I hate this game - back from Wembley

[Royal Rother]

Great stuff. Brought a little sting to the eyes for a moment! Such moments as a parent stay with you forever...

[Norfolk Royal]

Great stuff. Brought a little sting to the eyes for a moment! Such moments as a parent stay with you forever...

Indeed.

[Jerry St Clair]

The stirring 20 minutes at the start of the second half made even a cynical old sod like me swell with pride. Wonderful, wonderful stuff.

My abiding memory of the day? Shortly after we came back to 3-2 I turned to look at my 12-year old daughter who was sitting next to me, and she was sitting there literally shaking from head to toe with the nervous excitement of it, I'd never seen her like that. I had all but converted her before this, all her friends are Norwich fans, but on the way back she said to me: 'I'm Reading till I die.'

I do hope normal service is resumed shortly!

[swansea jack]

Calmed down a bit now. Oh, what might have been. Had Khiz not cleared it straight to Dobbie, had Griffin not put in a needless clumsy challenge, had Jem's shot and the rebound gone in Wembley would have shook. Had Kebe been more incisive with his crosses, had we got a penalty for handball, had Shane scored what was for him a relatively easy chance, I could go on.

At the end of the day the defensive frailties which we all knew were there came glaringly to the spotlight, undone by the pace of Swansea's front three. Tbf they have been marginally the better team than us all season and beat us three times. At times they play some good football, but boy, they didn't like it up 'em when we got going in the second half.

My abiding memory of the day? Shortly after we came back to 3-2 I turned to look at my 12-year old daughter who was sitting next to me, and she was sitting there literally shaking from head to toe with the nervous excitement of it, I'd never seen her like that. I had all but converted her before this, all her friends are Norwich fans, but on the way back she said to me: 'I'm Reading till I die.'

Last para is what it's all about. Hope you've converted some of these 'plastics'. Hope we have too.

Think the handball given would've been harsh but yeh, we didn't like it up us. Need a strong DMC as Britton & Allen a little lightweight sometimes - Leighterwood would be ideal

[westendgirl]

Just seen the match stats They dont tell the whole story, but 16 corners to 1 & Swansea scored from their only shots on target. Promised myself i wouldnt be gutted if we lost today, but i am.

Not sure if has been said elsewhere but 4 goals and no assists is another interesting stat

[Top Flight]

To be fair to the boys. That was an extremely brave performance full of spirit, fight and guts. A few unfortunate moments of poor decision making/judgements and bad luck have cost us. This game could easily have gone in our favour, but we just got done over by a number of situations conspiring against us. On another day it would have worked out differently. That is football sometimes. It doesn't always work out how you hope.

I was disappointed with Griffin, Khiz and Kebe. I don't want to be too hard on them because they have all been fabulous all season and it was just one of those things in the end.

Kebe, coming back from a thigh injury really lacked quality yesterday. He got into a number of very promising positions and just didn't make the most of them. His quality was poor. I think Robson Kanu would have had more quality in those areas but its easy to say in hindsight and before the match, I would have picked Kebe as well.

I was disappointed with Griffin because he is one of those that you rely on to bring a calm and steady influence to the game and use his experience wisely. But he stupidly got himself booked early on which stifled his handling of Sinclair and he needlessly gave away a penalty when we were right back in the game and blew our chances. For an older head, you expect him to be the one to keep his head on such a big occasion. But I hate to criticize Griff because he has been outstanding all season and those errors of judgement are rare from Griff. Which is why it was so disappointing.

Khiz as well, another wise man got himself totally unnecessarily booked very early which restrained his ability to defend full on. And it was very clumsy how he conceded the penalty.

But from all the lads, it was such a brave and gutsy performance. They wore their hearts on their sleeves and did Reading proud. We more than matched Swansea. We took them right to the wire and it could well have gone in our favour.

It is just Reading's dreaded play-off bad luck hitting us again.

Well done boys. You did us proud.

[JIM]

Rember at the start of the season we were relegation material. So not a bad finish after all.

[brendywendy]

im over it already.that game was everything i love and hate about reading.we do roller coaster rides and glorious failure better than anyone. And its games like that that makes people fans for life.im Proud of the lads, im looking forward to next season.im glad this one is over. We will rebuild and go again.players will come and go but the team remains. As elton john said, its The ciiircle of liiiife.

[Gordons Cumming]

Everyone has had plenty to say. most of which I agree with, some I don't.

Swansea were gifted a 0-3 lead..................

Our experienced defence was appalling. Griffin & Harte at fault for goal 2, Zurab for goal 1 and 3, Griffin for 2 & 4.

That was worse than 1995 & 2001.

Next final, I'm not going.................must be me. (If I live that long................... )

[Row Z Royal]

My tuppence, for what it's worth.

Well, that was a bit disappointing.

As I said to a mate at half time yesterday, it's really down-heartening to pay £100/head for a day out only to play like that in the first half. However, our second half performance allowed us to leave Wembley with some pride. Great game, exciting, for the neutral too. And that in itself is part of the Reading way. As is losing play-off finals!

Can't argue with the penalties, though I felt that a lot of the small decisions went against us in the first half and it got us down and frustrated. Saying that, they mostly went with us in the second half, so can't really complain about that either.

I guess I can look back on a fair result, though it's a result that sets us back 3 or 4 years. We'll lose players who have been key this year - Kebe will get snapped up, Long will go for big money - maybe £4-5m? - and others like Federici, McAnuff, Mills, Karacan may all have a lot of interest shown in them. While we've got some good young players, they're not as good as the previous group - there aren't any Karacans or Sigurdssons in there, so we're going to have to bring players in. I have confidence in McDermott picking the right players but it's down to how much Madejski wants to release on for signings and new wages. We'll see, but I don't expect us to be in, or even near, the play-offs for 3 years or more. C'est la vie.

[Big Foot]

^ How do you know there's no "Karacan or Sigurdsson" players in the academy?

The likes of Taylor, Obita and D'ath have been getting rave reviews

[Row Z Royal]

^ How do you know there's no "Karacan or Sigurdsson" players in the academy?

The likes of Taylor, Obita and D'ath have been getting rave reviews

Football Manager '11 m8.

[Big Foot]

^ How do you know there's no "Karacan or Sigurdsson" players in the academy?

The likes of Taylor, Obita and D'ath have been getting rave reviews

Football Manager '11 m8.

HRK actually turns out to be a decent player so it's not 100% realistic m8

[Tilehurst End]

Gutted of course but life goes on.

Our lack of pace at the back, particularly wide, was always going to catch up with us one day. Thought Mills, Leigertwood and Karacan were the stand out performers with moments from Jimmy but no end product.

At the end of the day the best 3 teams probably went up.

We've now played 13 games against the other sides in the top 6 and won 2.

[Uke]

what will a tougher Championship league next season with the West Ham, Birmingham, Brighton and Southampton now in the mix.

Don't we say this every year? And yet we still end up in the mix

[glenroyal]

Swansea were gifted a 0-3 lead..................

Our experienced defence was appalling. Griffin & Harte at fault for goal 2, Zurab for goal 1 and 3, Griffin for 2 & 4.

That was worse than 1995 & 2001.

I agree with that, all four of their goals in fact. There were plenty of if's and nearly's and might-have-beens, actually a close and exciting game, game-on in the second half. But the difference between the two teams was our beaten and clumsy defence, particularly those 3.

Other observations

Kebe may have been fit, but he had too few ideas and made too many mistakes, out of match practice ? I think I would have started with the Cardiff-winning line-up. Cummings and Robson-Kanu.

Shane became petulant when it wasn't going his way, think I'd have subbed him.

Noel was unlucky not to be credited with his headed goal - harsh to call that an own-goal.

Jem MOTM, Mills close behind.

[Row Z Royal]

^ How do you know there's no "Karacan or Sigurdsson" players in the academy?

The likes of Taylor, Obita and D'ath have been getting rave reviews

Football Manager '11 m8.

HRK actually turns out to be a decent player so it's not 100% realistic m8

Sorry, glib response.

The season or two before last (ie, 09/10), those up and coming youngsters had been on loans to Crewe, Northampton and the like, but our current youth team and reserves don't seem to be doing that so much.

Okay, maybe the manager prefers to keep the young players under RFC protection and guidance, but maybe they're not up to it yet. It could be a couple of years before they're on loan in League 1 or 2, let alone in a promotion-winning RFC first team.

[Uke]

FWIW we played the "kick it to Kebe" game too much yesterday, it was our main tactic and always risky as he was not 100% fit.

When he was out of the team recently we seemed to have more options and put together a great run of results.

[glenroyal]

The choice of, and then complete hash of playing, that "Don't Stop Believing" song cost us the game.

Cost us the game is going a bit far (see crap defence, etc.) but man it killed the atmosphere to have it faded out without a singable chorus - particularly to be followed by the boyos from the valleys in full voice! As well as "chants" we do need a club song (a proper anthem) or two. Add that to the list of tasks for next season.

PS Yes, I know Swansea is really "the valleys".

[Royal Rother]

Noel was unlucky not to be credited with his headed goal - harsh to call that an own-goal.

If a shot's going wide and gets deflected in off a defender it's an own goal. Noel's header wasn't goal bound...