Stephen Hunt’s letter to Reading fans

I just wanted to thanks everyone single person connected to Reading Football Club over the past four years.

I have had a great time and there have been many experiences that I will never, ever forget. On the pitch, that first year when we won the Championship was a brilliant team effort, and then we kept it going in our first year in the Premier League. On top of that, I have been able to play with my brother Noel and that was very, very special for me and my family, not many people get the chance to do that for a club, never mind their country as well.

Anyone else feel a little bad after reading Hunt’s letter?

A good Championship preview from The Guardian

Focuses on the vast quantity of unknowns that make the Championship such an exciting league this year. On Reading:

Reading have lost some key players but they have more in reserve than most. The Royals have spent the summer getting up the collective nose of Watford fans, firstly by taking their manager, Brendan Rogers, and then by attempting to take their best player, Tommy Smith. Matt Mills is an intelligent signing from Doncaster this week but they do need extra attacking options following the exits of Lita and Kevin Doyle and the return of Dave Kitson to Stoke. Shane Long, Simon Church and Noel Hunt have shown glimpses and are likely to fill the gap in the short term at least.

Read more.

Ivar Ingimarsson named as Reading captain

A good decision from Brendan Rodgers and one that this blog certainly agrees with. Also good to see Pearce named as vice-captain, a decision that makes it very likely that we will have at least one of our leaders on the pitch at the same time. With the signing of Matthew Mills announced yesterday, it caps off a pretty good couple of days for the Royals, ending pre-season on a very positive note.

Are you all as pleased as me?

New Reading away-shirt a fake?

So I’ve just seen this shirt floating around Football Shirt Culture and a few people seem to be taking it as gospel.

Being a sceptical sort, I thought I’d check it against the previous gallery on the official site and found an extremely similar looking photograph.

It looks to me as if it has just been cropped down, rotated a little and then had a colour filter applied to the hoops. You can also see a bit of blue around the neck, which you wouldn’t expect to be there if it were the actual shirt. So I’m calling fake, which is a shame as I actually quite like it.

The real new shirt will be unveiled tomorrow, with it’s first outing at the Chelsea game. Knowing my luck, it will look exactly like that one.

Update: Seems I’m miles behind and this kit was created by Rawlie19 on Hobnob a few weeks ago. I’d since seen it flying around as an officially leaked kit though so I’m using that as justification for the post anyway.

Ingimarsson selected in all-time Premier League XI…

…for players whose surnames begin with the letter ‘I’

Centre-Half: Ivar Ingimarsson
At £175,000, we also have another I bargain in the shape of the Icelandic centre-half who was surplus to requirements at Wolves but established himself as a regular with Reading in partnership with Ibrahima Sonko. He didn’t look out of his depth in the Premier League and was voted Player of the Season by Reading fans after an ever-present season that saw Reading exceed all expectations. If footballers had any imagination at all, his nickname would be ‘The Engine’. In reality, it’s probably ‘Ingy’.

Read the full article here.

Kevin Doyle: A tribute

The expected summer saga was over relatively quickly as Kevin Doyle sealed his record £6.5m move to Wolves yesterday and with it proved himself to be that rare breed in football, a genuinely good bloke. Unlike a certain someone, he never complained about not being able to move, made it patently obvious that he was happy to stay at Reading should no team match his release clause and, more importantly, gave his absolute all to the club while he was here. Doyle could have left in the January transfer window, where his stock was arguably higher after his explosive start to the season, but he chose to sign a new contract instead signalling his intent to try and help Reading back into the Premier League. Although safe in the knowledge that nobody would begrudge him a move back to the top league should that attempt be unsuccessful, it spoke volumes about the man.

If there is any Reading fan out there with any bad feelings towards Doyle whatsoever, though I’m not sure there is, compare and contrast his attitude over his four years at the club with his fellow strikers. Dave Kitson caused dressing room problems in our relegation season, was caught drink-driving, bad-mouthed the FA cup and, when we went down, announced to all potential suitors that he belonged in the Premier League and wouldn’t be staying with us. Leroy Lita had numerous fall-outs with the manager, recorded a sex tape which made the newspapers,, was involved in Bristol nightclub ‘incidents’ and was generally such a nuisance that he had to be loaned out to another Championship club. Even Shane Long had one or two petulant moments.

Doyle, on the other hand, has never let his demeanor slip beyond that of the consummate professional. All of the cogs involved in his transfer were done behind the scenes, including the release clause that was put into his contract in January that ensured he would be able to leave for a reasonable amount, and he never went to the tabloids complaining about his lot. He revealed that he would have been happy to stay at Reading had no bids been made and, if we had been promoted, he would have stayed anyway. Even when the goals weren’t going in for him, he never let his head drop or hid on the pitch. He gave his all for the club and was loved by the fans for that.

It’s a well-trodden path, but his story really was something of a fairytale and nicely coincided with Reading’s own rise to the top. He was named player of the season in his first year and had an integral role in our promotion.

In his second season, our first in the top division, he scored one of the fastest goals in Premier League history and was nominated for Young Player of the Season. His third season ended in disappointment and, although his form dropped, nobody could blame Doyle for his work ethic and he continued to represent his country at the highest level.

In the wake of our relegation, Doyle won the respect of every Reading fan by staying with the club. He was amongst those expected to leave, but instead chose to stay and try to propel the team back to the top division. He scored 18 goals last season and, again his form petered off towards the end of the season, but this was not helped by injury problems and the shoddy performances of the team generally.

So farewell Kevin Doyle. You leave with the best wishes of the club, the manager, this blog and thousands of loyal Reading fans everywhere. You were one of us and we adored you for it. We wish you the best of luck with your career although I’m sure that I am not alone in hoping we swap places with Wolves come May and bring you back to the Madejski where you belong.

Doyle to be the second most expensive signing in football

Bloody hell. Seems a bit steep.

Rodgers endears himself to the fans

My opinion of our new manager Brendan Rodgers is shooting up and up following what I’ve heard from his press conference earlier today. It has made me feel a lot better about the controversy that I wrote about yesterday, in that Rodgers seems to be a real Reading man and simply couldn’t resist the opportunity to manage the club that he joined at 13 years old and has lived in for twenty years. He told the fans “I’m one of you” as he explained that he was something of a Reading supporter himself. It certainly seems less of a Pardew affair and more of a homecoming by his quotes so far. He is certainly saying all the right things. He told the official site:

“My message to supporters is that I’m now the greatest and biggest supporter of Reading. I’m one of you – but I have the responsibility and therefore have to remove some of that emotion to help us win games.

“I promise that my communication will always be open, I will have quality in my work and big ambition.”

Promising stuff and I’m personally looking forward to a more open channel of communication, as well as seeing some passion on the touchlines and, hopefully, in post match interviews, although I’ll always miss Coppell’s dry wit.

The press conference transcripts are slowly coming up on the official site. Here are the links:

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Brendan Rogers to be named new Reading manager

Reading are set to announce that Brendan Rogers, the current Watford manager, will become Steve Coppell’s successor today. Rogers, who has been the bookies favourite for the job since Coppell resigned last month, has only been in charge at Vicarage Road since November, but still lives in Reading and is understood to favour a move back to the club where he started his coaching career in charge of the Academy.

A compensation package has been arranged with the Hornets for Rogers’ services and personal terms are expected to be confirmed later today. BBC Berkshire today reported that the announcement was ‘imminent’ and unofficial Reading website Hob Nob Anyone? reports that the deal is done. Rogers’ Wikipedia page has already been edited this morning in expectation of an official announcement.

Update: Reading Football Club have reached a compensation agreement with Watford Football Club with a view to appointing Brendan Rodgers as their new manager. 12:55

Update: Watford confirm that Brendan Rogers has left the club for Reading FC. Jimmy Russo, the Watford chairman, says that the compensations package starts at £500k and could potentially rise to £1m. 13.00

Simon Church makes debut for Wales

Always last with the news here at The Reading Fan, I was mightily chuffed for young Simon Church, who made his international debut for Wales on Friday, coming on as a substitute in a 1-0 win over Estonia. I have to admit that I was more than a little surprised, given that he had only made his debut for us in the play-off semi-final against Burnley three or so weeks ago, but I’m not sure whether that says more about the strength of our striking line-up or of Wales’. That said, it has no doubt been his form at U21 level for his country, where he has eight goals in twelve appearances, that caught the eye of first team boss John Toshack. After the game, Toshack was full of praise for the Reading youngster, saying: “I was particularly pleased with Church who showed a lot of skill and effort in the time he had.”

He is now in contention for the World Cup Qualifier game against Azerbaijan this Saturday. Church has previously impressed on loan spells for Leyton Orient, finding the net four times in thirteen games, which earnt him a surprise debut for the Reading first team in the final game of the season.