News and Views
Kuhl Takes Charge As Reading Visit Preston
11 December 2015
By Hob Nob Anyone?
Caretaker manager Martin Kuhl will be taking his Reading side to Preston North End this weekend looking to end a run of three straight away defeats. Previous manager Steve Clarke was given his marching orders after a home defeat last week to QPR - but it's on the road where the Royals have really been struggling recently. Despite the on-going rumours of the return of former manager Brian McDermott this week, it has been Martin Kuhl who has taken both training and responsibility for the squad ahead of the visit to Deepdale. There remains a reasonable chance that Kuhl could also take charge of next week's trip to Hull City as the Reading board and contenders for the job mull things over.
No-one will be expecting an instant return to winning ways, so perhaps Kuhl can do no wrong this weekend, but he does have a very tough job ahead of him.
Preston are 18th in the Championship table but have lost just once in their last nine league fixtures. Their last outing was a 2-0 away win at high flying Burnley as they start to put a poor start to the season behind them. While Reading have already let in 22 goals in the League, Preston have conceeded just 16, and have one of the best defences in the division. Preston have lost just six games so far this season - the same as visitors Reading - and will see the visit of the Royals as a prime opportunity to record consecutive league wins.
The good news is that Reading will see the return of Paul McShane in the centre of defence after he was forced to sit it out during the visit of QPR to the Madejski. One player we've really missed in recent weeks is Stephen Quinn, and we'll have to wait to see his return as he remains sidelined along with Tshibola. It'll be interesting to see if Kuhl shuffles things around or continues with a line-up similar to Steve Clarke's preferences. Jordan Obita will be hoping to return to favour with Clarke out of the picture.
More good news is that Reading normally do pretty well against Preston. We're undefeated in our last five games against them and have won 6 out of our last 10 meetings. Our last visit to Deepdale was a 1-1 draw in the Championship back in October 2010 when Karacan scored for the Royals. Our last match against them was at home in the same season when we ran out 2-1 winners with Kebe and Robson-Kanu scoring the vital goals for the Royals.
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