.

[rabidbee]

Wasn't the Ipswich game with two sendings off the 5-2 defeat a year or two before? Bobby Mihaylov and Andy Bernal IIRC.

So, the Magnificent Seven:

Jimmy McIntyre
Stuart Gray
Jimmy Crawford
Paul Brayson
Patrick Kelly
Scott Howie
Robert Fleck

Reilly, Brebner and McLaren followed later didn't they?

It is difficult to imagine seven worse players.

To be fair, I don't think that Jimmy Mac was that bad. As I recall, he was just played out of position a lot, and expected to be a good target man for no other reason than he's a lanky streak of piss.

[Baines]

Reading 1 Sam Allardyce's Notts County 0
A great goal scored by........ erm ....them, and a streaker with even less tackle potential than our entire defence

You might think that it was an Ian Richardson own goal.
I couldn't possibly comment.

[Skyline]

Reading 1 Sam Allardyce's Notts County 0
A great goal scored by........ erm ....them, and a streaker with even less tackle potential than our entire defence

Ian Richardson. A player who in two games for Notts County managed to score more Reading goals (2) than Paul Brayson did in 40-odd games in a Royals shirt.

[rabidbee]

He was good in House of Cards, though.

[Baines]

Killing people that threaten to undermine your grip on power >>> scoring comical own goals

[papereyes]

He was good in House of Cards, though.

I am convinced that when Cameron grows old and wizened, he will look like Ian Richardson.

[Baines]

Back on topic, it's got to be Luton 3-0. Optimism in the sunshine and all that.

[Uke]

Reading vs Norwich, last game at EP

Great atmosphere, sad outcome

History never repeats itself does it?

[Baines]

He was good in House of Cards, though.

I am convinced that when Cameron grows old and wizened, he will look like Ian Richardson.

Cameron's got too much pork on him. He'll be closer to Ken Clarke once he stops cycling.

[papereyes]

Reading vs Norwich, last game at EP

Great atmosphere, sad outcome

History never repeats itself does it?

Our player getting their player of the season award.

Tommy Burns would have been my A-levels and first year university. Barely saw more than a handful of games.

Ah well.

[handbags_harris]

Wasn't the Ipswich game with two sendings off the 5-2 defeat a year or two before? Bobby Mihaylov and Andy Bernal IIRC.

So, the Magnificent Seven:

Jimmy McIntyre
Stuart Gray
Jimmy Crawford
Paul Brayson
Patrick Kelly
Scott Howie
Robert Fleck

Reilly, Brebner and McLaren followed later didn't they?

It is difficult to imagine seven worse players.
Does anybody remember the load he bought on deadline day in the next season?

Andy McLaren
Alan Maybury
Keith Scott
Sean Evers
Tony Barras (signed permanently after being on loan)

There's 5 worse players for you sir. And they were all signed on deadline day a year after the magnificent seven.

And Reilly, Brebner and McLaren did all arrive later, McLaren is listed above. Reilly and brebner were signed in pre-season 1998.

As for my favourite game, I think Stoke City at Elm Park, Burns first home game in charge. We were bottom, Stoke 2nd bottom, we won 2-0 and went above them. We all thought it was the start of our revival, the atmosphere was great, and Meaker scored!

[cmonurz]

Has to be the 2-2 draw with Bradford. It was the first game I went to after I started uni in Uxbridge, and I got a ridiculously long train journey to Reading, arriving at the ground to meet a friend and Miss Cmonurz with 15 minutes to spare. Don't remember much else about the game except a couple of very quick pints, and then THAT Keith Scott goal. He moved twice as quick as he did at any other time at Reading, showed all the skill he ever did at Reading, and made the best finish he ever did at Reading, all in the space of 30 seconds. Made David WetheROFLaLOLOL look like a pub player.

[handbags_harris]

Can I also just point out that the Bradford 2-2 game was 2 games into the Pardew/Gorman caretakership. Burns left 2 days after the first leg which ended 1-1.

[cmonurz]

Well, it's still a great memory.

[From Despair To Where?]

Best goal that I can recall was the long range effort by Neil Clement, on loan from Chelsea.

That would be the 35yd daisy cutter that the Lincoln keeper spooned through his legs Massimo Taibi style. The ball barely had the guts to cross the line. All the more hilarious for it being about 20 seconds after the break and half the crowd were still in the concourse.

As the HobNob report puts it

as the second half got underway and were last rewarded as Clement pulled one back for Reading. Unfortunately we owed the goal to some fantastically funny goalkeeping from the Lincoln keeper. I'll no longer laugh at the name "Simon Sheppard" in quite the same way again. Clement let rip with a superb power shot from about 785 yards out. It went straight for the keeper who made the save. With the ball almost dead he dropped it, went to grab it and fumbled it through his legs. It trickled over the line to make it 1-1.

Soft as oxf*rd.

Mass Sarr's winner in the same game was utter class though, picks the ball us on the left wing, skins the full back, cuts in towards the corner of the area and smacks it in off the far post from about 25 yds.

[Royal for Sale]

Those were the days ... shortly before I moved away and could no longer get to home games. The 2-1 win against Stoke was great, particularly sweet when observing the generally obnoxious behaviour of the away fans afterwards. I was gutted that the 3-3 with Bournemouth was ultimately only a draw, but we got our money's worth I suppose.

But Notts County at home... I recall that there was a collective ironic shout of "offside" for the own goal after some dreadful line calls leading up to that moment, and the streaker was the only bit of entertainment after that, but does anyone remember the County fan with the football rattle right at the beginning? I was shocked to see one of those but it only came out once - it made the national paper the next day because apparently it had been confiscated as an "offensive weapon" by the stewards. Great story, idiot steward.

[Stooper]

Wasn't the Ipswich game with two sendings off the 5-2 defeat a year or two before? Bobby Mihaylov and Andy Bernal IIRC.

According to soccerbase, only Mihaylov was sent off in that game. The 1-0 defeat was Bernal and Legg who were sent off.

Must be my memory then.

Maybe it was Bernal who replaced Mihaylov in goal.

[Compo's Hat]

Wasn't the Ipswich game with two sendings off the 5-2 defeat a year or two before? Bobby Mihaylov and Andy Bernal IIRC.

So, the Magnificent Seven:

Jimmy McIntyre
Stuart Gray
Jimmy Crawford
Paul Brayson
Patrick Kelly
Scott Howie
Robert Fleck

Reilly, Brebner and McLaren followed later didn't they?

When did Michael O'Neil arrive then?

Also wasn't Patrick Kelly (on loan from Celtic?) the one that suffered a nasty injury a couple of games in?

[Barry the bird boggler]

That McKeever match at Stoke for me - what a game! Whatever happened to him?

Believe he's now at Weston Super Mare

[Barry the bird boggler]

First batch, the magnificent seven. To be fair to tommy he came in and quickly assessed where we were weakest and had about 2 days to get things together so went for quick fixes from players he knew were available and could get quickly...

Scott Howie
Jim McIntyre
Robert Fleck
Paddy Kelly (loan)
Stuart Gray
Paul Brayson
Jimmy Crawford

Then in the summer more were added

Graeme Murty
Grant Brebner
Mass Sarr
Elroy Kromheer
Peter van der Kwaak

Then we had a season of loans and other new faces such as

Andy Wright
Chris Casper
Mark McKeever
Neil Clement

And on next deadline day we got the "Renault 5"

Alan Maybury (loan)
Tony Barrass (loan converted to permanent)
Andy McLaren
Keith Scott
Sean Evers

Brilliantly entertaining days in a peculiar way, remember that on that 2nd deadline day we were pushing for the play offs - no I don't know how either.

Some great games though

Stoke 0-4 was the best and then there was that 1-0 win at a very good Bournemouth courtesy of Mark McKeever again. 1-1 at Bradford 2-1 v Preston and Bristol City.

By the way the Bournemouth 3-3 that has been mentioned was under Alan Pardew NOT Tommy Burns.