Ramarena

See how they aren’t pressuring our CB’s but are straight onto our full backs when they get the ball. Smart management

Cheltenham have done their homework, double up on us in wide areas and try to break quickly isolating our defenders

Great defensive work from Sibs when he was the last defender there

Wilson has been caught trying to do too much in potentially dangerous defensive positions twice now. Luckily we’ve got away with it

Bit of a wild start with Cheltenham arguably having the better of it and should be 1 up

Yep, get that midfield right and things will look a lot better. Pretty sure we need to revert to three in there away from home!

Very poor fare

Lucky that was offside, Ward was tripe there

Indeed, five in without any departures would give us a heavy squad and wagebill. Smith would be an obvious candidate to be moved on this window. Out of contract in the summer, plenty of competition for his position. Other than that I’m not sure who’d be out the door. Maybe Ward, but he’s only been here six months.

Reading back, lots of posters on here wanted shot of him, because they thought he’d never be good enough and thought it was the correct decision by a manager they rated highly. With the benefit of hindsight they were wrong on all counts.

Seems a decent player for this level, hopefully his link up play is decent. Would have preferred a Lapado style striker with a bit of pace, strength and presence, but if we can’t get that then maybe this is the next best option for a 6 month loan. After that it’s a mobile central midfielder and we’re good.

I was just about to post exactly the same 🤣

Urgh the absolute state of some people!

Darren Witcoop is most certainly a real person. He’s doesn’t get much right, but he’s definitely real.

He must be at the end of his tether with everything that happening at Reading

If we’re in league one next year then I’d offer Collins a one year deal. We’d absolutely need to sign another striker as well, if we hadn’t already (this Jan). If we get promoted then I’d lean towards not renewing, unless he was prepared to be a back up player we could bring on in the last 15 mins to harass the oppositions defence.

Decent player, but not the type we’re supposed to be after and he’s older than we should be looking at. Maybe a decent loan option if we can’t get our primary targets

The misses weren’t the problem for me. At least they showed he was capable of being in the right areas on occasions. The major problem was despite his effort, he was always too busy doing something other than being where we needed him……..in the penalty area! He has improved this and is now doing much better as a result. He still has a habit of hiding behind defenders when we’re in good positions, but at least he’s actually in the dangerous areas now and getting chances/ goals. At the start of the season in one of the threads, I had him down for 15 league goals, but back in Oct and Nov he looked like he had no idea to get into good positions and was more intent on handbags with a player outside the box, while we were putting a decent ball in an area he should have been. Put short, despite the effort, he wasn’t doing his job properly and that’s what frustrated people. He’s a decent player at this level and although we need another striker, he would remain a decent rotation option until we get out of this league. As an aside, I do really wish he’d stop this silly deliberate hand ball business when we put dangerous crosses in!

31Vickers 6.5 35Nelson 7 5Bradley 6.5 6Cashin 7.5 2Wilson 7.5 8Bird 7.5 4Hourihane 6.5 22Fornah 6 3Forsyth 6 20Elder 6 19John-Jules 6 7Barkhuizen 6.5 11Méndez-Laing 8 9Collins 7 16Thompson 7

Hopefully if it suits us. I can see why he would do it for a one off, we did today and it worked! I'd also say it's probably due Nyambe being away as well. We recruited for 3 at the back in the summer and had to scramble to get a RB in to be comfortable with 4 at the back, now that RB is away for a few weeks, no one to really play that position with Smith out as well. So we've got a dilemma, which led us to 3 at the back today. We're going to be a bit hamstrung with our defensive options till Nyambe returns, unless we bring a loan in.

Yep, I get people don't like or don't rate him, that's up to them. But why not say he was poor............instead of calling him a disaster? Seem's silly. I personally think he was o.k, but he should have done better for their goal.

This is exactly the response we needed after last weeks setback! First half was efficient, without playing particularly well, but second half was largely poor, so it was a very mixed performance, but the 3 points is all that mattered. Some good individual performances from Bird, NML and Wilson (who's fast become in a first choice player). Yes it was against a poor side, but away to a side fighting for survival can always be a banana-skin and we successfully avoided it. One word of caution, three at the back really doesn't suit our CB's and a better team may have punished us today. Something for the management to consider.