Reading take on Swindon Town in the game rearranged from December. Obviously we'll be looking to get into another long unbeaten run to continue the push for promotion. Swindon on the other hand might even go out of business in the next couple of weeks, and are far from safe from relegation if (as is likely) they do survive. Swindon have been on a decent run themselves recently, though, so nobody will expect an easy game.
Last Friday night, Alan Pardew brought in Ricky Newman at right back to counter the Bristol City left wing-back. This worked quite well until Reading started to sit back and allowed the wing-backs on both sides to start making forward runs. You would expect that Pardew would revert to the previous formation and bring in Darren Caskey for the Swindon game. There's a chance that Adi Viveash will return against his old club but I expect to see Barry Hunter remain in defence. Anthony Rougier has departed on international duty, which will probably mean that Jamie Cureton plays from the start.
The weather forecast is for heavy rain during the day - quite apart from the effect on the pitch, the majority of Reading fans will be sitting on an uncovered bank. Those of us who got our tickets early are in a covered stand, and will of course be thinking of you whilst you're getting wet should the rain persist into the evening.
Next Saturday, Swindon play Rotherham United, so it's quite possible that their manager Ronnie Moore will be at this game. If you spot him pass on my warm regards.
When the game was arranged for December, the referee was to be David Elleray. Normally the referee for a rearranged game is the same, but with this being an international week that may not apply.
You may have noticed that ex-Reading player Tony Thorpe gestured to the home fans after scoring the equaliser on Friday. The following is the text of the letter that 1871 sent to the Football Association regarding that incident:
On 20th January, Reading beat Bristol Rovers 1-0 at Madejski Stadium. The winning goal was scored by ex-Bristol Rovers player Jamie Cureton at the goal in front of the away fans. Part of his goal celebration involved smiling at those fans (who had subjected him to horrendous and unfounded personal abuse throughout the game). The referee spoke to him afterwards and your organisation saw fit to charge him with bringing the game into disrepute.
On 23rd March, Reading lost to Bristol City 3-1 at Madejski Stadium. The Bristol City equalising goal was scored by ex-Reading player Tony Thorpe at the goal in front of the home fans. Part of his goal celebration involved running in front of those fans and those in one of the side stands with his finger held to his lips. The referee chose to ignore this and so presumably Thorpe will not be similarly charged.
What I would like to know (assuming that my last sentence is correct) is why the difference in treatment for the two players? I am not calling for Thorpe to be charged - what annoyed me was the fact that he scored, not how he celebrated.
I am however asking you to drop the ludicrous charge against Jamie Cureton, and to consider whether you should instead be taking action against the thousands of fans from both Bristol City and Bristol Rovers who have spent entire games this season accusing Cureton of the most appalling behaviour.
If I get a reply, I'll print the text here.
Reading's Under-19 team were supposed to play away to West Ham United this morning, but the game was postponed due to (surprise, surprise) a waterlogged pitch. The Under-17 game at home to Fulham was switched from Cantley Park to Fulham's training ground to avoid the same problem - no news yet on the result, or indeed if it managed to take place at all. [Footnote added 29/3/2001: the Under-17 game was postponed.]
You may have heard that work really has got underway again on Oxford United's new ground at Minchery Farm. They're currently going through a new round of legal problems with two court cases from the owner of land adjacent to the site. He objects to Oxford's plans for a hotel on the site, and is also claiming that he has a right of way over the pitch! However, Oxford have already begun installing a pitch which has a revolutionary new type of drainage. They are the first organisation to employ these particular Dutch contractors, so with the amount of rain around this season it's not surprising that it's attracted interest from other clubs. According to the Oxford Times the groundsman from Reading has already spoken to Oxford about their pitch, and representatives from our club are expected to visit Oxford to have a look at the system. Personally, I rather like the idea of Oxford acting as guinea pig for something like this, allowing us to get the improved version later.
Incidentally, for reasons that defeat me, Oxford say that they are hoping to link up with a rugby club. Well, they can have our squatters tomorrow (today, even!).
Very disappointingly, Reading crash to a 3-1 home defeat to Bristol City. After taking an early lead with Graeme Murty's first goal for the club, we decided to sit back and never regained control of the game. Reading stay third in the League but effectively lose ground on our rivals for automatic promotion. For match details (report to follow), click here.
Reading have cancelled the contract of Stuart Gray which in any event was due to expire in the summer. I'd like to say something nice about him, but I can't think of anything. He has signed for Rushden & Diamonds until the end of the season - the connection being that Reading's Chief Scout Brian McDermot is friendly with the Rushden manager Brian Talbot (presumably via their time at Arsenal).
Bristol City preview - Tomorrow evening, Reading take on Bristol City in the next of our important home games during March. It's going to be a cracking night with a big crowd, a good atmosphere and hopefully three points. When you're third in the League table motivation is not going to be a problem for this sort of match, but if any extra was needed then it is freely available with memories of the way City turned us over at Ashton Gate in October. In that game our full-backs Graeme Murty and Matthew Robinson completely failed to deal with the quick attacks made by the home team's wide players leading to our 4-0 defeat. The game also saw the injury that has kept Adie Williams out since that date.
It seems likely that Murty and Robinson will be in the same positions on Friday, so hopefully we have got some sort of plan to deal with the wide player threat. The rest of the Reading team is likely to be unchanged from Wrexham, unless Adi Viveash is available this week or Alan Pardew decides to play Jamie Cureton from the start instead of Anthony Rougier. Although Rougier is available tomorrow he then flies off to join the Trinidad & Tobago World Cup squad and will miss the Swindon Town game next Tuesday, so a change will have to take place at some point. There must be a chance that Chris Casper might make the bench after his recent reserve games, but it's surely too early for Nicky Forster or Williams, unless Pardew decides that one of them could fill a cameo role.
Reading are unbeaten in eleven games, and more importantly have generally been winning the games. In contrast, Bristol City's recent form has been atrocious (four points out of the last 18), but does include a win at home to Millwall in their last game. The two Bristol players sent off in that game are available to play against Reading as their suspensions will not begin until next Friday.
Some potential interest in the game will be if convicted criminal Gerard Lavin plays for Bristol City. It's highly unlikely as he hasn't featured in the team since the start of the season (and also managed to get injured whilst on loan at Wycombe Wanderers last month), but it would represent his first return to Madejski Stadium since the game last season when he was sent off for deliberately firing the ball into the crowd, an event which later saw him taken to court. There's also the possibility of ex-Bristol Rovers player Jamie Cureton getting some reaction from the away fans, whilst Tony Thorpe returns to Reading after we found out from his loan spell that he wasn't good enough to play for us two seasons ago. In the other direction, Jim McIntyre is likely to be playing against one of his old clubs although it was a long time ago that he left Ashton Gate.
The scheduled referee is Paul Durkin of Portland, who last took charge of a Reading game when we performed the classic smash-and-grab 1-0 win at Bristol Rovers last season. I don't know if that's a good omen or not - he certainly had a pretty awful game on that evening and was massively biased towards the home side.
As has been the trend in recent seasons, the transfer deadline day passed without that many deals going ahead across the country. The only transfer relevant to Reading has been for Adam Lockwood to sign on loan at struggling Nationwide Conference club, Forest Green Rovers. The deal is either for one month or for the rest of the season, depending on who you believe. That continues the recent trend for some of our younger players to go out and get first team experience. Apart from the long-term benefits of such moves, it also presumably means that if we have to call on any of them in the final games of the season, they will be properly match fit.
Transfer deadline day preview - Today is transfer deadline day for the Nationwide League and the Premiership. That means that any players who take part in games affecting promotion or relegation before the end of the season must be signed before 5pm today (with possible excpetions for a goalkeeper in an emergency). Although Chief Executive Nigel Howe said last week that Reading were not to looking to bring anyone in, you know that there is always a chance, particularly if a player that Alan Pardew is interested in becomes available. To be honest, the current squad looks good enough to secure automatic promotion, and the return to full fitness of Adie Williams and Nicky Forster in the not too distant future will only strengthen the competition for places. So really anyone coming in has to be with an eye to a Division 1 campaign next year, although of course any such person should also come in handy for our final 11 League games this season.
So what might happen? The players most often linked with Reading in the last few days are John Salako of Charlton Athletic, Lee Hodges of Scunthorpe United and Andy Hughes of Notts County (who claim that we have not yet put a bid in for him despite Howe stating that County were asking for too much). The common theme there is that all three players are attacking midfielders - given that we have just bought James Harper, I wonder if our interest in these players has waned, and the rumours are just old ones being recycled. There's also the possibility of a permanent deal for Adrian Whitbread, or a loan extensions that takes him beyond the play-off final just in case. However, I think we can probably expect not to see the deadline-day panic-buying that Tommy Burns managed in 1998 (justifiably in an attempt to shake things up) and 1999 (proving that he had totally lost the plot).
From the other side, Andy Gurney is currently on the transfer list, and there must be a club who think that he could do a job for them, either permanently or on loan. Reading have such a large squad by Division 2 standards that other clubs are certain to be considering making bids for certain of our players, with Neil Smith and Lee Hodges perhaps being the most obvious targets. Also, Rushden & Diamonds may pursue their interest in Stuart Gray, but they do have another week before the Nationwide Conference transfer deadline applies. However, if Rushden do want him, then they would obviously prefer to complete the deal before their game at Northwich Victoria on Snuday.
What about the clubs we are fighting against for promotion? Well, at the moment all of them except Rotherham are faltering so they are all going to be looking to bring in players to give them a bit of a push. Hopefully one of them will bring in five players who have never met before and throw them all straight into the side for their next game.
Reading's reserve side won 3-2 away to Wycombe Wanderers this afternoon in the only Avon Insurance Combination League game not to be called off due to a waterlogged pitch. For a brief eye-witness match report, click here. We stay third in the league table. Both Adie Williams and Nicky Forster made their returns from injury, playing the first hour of the game. Forster also scored a penalty. An eye-witness report to follow very shortly.
Brian Talbot, the Rushden & Diamonds manager, may well have claimed not to have heard of Stuart Gray last week, but this week he really is trying to sign him! So we're either looking at a lie from Talbot else that the speculation prompted him to have a look. At the moment the two parties are trying to work out the details of whether the deal is a loan or whether Rushden take over Gray's contract (which only runs to 30th June this year). Note that the Nationwide Conference transfer deadline day is not until Thursday, 29th March so the deal does not have to be done this week.
Next year's Worthington Cup will have a different format - rounds 1 and 2 will now be played as one-off games rather than over two legs. However, the semi-finals will remain two-legged.
Reading's Under-17s lost 2-0 away to Crystal Palace this evening. This leaves us seventh out of the eight teams in the FA Premier Academy League Group D table, which you can see here.
Last week Colchester United described Keith Scott as a free agent and stated that they were interested in signing him. The first part of that now makes sense as Reading have today announced that Scott's contract has been cancelled. Colchester have wasted no time and have signed him until the end of the season, which of course includes a game against Reading in April. However, part of the deal between the two clubs is that he will not play in that game! Scott was another of Tommy Burns' unsuccessful and ludicrously overpriced signings - however, he always put in the effort and managed to get considerably more goals for Reading than Paul Brayson, despite playing less games.
Joe Gamble went to Crawley Town on a month's loan last week to get some first team experience, as previously reported. He didn't get to play yesterday because their game was called off, the Broadfield Stadium pitch in Crawley being waterlogged. However, I have found out part of the reason why Crawley wanted to sign him. He is seen as a temporary replacement for Scott Mean, who left the club to take up an acting role in a film that is being shot in Brazil! (Mean played for Bournemouth in both of the games against Reading last season, in case you're wondering where you recognise the name from.)
Anthony Rougier is named in the Trinidad & Tobago squad for their next World Cup qualifier, which is away to Costa Rica. The game has been moved to Wednesday, 28th March (previously it was on Sunday, 25th March). That means that Rougier is available for our home game against Bristol City on Friday night, because the FIFA 5-day rule does not apply until Saturday. However, it rules him out of the trip to Swindon on Tuesday, 27th March. In T&T's last game, a 1-0 defeat in Jamaica, Rougier played at left back.
Martin Butler's two goals in yesterday's game at Wrexham gain him a place in the Sport First Team of the Day. Also in the team are two Wrexham players, including the centre-back supposedly marking Butler!
Reading win 2-1 away to Wrexham with Martin Butler getting both of our goals. That's now 11 League games unbeaten overall (the longest current run in the division and including eight wins) and seven games unbeaten away from home (including four wins) - what happened to the club with bad away form? Barry Hunter played in place of the presumably injured Adi Viveash, whilst Darius Henderson was on the bench for the first time since his most recent injury. The Wrexham goal ends Hunter's run of being on the pitch without Reading conceding a goal at a very impressive 559 minutes. (The current run is 21 minutes!) We stay in third place in the table. For a match report, click here.
The Under-19s match in the FA Premier Academy League at home to Crystal Palace is called off, presumably because of the poor state of the pitch at Cantley, but the Under-17s played away to West Ham United and lost 3-1.
In Sport First, Rushden & Diamonds manager Brian Talbot is quoted as saying he's never heard of Stuart Gray so it seems that that particular loan story is a dud. However, Reading today confirm that Joe Gamble has gone to Crawley Town for a month's loan.
Wrexham match preview - tomorrow brings a meeting at the Racecourse Ground between the two form teams of Division 2. Wrexham have won their last four games, scoring 14 goals, whilst Reading are unbeaten in ten League matches. Wrexham's run of form coincides with the arrival of one forward and the return to the first team of another, but although they have been knocking in the goals they have not been up against particularly good sides, and they have still been letting them in as well (seven goals conceded in those four wins).
The Reading line-up is likely to be much the same as that which beat Wigan - however, in the last two games Anthony Rougier has replaced Jamie Cureton and looked pretty good. If Rougier's ankle is still troubling him, then maybe he is not ready for a starting role but I think that Alan Pardew will be considering making that switch from the start. Barry Hunter is likely to be on the bench - since we bought him from Wrexham he always seems to have been injured whenever we play against his old team. Their fans constantly ask after him, and he can probably expect a good reception.
Back in October, Reading demolished Wrexham 4-0 in the first half at Madejski Stadium but then sat back in the second half, conceded a goal from a corner that never was, and it took us until January before we really got going again! At this stage of the season we can't afford a sustained run of similar poor results so hopefully only the first half of the home game will repeat itself. If we do fail to win then a Walsall victory would see Reading drop to fourth in the table.
One other thing - Anne Robinson was right.
Reading's Chief Executive Nigel Howe has confirmed via the Reading Chronicle that Notts County have shown an interest in Neil Smith (they bid £10,000 which we turned down) and Lee Hodges (they apparently made a bid but it was below what we wanted). Similarly he confirmed that Reading are interested in County's Andy Hughes and Charlton Athletic's John Salako but we would only take either of them on a Bosman free transfer (which could mean over this summer). Howe also stated that Reading would not be buying anyone before the transfer deadline on Thursday, 22nd March, but then he would say that, wouldn't he?
Jimmy Hill's guest this week on his Sky Sports interview show, "The Last Word", was Mark McGhee. If you missed the programme, then you've missed almost nothing of interest. At the stage when McGhee was talking about leaving Reading, Hill kept interrupting him and therefore there was no chance of gleaning any new information. One thing that McGhee did mention was that he had a drink with John Madejski "last Thursday" and that both of them had agreed that they wanted Reading and Millwall to go up this season. Of course, I don't believe anything that comes out of the Scottish liar's mouth anyway, so the fact that this flatly contradicts what he has said previously is no shock at all.
It seems that yet more players have left Reading and gone out on loan - Stuart Gray has apparently gone to Rushden & Diamonds, currently at the top of the Nationwide Conference, whilst Joe Gamble is spending a month at Crawley Town of the Dr. Martens League Premier Division. I've not seen confirmation of either of these moves from any of the clubs involved, though, and other reports have suggested that Gray is instead about to sign for Rushden rather than go there on loan. If both players have gone, then that's five Reading players currently loaned out with Chris Smith to follow next week (he has not left yet, as reported previously). There are two trends here - some unwanted players are getting a chance to put themselves in the shop window, whilst some of our younger players are getting experience of playing first team games. It's pretty obvious that Gray and Keith Scott fall into the first category whilst Gamble and Jamie Ashdown are in the second, but it's not so clear which description applies to Smith and Nathan Tyson.
Our very good friend the Rotherham United manager Ronnie Moore has been talking about the first sending-off from the game 11 days ago. Referring to the thug Stuart Talbot, he said, "The whole season could be ruined by his stupid mistake. It was a lack of professionalism and one hell of an error." Moore might well be right about this, but on the day of the game where was his praise for the referee getting these simple red card decisions correct? He was too busy mouthing off and trying to make out that his team had been hard done by, when in reality the fault for their defeat lies squarely at his own door for trying to kick and cheat their way to a goalless draw rather than trying to play football. Rotherham have been trying to buy players this week to cover for the ones they have lost through suspension, and I'm delighted to say that so far they've not been able to persuade anyone to join them.
Some news about the players out on loan at the moment. Keith Scott played about an hour of Colchester United's 3-2 reserve defeat to Cambridge United yesterday, but didn't score either of the goals. Colchester know that he is available on a free transfer and seem keen to sign him permanently. Nathan Tyson scored one of Maidenhead's goals in their 2-1 Ryman Premier League win over Harrow Borough last night (a six-pointer in the fight to avoid relegation).
Meanwhile York City reserves are at home to Wigan Athletic this evening, with Chris Smith presumably playing for York. Jamie Ashdown was due to play for Gravesend & Northfleet against Hendon on Saturday but the game was postponed - his first game should be tomorrow night when they take on Hitchin Town in the third round of the Ryman League Full Members Cup. Gravesend recently had a run of ten successive wins, but their goalkeeper still managed to pick up the "Umbro Safe Hands Award" for Ryman Premier League goalkeeper of the month in February before he got injured.
Keith Scott has joined Colchester United on loan, officially for two reserve games. That would mean their home game against Cambridge United today (which Colchester lost 3-2) and the trip to Barnet later in the week (or if that has been called off the home game with Millwall next week). Scott went on loan to Colchester earlier this season and played and scored for them, but injury cut short his time there and attempts to arrange a permanent move broke down. Also Chris Smith has gone on loan to York City, again for two reserve games.
Today's reserve game against Oxford United was moved from Farnborough to Sonning, but Reading still won 2-0, with goals from a Darius Henderson penalty and Keith Jones. Chris Casper played the full 90 minutes. Despite suggestions that Keith Scott wanted to play in this game, he was not involved. In the other game played today, leaders Norwich City managed only a goalless draw, but they and Fulham remain ahead of Reading in the table.
Jamie Ashdown and Nathan Tyson have gone out on a month's loan to Gravesend & Northfleet and Maidenhead United respectively. Tyson played against Maidenhead last week so is presumably now cup-tied for the remainder of their Berks & Bucks Senior Cup campaign! Ashdown went out on loan to Bishops Stortford earlier in the season but had to return when he picked up an injury.
Although the top two clubs, Millwall and Rotherham United, win today, other results are pretty favourable for Reading and we stay in third position in Division 2.
The Under-17 match with Ipswich Town is switched to Sonning due to the poor state of the main pitch at Cantley - Reading win 1-0. For a brief match report, click here. This is an excellent result because Ipswich had the second best record in the entire country at this age group. The three points also lift us off the bottom of our Under-17 Group table. The Under-19 side lose 3-1 away to Wimbledon after taking the lead.
With the nation watching (well, with a few of them watching Sky Sports 2), Reading beat Wigan 1-0 to climb back to third in the League table. Jim McIntyre gets the goal after an excellent quick break started by Adrian Whitbread and continued by James Harper. It was a tough game against a team who played some good football (and so was in stark contrast to the cloggers from Rotherham), but we got the three points which is all that really matters. For a match report, click here.
When reading the teams out before the match, the stadium announcer said of Adrian Whitbread, "And he's ours now". Quite what this means has yet to be determined.
When interviewd on the television, Jamie Cureton said that the fee for James Harper was £400,000 and could rise to £1m, so I guess that you could say it's no longer undisclosed!
Although there have been rumours about Portsmouth recalling Adrian Whitbread from his three-month loan deal, Reading say that they have not heard from the South Coast club. Whitbread has been a fantastic signing, and if we do gain promotion this season the part he played will not be forgotten. We definitely do not want to lose him now, although if Adrian Williams regains his fitness soon he could certainly fill the same role.
Sean Evers has signed for Plymouth Argyle on a free transfer, but with a "huge" sell-on clause attached. I'm tempted to say that we never saw the best of him, but then again perhaps we did and he is just useless. Other players not good enough to play for Reading have succeeded in Division 3, so maybe Evers will as well. Certainly another tremendous signing from the Tommy Burns school of how to throw good money away.
The Evening Post report that both Adrian Williams and Nicky Forster have pencilled in the reserve game at Wycombe Wanderers on the afternoon of Wednesday, 21st March for their comebacks.
The Under-19 side beat West Ham United 2-0 in the FA Premier Academy League at Cantley. Adam Lockwood and Darius Henderson get the goals, with several Reading players starting their second game less than 15 hours after the previous one had finished! For a match report, click here.
A reserve side lose 1-0 away to Maidenhead United in the quarter-finals of the Berks & Bucks Senior Cup. Chris Casper makes his long-awaited return from the injury he suffered in December 1999 and plays the first half, whilst Darius Henderson also returns from injury and plays most of the game. For a match report, click here.
Keith Scott, who was supposedly fit a week ago, says that he hopes he'll be able to play in the reserve game at Farnborough against Oxford United next week. Also, that reserve game has been moved from Wednesday evening to Monday afternoon.
Reading draw 1-1 away to Wycombe Wanderers after dominating the match but failing to make clear chances. Sammy Igoe gets a scrambled late equaliser. For a match report, click here. James Harper missed the match, officially due to flu but I wonder if this was really Alan Pardew's way of keeping his feet on the ground after last Saturday's game against Rotherham. Other results mean that Reading drop to fourth in the table. Some people managed to watch the game at Adams Park right to the end, applaud the players off, and still get away quickly enough to be in Reading 30 minutes later! Others were still walking back to their cars in the pouring rain at that time - that's right, Andy, I mean you!
Wycombe match preview - Reading travel to Wycombe tonight looking for our fourth successive win away from home (last achieved in 1998 under Tommy Burns, amazingly enough). If we can win and Rotherham do not beat Bournemouth, we'll move up to second place. On the other hand we could drop two places if we draw or lose.
Earlier in the season Alan Pardew was reluctant to change a winning team but for this game he could potentially recall any of Adi Viveash, Ricky Newman or Keith Jones. I can't see Newman getting straight back into the side but Viveash may well replace Barry Hunter and I can envisage Jones coming in for James Harper. If you consider this one game in isolation, Jones for Harper would be a mistake but Pardew may well feel that he needs to keep Harper's feet on the ground (which is why I think he made comments telling him off for show-boating at the end of Saturday's game).
Whilst we all know that it doesn't work this way, Wycombe should be no match for us. Far from taking each game as it comes, they are really looking at their FA Cup tie next Saturday, and also have quite a few players out with injuries. And of course, they're nowhere near as good as us under normal circumstances. They've lost their last two League games and a home defeat to Port Vale last Saturday does not indicate a team in form.
In the last two seasons, this match has been refereed by Clive Wilkes, the single worst referee in football (well, either that or the referee most biased against Reading). Given that we have already had to suffer him at Peterborough this season, hopefully that is one tradition that has come to an end. Because of Wilkes and others like him, games between Wycombe and Reading have seen a high red card rate. We don't want the suspensions, so hopefully it's Wycombe's turn to lose a player.
Finally, Reading have sold out the small number of tickets that Wycombe have granted us, but for the benefit of any Wycombe fans reading these pages I'd just like to point out that it's pay on the day in the home areas of the ground.
Something I missed from Sport First yesterday - they did a survey to find out who should be the Player and Young Player of the Year, and asked 100 "movers and shakers in the game" for their opinion. One of the people they asked was Jamie Cureton. Jamie voted for David Beckham and Joe Cole respectively. Ex-Reading players Steve Morrow, Ray Houghton, Peter Shreeve and Kerry Dixon were also asked - Morrow went for Paul Scholes and Joe Cole, Houghton for Roy Keane and Matthew Carrick, Shreeve for Roy Keane and Joe Cole, whilst Dixon plumped for Teddy Sheringham and Wes Brown. The overall winners were Teddy Sheringham and Joe Cole. Personally, I'd have voted for Jamie Cureton and Simieon Howell.
The Rotherham United manager Ronnie Moore was on talkSPORT tonight between 7pm and 10pm. I must give him some credit - he has changed his tune over the second sending-off on Saturday after seeing the video and was man enough to admit it. He even said that they were lucky it wasn't a straight red card. However, I must have missed the apology to Adrian Whitbread, and he still blamed the referee for his team's defeat. He also said that seven wins from their remaining 13 games would be enough for automatic promotion - well, you get your seven wins Ronnie and see where you end up. Fifth, probably.
In today's Times, Ronnie Moore is quoted about the incident in which Alan Lee, a Rotherham forward, was sent off after a foul on Adrian Whitbread. “For a fellow pro to go down like that is bitterly disappointing. He’s 6ft 2in and strong as an ox, but hit the deck as if he’d been shot. It makes me really mad.” Well I would like to ask Moore to take the 1871 challenge - we will recreate the incident at the end of the game, but Moore will take the place of Whitbread and I will take the place of Lee. Based on TV pictures, my role is to run alongside Whitbread, take a careful look at him, and then swing my elbow hard towards his throat. Let's see how Moore reacts to that. In the interests of statistical certainty, we'll run the test a few times.
There should be further opportunity to examine the scenes from Saturday on Nationwide League Extra tonight. The programme is on ITV at 12:50am tonight (early Tuesday morning) and repeated at 3:10am tomorrow night (early Wednesday morning). It's normally the same time in all ITV regions, but you should check just in case yours is different from where I live. The camera crew were filming as the teams ran out onto the pitch, which will probably be the opening moments of the programme, and they were also apparently on the field after the final whistle when our good friend Ronnie Moore attempted to take revenge on some of our players.
Do you realise that if February had had 31 days, yesterday would still have been in February and Alan Pardew would have been Manager of the Month? Unlucky or what! I blame Julius Caesar.
I've noticed some big discrepancies in the statistics reported from the Rotherham match. On the Reading scoreboard at the end of the game it said that we had 14 shots to Rotherham's 3. However the Press Association said it was 15 to 10 (9 to 5 on-target) and sports.com say that it was 16 to 9 (10 to 2 on target). Now I realise that it's sometimes difficult to know exactly what counts as a shot, but here are what the three say about the number of corners in the game (Reading first): scoreboard 10 to 4, Press Association 8 to 6, sports.com 11 to 4. I have to say that the statistics on the Reading scoreboard agree best with what I remember happening in the game - I think that the Press Association have just got games mixed up.
How much did it cost us to buy James Harper from Arsenal? Well, so far the figures I've seen mentioned are £750,000, £250,000, £400,000, £1,000,000 and £375,000. Although the official number has yet to be released, it appears that the media are beginning to cluster around the £400,000 mark. One thing's for sure - to a club who got £23m for Nicholas Anelka, all of those numbers are small change and so it is surprising that it appears to be Arsenal who want the amount to be undisclosed.
After his first appearance for Reading James Harper makes the Sport First Team of the Day - he also gets nominated as Man of the Match by both the Sport First journalist reporting on the game and by the Reading fan in the "Fan's View" section (an extremely heavily edited piece - you can read the unedited version here). However, the Team of the Day also includes a Rotherham player which yet again indicates that there's something seriously wrong with the Sport First system. Looking at the Rotherham players on show at Madejski Stadium yesterday, it is impossible to understand how any one of the fouling, elbowing, diving, time-wasting, moaning cheats with no football ability at all could make it into any such representative side.
If there was any doubt about the second sending-off in yesterday's game then the television pictures have removed it. In fact, the only difficult part to understand is why such a blatant elbow on Adrian Whitbread resulted in a second yellow card rather than a straight red. The TV cameras not surprisingly completely missed the first red card incident which was even more blatant.
In the first of our series of important home matches against fellow promotion contenders, Reading beat Rotherham United 2-0 with debutant James Harper and Martin Butler getting the goals. The flu bug appears to have cost Keith Jones a place in the team but no-one else. However, that left room for Harper to make the best Reading home debut since Mass Sarr. Despite their lofty (and temporary) League position, Rotherham showed no interest in playing football and had two players sent off. Reading have now gone eight League matches unbeaten, whilst it's now 490 minutes without conceding a League goal when Barry Hunter is on the pitch. None of the other sides in the top five won or even managed to score a goal, so we move up to third in the table. For a match report, click here.
In the FA Premier Academy League, the Under-19s won 1-0 away to Southampton with a goal from Nathan Tyson - click here for a brief match report. The Under-17s played away to Watford and won 2-1.
The scheduled referee for tomorrow is Frazer Stretton of Nottingham. He refereed our defeat at Millwall on the opening day of this season and before that in the relegation season of 1997/98 he handled our home game with Stoke (the last win at Elm Park!) and the away match at Norwich (0-0 draw) . Although he had no effect on the result, his handling of the Millwall game left much to be desired. I can't remember anything about him from the other two games which suggests he didn't make any huge howlers.
With tomorrow's big game getting closer, stories of a flu bug are beginning to sound more serious. Originally the bug was supposedly limited to Alan Pardew and Keith Jones, but then Adrian Whitbread, Andy Gurney, Jim McIntyre and Sammy Igoe were added to the sick list. There have also been local media reports that the club has only 10 fit players. However, this seems unlikely - Reading have 37 professionals and at the moment "only" six are injured (Casper, Adrian Williams, Forster, Gray, Henderson and Scott). If we also omit the four younger players with little or no first team experience (Allaway, Chris Smith, Lockwood and Tyson) plus Alex Haddow (who might still be in Rochdale) and the suspended Adi Viveash and Ricky Newman, that still leaves 24 in the squad. It's possible that Jamie Cureton and Darren Caskey are resting their groin strains but to get down to 10 fit players, that would still mean 12 with the flu compared to the five players mentioned.
Rotherham match preview - Another week has rolled by and it's time for one of the big matches of the season. Now looking at the fixture list back in August, no-one would have expected a home game with Rotherham to be described with those words, and our comfortable 3-1 win there back in September did nothing to change that view. However, Rotherham did have a number of players out injured for that game and the fact is they have enough points this season to deserve some respect. (And I still think they'll fall away before the end, by the way!) This is a big test for Reading - in the only comparable home games in recent seasons (Manchester City two years ago and Millwall this season), we have appeared overawed and thrown the points away. There's no good reason at all for the current line-up to do the same against Rotherham.
Alan Pardew is almost certain to stick with the line-up from last Saturday at Swansea as far as he can. However, Adi Viveash is suspended and so Barry Hunter should return to the starting eleven. With Hunter in defence we have not conceded a League goal for 400 minutes, and given Northern Ireland's 4-0 home defeat this week he has every reason to try to impress the managers of both his club and his country. Hunter's promotion to the starting line-up will leave a vacancy on the bench and most people will expect to see new signing James Harper filling that. He may have only just joined Reading but given the size of the transfer fee he's not going to be playing in the reserves for long. Another player who might come back into the squad is Anthony Rougier, although how he will cope with the predicted temperature of at best eight degrees Celsius after playing 90 minutes in the Jamaican heat of 31 degrees on Wednesday is anybody's guess. There have been slight injury worries over several players during the week, although no-one is expected to be out of the game for that reason. However, there is also talk of a flu bug with a number of players' names mentioned. This is beginning to sound worrying although there's still the possibility that there's some kidology mixed in with the truth.
Rotherham have won their last five games, but all of them were at home and apart from Stoke the opposition wasn't of a terribly high standard. Away from home they've only won one League game since early November, and their last three away have seen two draws and a defeat. But footballers being what they are, that run of fairly easy home games will have given their team confidence. One of their forwards is Reading reject Mark Robins. He was good for the first 90 seconds of his Reading debut and then rubbish for the remainder of his five games on loan for us. Sadly, the Rotherham keeper responsible for the comedy goal at Millmoor (he came rushing out to kick the ball and then left it, leaving Jamie Cureton to tuck it into an unguarded net) has lost his place in the side recently. However, that does mean that his replacement Paul Pettinger has only ten League games in his whole career. Perhaps the cauldron of Fortress Madejski will unnerve him.
No news yet on the referee but one thing is certain - the incompetent fool who mishandled our trip to Walsall was Howard Webb of Rotherham, so we won't be seeing him again tomorrow. Or at least, we'd better not.
Today sees the start of March (this is the website that brings you all the hot information!) and that means a landmark date for quite a few Reading players. Under normal circumstances five yellow cards will get you a one match suspension, but towards the end of the season the rules change and the fifth card only triggers a warning from the FA as to the player's future conduct. Martin Butler, Barry Hunter, Jim McIntyre, John Mackie and Darius Henderson all had four yellow cards at the end of February and so will escape a possible suspension (assuming that Mackie did not pick up an unreported booking in yesterday's reserve game) regardless of whether they pick up a fifth yellow card this season.
Similarly ten yellow cards normally attracts a two match suspension, but if the tenth comes after the second Sunday in April (which is 8th April this year) the player instead gets only a severe censure and a warning as to his future conduct. At the moment Darren Caskey, Adi Viveash and Phil Parkinson are all on seven yellow cards, so if they can get two or less over the next five and a bit weeks, they'll also be free to play in all games. All of the above two paragraphs assume that none of the players concerned see a red card, because that gains a suspension whatever the date.
What this all means is that once Adi Viveash and Ricky Newman have served their suspension for Saturday's game against Rotherham, we might well see no further suspensions for the whole of the rest of the season which would obviously be extremely good news.
Despite Reading having a record of four wins and a draw over the month of February, Alan Pardew fails to win the Nationwide Manager of the Month award for Division 2. Instead it goes to some con-artist who merely selects the players left to him by his predecessors, and who still couldn't manage to beat Swansea away. Hopefully the supposed curse will apply.
First Team . Opposition . Reserves . Academy . Where Are They Now? . Columns . Kingsley . MadStad . Interactive . Links . Site Map