Leicester 1 Reading 2

[Mystery benefactor]

It was a defo penalty from where I sat. Last man, tackle from behind nowhere near the ball. Solano should've seen red.

I agree it was a blatant penalty, from where i was sitting in the family end, it was either a push, or a tackle from behind, maybe both. You could see as soon Church rounded our two defenders he was either going to score, or he would win a penalty. Not everyone in our end saw it the same way however.

And Mcgivern was let us say inconsistent, he had a decent game on Sunday though.

I must confess, i wasn't looking when Dyer got whacked, so I'll reserve judgment on that one.

 

[fludie]

Oh come on, that's easy to say in hindsight. We were drawing 1-1 and he bought on players he thought could win us the match. Today's result wasn't the end of the world anyway, I was expecting to get beaten today, and again other results went in our favour. I think Reading are probably the side t watch at the moment with regard to who might pinch a play off place. I'd have saturday's derby down as a draw and a defeat at West Brom meaning we will need some good performances in winnable matches before the last game of the season against Middlesboro'.

Maybe I take back what I said about a loss, a draw was probably a fair result with ten mins left.

 

[beaumontfox]

I think people are forgetting Reading ARE the form side of 2010. Averaging about 2.5 points per game since the New Year isn't bad going at all.

Sometimes I think some fans are expecting us to play like the Scunny match every week, where everything goes right......


Of course I'm annoyed we lost, especially how we lost but in the grand scheme of things, we haven't lost ground on anyone as other results were helpful to us.

 

[Profondo Rosso]

Anyway, Dyer, King and Hobbs all played well today.

Although he pulled off a couple of great reactions saves, have to see Weale didn't look confident in his gathering of the ball and rushing out today.

 

[Uncle Connolly]

None of the players seemed to argue with the decision, despite their being about 4 Leicester players around at the time. You would've thought one of them at least would if it wasn't a pen.

To be honest I don't think there is any point anyway?

It's a totally futile response that seems to always happen once a penalty is given in any game of football.

How many people on here has seen a penalty decision reversed due to player protests?

 

[Profondo Rosso]

I think people are forgetting Reading ARE the form side of 2010. Averaging about 2.5 points per game since the New Year isn't bad going at all.

Sometimes I think some fans are expecting us to play like the Scunny match every week, where everything goes right......


Of course I'm annoyed we lost, especially how we lost but in the grand scheme of things, we haven't lost ground on anyone as other results were helpful to us.

I agree. Personally, I think the fans expect too much sometimes.

The "Pearson, sort them out" chants after about 30mins really pissed me off. Reading had one lucky counter-attack to that point, then stuck 11 men behind the ball and we weren't playing that badly either.

 

[beaumontfox]

Photos:

http://www.facebook.com/editphoto.php?aid=163750#!/album.php?aid=163750&id=677852270

 

[Jeff]

You could see as soon Church rounded our two defenders he was either going to score, or he would win a penalty.

So presumably it should have been a red card too?

 

[East Anglia Fox]

With that penalty at the end it was almost heart-breaking. I agree with Profondo Rosso: I thought (and hoped) it had 1-1 written all over it. In my opinion it was very frustrating how we created so many chances and just didn't manage to do anything with them. As the game went on, we seemed to run out of ideas.

For some reason in the first 15 minutes or so we managed to totally dominate them. Before the Reading goal, they barely got out of their own half. However, by end of the second half, Reading were pretty much dominating us.

McGivern wasn't too bad, although I though sometimes against that Kebe, he just seemed out of his depth.

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Jay Spearing yet, since he actually played for quite a long time. Personally I thought he was useless, as he basically just gave the ball away a lot, and generally achieved very little. Perhaps he just needs to just get used to playing more competitive games, as he's had very little experience of that so far.

 

[Motown Fox]

Shocking game but were still 4th on goal difference and also we have a game in hand next tuesday against cardiff but 4 now BRING ON THE DERBY

 

[Miles Away]

Not to harp on the Mcgivern thing, but since he came into the side we've leaked 2 goals a game after a string of clean sheets (4 in last 5).

I'm not trying to lynch the fella, and fair play to him, he's doing his best...but we simply need Berner back in the side.

I was a bit surprised Pearson didn't mix it up a bit today in terms of personnel...I suspect he will against Derby.

 

[Billyjof]

Not a good week for us. Good to see Waggy is consistently scoring but 1 point out of 2 home games is not good.

Some were discussing automatic promotion last week but we are now 17 points adrift.

 

[beaumontfox]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Jay Spearing yet, since he actually played for quite a long time. Personally I thought he was useless, as he basically just gave the ball away a lot, and generally achieved very little. Perhaps he just needs to just get used to playing more competitive games, as he's had very little experience of that so far.

I said this and all I got was, well he hasn't played much first team football has he? I pointed out that I expected to see him put at least one tackle in, and I got back, well he needs time to gel with the others or, you're only saying he was crap cos he came on for Oakley:icon_roll

First 20 mins or so?? Disappointed in him. Let's hope for better next time!

 

[Hazzman]

Dunno how anyone can say we deserved to lose today personally. I thought that game had draw written all over it.

Reading miss three open goals!

**** me McGivern some of his decisions yesterday were not worthy of a professional footballer. Surely we can not allow this to keeping happening, Reading pick on him and 90% of their attacks came down that side. Thought Morrison had the runaround off Long.

Solano has been dragged down; his passing was superb but now it's a long hoof. I thought King's passing was weak, Wellens is a good player but got no speed to carry it, Oakley deserves credit cos he was one of the few running around trying to create space. Gallacher hardly in it, Dyer worked his socks off(why didn't we keep giving the ball to
him in 1-1's against Griffin). Waghorn is beginning to frustate me, last couple of games he hasn't even challenged for headers.

As for Spearing....he created our best chance of the second half with a cracking through ball.

We were just so lazy, little bottle or bollocks. No 'get up and go'. No 'grrr'.

 

[Redditch Fox]

Nothing we didn't already know.

There's not a lot of difference between about 12 teams in this division once you get below the top three.

Pearson and the squad have done a great job this season by punching above our weight. We still have a good chance of getting into the play-offs but unlikely to get promotion.

If we do get promotion then we'll have a load more money......and be a racing certainty to come back down, when we will need to use the money sensibly re-build and try again.

Simple really.

 

[Matt_B]

I'm suprised it hasn't been mentioned elsewhere (that I could see) but bar one good save Weale had a nightmare yesterday. Fecked up the first goal between him and McGivern and bobbled/spooned it several more times.

I've not seen the replays but for the penalty it looked like Church hit the ball between our two players and well into the area to run onto it, if Weale had been more alert he could have collected it with no problem. Maybe the replay will change my mind.

 

[Profondo Rosso]

Nothing we didn't already know.

There's not a lot of difference between about 12 teams in this division once you get below the top three.

Pearson and the squad have done a great job this season by punching above our weight. We still have a good chance of getting into the play-offs but unlikely to get promotion.

If we do get promotion then we'll have a load more money......and be a racing certainty to come back down, when we will need to use the money sensibly re-build and try again.

Simple really.

Here we go with the "if we go up we'll be certainties to come back down" tripe again. :icon_roll

Every team in the PL underneath Stoke is poor and we could easily finish above any of them. How teams with such awful managers as West Ham and Wigan look able to survive there this season is beyond me, we could easily finish ahead of those with a good manager like Pearson next year.

 

[tedfoxxx]

The only postsives I can really take from last night was another Waggy goal and the magnificent Lloyd Dyer.

This 4-5-1/4-3-3 system has been sussed out now, save it for away days and start two upfront for home matches. It didn't take a tactical genius to notice that they played almost exclusively on the break, having Waghorn on his own meant that they could take the ball off him (why the **** were we hoofing it to his head all night too?) and clear it quickley. Solano gave the ball away more times than I care to mention, if McGivern had done it every split arse in the stadium would be booing but no, a shit Solano header on the half way line that nearly cost us a goal was met with a hearty chant of his name.

The midfield got bypassed far too often and crowded out when they did get the ball on the floor, in fact the only incisive pass that Wellens managed to play into space all night resulted in our goal.

I can't say I'm that surprised or disappointed with the result, just our performance and like the second half of the Cov match, Pearson's reluctancy to change the formation or the tactics. (I don't count bringing Dany on to hoof it at him rather than Waghorn as a tactical change.)

 

[Biff]

**** me McGivern some of his decisions yesterday were not worthy of a professional footballer. Surely we can not allow this to keeping happening, Reading pick on him and 90% of their attacks came down that side.

Have to agree with this.

McGivern is here on loan, and some think he does ok, but hes just not good enough.

Those who are sticking up for him, i will ask you this, should we sign him up in the summer if we get the chance

Didn't think so :icon_wink

 

[Redditch Fox]

Here we go with the "if we go up we'll be certainties to come back down" tripe again. :icon_roll

Every team in the PL underneath Stoke is poor and we could easily finish above any of them. How teams with such awful managers as West Ham and Wigan look able to survive there this season is beyond me, we could easily finish ahead of those with a good manager like Pearson next year.

You never know - but I don't think so.

I disagree with your assessment of the gap between the divisions.

However, as I've said I think we have done great this season but can't see us being strong enough to actually get promoted through the play offs. So, I guess that we may never know which of us is right.

Unfortunately, there will be a limit to MM's willingness to subsidise and Pearson is likely to get drawn elsewhere if we don't get promoted and/ or be given a sizeable transfer kitty- so the future could be tricky. That's why it would be so beneficial to get promotion this season.