News and Views
Late Rotherham Goal As Points Shared
15 December 2018
By Hob Nob Anyone?
Reading caretaker boss Scott Marshall remains without a win after his second game in charge ended in a frustrating 1-1 draw at fellow strugglers Rotherham United. After last week's 0-2 home defeat to Sheffield United, where Reading were very much second best, Marshall opted to make a few changes to the trip to Rotherham who were 3 points ahead of the Royals. Twenty year old Tom McIntyre, obviously very well known to Marshall, made his first team debut in defence. Up front youngster Danny Loader was back on the bench with Baldock making a start.
The Royals started strongly and were much the better side in the opening half. The choice of Baldock up front paid off inside the opening ten minutes. After sending an early effort just wide of the post it wasn't long before he was on the scoresheet. Minutes later a great pass from Sims into the area set Baldock up and he finished well to give Reading an early lead. It was Reading's first goal away from home since our 1-2 defeat at Birmingham in the middle of October.
Baldock continued to look dangerous and could have doubled Reading's lead before half time, putting one just over the crossbar and missing the target when he really should have done better. Sims, who had a decent game, nearly scored but his effort found the post, and the impressive Swift saw his goalbound shot well saved by the Rotherham keeper. Last weekend Reading failed to register a single shot on target, so this could definitely be seen as improvement.
However, the match flipped around after the half time break as Reading began to hang on. Jaakkola was again in good form with some good saves to prevent the equaliser. With Reading set to collect a rare three points the inevitable goal came with a minute left to play when Mattock scored from close range with little resistance from the Reading defence. It could have been worse when Rotherham put the ball just wide in stoppage time.
The point was enough to take the Royals out of the bottom three - above Millwall on goal difference. Reading travel to Millwall on Boxing Day in a match where they must avoid defeat. Before that we face sixth placed Middlesbrough at the Madejski Stadium next weekend.
Discussion On This Story:
Kitsondinho
2nd half......just......it was coming....I really can’t be bothered to pull it apart. The bottom line is, we threw two points away through our own ineptitude once again. We are in serious trouble.
NewCorkSeth
The second half was a classic Clement. Suffering for 15 minutes while crying out for a substitution and alienating our attackers by allowing the team shape to be abandoned.
Yiadom was good, Jaakkola was good, Swift was good and the rest were varying degrees of 'ok'. Nobody stood out as bad actually (maybe Sims who despite the assist lost the ball half the time and hit the post) and I think the guys were actually let down by Marshall. I think he should have seen the need for a change in response to the domination Rotherham were showing and he really should have seen Sims and McCleary became totally ineffective.
I'm honestly still too furious to finish this right now. Might edit it later.
Elm Park Kid
It was an ok trip though - couple of good pubs, I liked the stadium and it's located pretty close to the station. Stupid cold though . . .
URZZZZ
URZZZZ
oxf*rd the wingers. Play Baldock, Bodvarson and Meite.
Inclined to agree but firstly whilst I'm no fan of Swift, he does seem to play better with natural wingers, take the Leeds, Stoke and Wigan game where he was atrocious and we played with "forwards" rather than wingers, whereas today he was much better. Also, you need decent attacking fullbacks for this, Gunter isn't good enough offensively, Blackett and Yiadom are average but not enough
Royals and Racers
Whore Jackie
strap
Myself and 432 others !!!
I can make that another 429, as I went with 2 of my kids.....
You are all oxf*rd HEROS! I wouldn't watch this pile of shit if they we're playing in my back garden! (Er, which isn't the size nor condition of a LCh pitch before you get the wrong impression! In fact it's a weed bed but you get my drift!)
Top Flight
I wasn't confident we could hold out though with one of the kids at the back ( who by the way will become an outstanding centre back for us). A lot needs to change in January but with Clement gone and the sporting director gone and the prospect of a foreign coach taking over who doesn't know any of our players. This January window will likely be wasted. The situation looks very worrying right now. With a few changes, the right changes, we are not far away from being a very good side. But the guy who knew what we needed is now gone. A new guy from Portugal will come in and have to spend 6 months learning about this group by which time it will be too late. We are heading to League One sadly. And it is all our own fault. We deserve it quite frankly.
I thought Sims was decent today as well. With pace like Sims and Barrow we should be winning a lot of games on the road but we don't know how to go about our business. We have to focus on building a good solid defensive base. Defending from the front all the way back.
We should have won today but were probably just unlikely. Baldock should have buried his chance with the goal open. The keeper stopped a Swift effort with an outstretched leg. Sims hit the post. Our chances were very good ones today and we didn't capitalise. Most of Rotherhams attempts were hopeful shots from range hoping for a deflection on a slippery wet day, a slide under he keeper or slip off the glove. Last ten minutes they just went long into our box, flooded forward with bodies and hoped for that loose ball or to out jump one of our defenders.
We need to get the fundamentals of football right and not make so many basic errors like when Blackett cleared across the face of goal in the first half. You just don't do things like that. Parky probably is the right fit for us at the moment. At least he knows what we need and he knows the division. We can't get someone in that doesn't know our team. We will go down like that.
sandman
He was far from alone in missing chances though. Both McCleary and especially Baldock should have finished the game off before half time. However, as so often with this team we let the opposition off the hook and they came back in the second half.
We were under pressure from their set pieces, with players unable to clear the ball properly on a number of occasions. One time in particular where we cleared to the edge of the box and one of their players hit a shot that luckily went straight at Jaakkola.
When you are playing a team that are bombarding you with set pieces it is crucial that you don't give anything away needlessly. Which brings us to the absolutely brainless, Christopher Gunter. Under no pressure he put the ball out for a corner and we conceded. He'd actually played quite well up until that point but one moment of stupidity ruined it.
Special mention for Mcintyre who apart from one wobble in the second half looked assured on his debut. Don't believe many of our academy prospects that have come through are actually Reading fans. He is and his debut clearly meant a lot to him
Jaakkola 6
Yiadom 7
Blackett 7
Mcintyre 7
Gunter 5
McCleary 5
Rinomhota 6
Bacuna 6
Swift 8 motm
Sims 6
Baldock 6
Subs:
Bodvarsson - 5
Loader - Not on long enough, N/A
Kitsondinho
It was a lot better than some of the songs I had to endure. One about kicking someone's head in, some childish chants about someone's haircut making them look like a girl, another one about voting Tory (surely the worst)
Fair enough......I just feel a disclaimer about wanting/not wanting Parky as manager would have made things clearer 
Lower West
Ehhhh. Kinda. He sat deeper in the second half when our shape seemed to be more of a 4-3-2-1.
First half for sure but then again we attacked better in the first half so it's hard to know if it was a tactical change or he just couldn t get higher up the pitch.
Sounds as if he was playing in a more suited role. Needs a run of games to build match fitness and sharpness. After a stop start season. Applies to some other of the players as well.
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