Difficult Trip To Norwich Next For Reading

28 November 2014
By Hob Nob Anyone?

Unless Reading can pull off a shock result, it appears set to be another miserable weekend for Reading as they travel to Norwich City in the Championship this weekend. The Royals are on a run of four straight defeats away from home in the league, and have picked up just one point away from home in their last six attempts. Last Friday Reading slumped to another away defeat with an Alex Pearce horror show after he scored an own goal, conceeded a penalty that led to Cardiff City's winner, and got himself sent off. This week Reading appealed Pearce's red card but failed to get it overturned - so Pearce will definately be missing at Carrow Road. Ferdinand is hoping to be fit again, after managing just 45 minutes of first team action so far this season, and will be expected to take his place.

After last Friday's defeat, Reading sit in 15th spot in the table and are just three points outside the relegation zone with 18 games played. The poor run of results has seen Adkins position as manager widely discussed. You know a manager is under pressure when one of his players is widely quoted in the media as supporting his manager. Chris Gunter spoke out when questioned about Adkins getting the sack and said: "What this club doesn't need is to make a decision like that, it would be one of the worst things we could do... The manager has stuck with this club in some dark times over the past 12 months, There are things people don't know.".

Adkin's supporters will quickly point to the turmoil behind the scenes during 2014 with the hugely delayed Thai takeover and the massive lack of funds. Adkins has been unable to strenghten his squad and maybe unable to add players in the next transfer window. It seems likely the current owners of Reading Football Club would have little reason to blame the manager and no-one realisitcally expects any change this season regardless of Reading's position in the table.

Norwich fans are another set of unhappy supporters as their club has blown an excellent start to the season with a run nearly as bad as Reading's. The Canaries have won just one out of their last nine games and have dropped to tenth in the table. Last weekend Norwich drew 3-3 at home to 20th placed Brighton - but needed an 85th minute equaliser to share the points. Given that Norwich have drawn three out of their last four home games, Reading will be aiming for a point, which would be a good return for the Royals right now given the current circumstances.

Reading and Norwich last met in the Premier League in the 2012/2013 season. No goals were scored in the game at the Madejski while Norwich defeated Reading 1-2 at Carrow Road. McCleary scored for Reading that day but it turned out to be only a consolation goal - something Reading fans are getting used to. Our last win at Norwich was in the Championship in April 2009 when two goals from Shane Long saw Reading win 2-0 and remain 4th in the table.