25 years ago today

Mid Sussex Royal
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Re: 25 years ago today

by Mid Sussex Royal » 01 Jun 2020 18:44

Tony Le Mesmer I didn't take it as bad as most. Don't get me wrong, when they equalised and immediately after I felt awful. But I got over it very quickly. It had been such a good season, the best in our history. I didn't see that as a failure. Just 4 years earlier, we played a home league game in front of 1,900 and the club faced closure. That hurt a lot.

93-95 still remains the most enjoyable years as a Reading fan. Better than 2005-2007 (just).


I tend to agree with this probably because I had moved south before 2005 so had to give up my ST which made it very hard to watch live games from the end of 2005 onwards.

93-95 was also so unexpected - and the football we played still ranks as the best I've seen any Reading team play.

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Re: 25 years ago today

by sandman » 01 Jun 2020 19:37

It was only my second season. Spent most of that second half looking at the clock hoping it would move quicker somehow, stupid time.

It is without doubt the most disappointing of the four finals. Although unlike many the Swansea one disappointed me the most after 95. Yes, during the season and quite a few before and after that they were better than us but they weren't in that final. They had the advantage of our two best and most dependable defenders at the time having the worst game they both played for us. Plus that pig featured shitrag Phil "Fatty" Dowd must have had a fiver on them. He was almost as gleeful at blowing for fouls against us than he was at the sight of an all you can eat buffet.

Yes we went up the following season but we'd lost Long by then. Plus the sheep shagging bastards (sorry Zip, et al) went and signed, Gylfi albeit on loan.

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Re: 25 years ago today

by Westwood52 » 02 Jun 2020 12:24

You wonder if it’s a gypsy curse or something.One meaningless Symod Cup win(though I did enjoy the day);followed by four play off horlicks and an FA Cup semi final defeat.Perhaps we should swing a dead cat and bury it at the Mad Stad,and at Elm Park Housing estate for good measure.
You can imagine the tension if we get to another play off final.

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Re: 25 years ago today

by Franconian Royal » 02 Jun 2020 13:52

Sutekh
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Zip
I don’t think you could have started Quinn ahead of an in form Nogan. Not for me. Quinn would have buried the pen though. No doubt.
Archie also missed another great chance just before half time. We should have been at least 3-0 up at half time with them down to ten. There would have been no way back for them.


Possibly.

Just watched it to the end. Their 4th was a handball, 3rd was offside. So technically if VAR ( :lol: ) had existed, they wouldn't have gone up. -our 4th was nicely made as well, Lovell's flick etc. Didn't see in the highlights what McAteer did. What did he do?

Some poor refereeing decisions in that game. Quinn should've had a pen 2nd half. And their player should've been sent off after that incident because he butted Quinn.


Must have missed that. Did Reading then lose on penalties?

3rd, I mean

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Re: 25 years ago today

by STAR Liaison » 02 Jun 2020 15:03

Westwood52 You wonder if it’s a gypsy curse or something.One meaningless Symod Cup win(though I did enjoy the day);followed by four play off horlicks and an FA Cup semi final defeat.Perhaps we should swing a dead cat and bury it at the Mad Stad,and at Elm Park Housing estate for good measure.
You can imagine the tension if we get to another play off final.


It has been pointed out to the football club that we won the Simod in a change strip but all our PO final defeats have been in hoops.

We never beat Arsenal whatever, even with a 4-0 lead, so hoops no use at the FAC SF.


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Re: 25 years ago today

by Jerry St Clair » 02 Jun 2020 17:30

Sutekh No problem with it now. Revenge was completed when Bolton, then steaming away at the top of the Championship a couple of seasons later, and on a long winning run were overturned 3-2 at Elm Park with Jimmy Quinn having to go in goal for most of the 2nd half.


I'd forgotten about that, but it's all coming back to me now. After the game a group of gobby Bolton supporters had a pop at us as we walked through the alleyway to Windrush Way. There were a few scuffles but none of the Reading fans, mostly from the Tilehurst End, were interested in reacting. Then a large number of Southbankers arrived from Waverley Road and the Bolton lads suddenly found they had their hands full. Then the very angry owner of one of the houses they'd dumped their minibus in front of, blocking his driveway, emerged with his sons and got stuck in too. I imagine it was a chilly journey home to Lancashire............

But, yeah, thanks for the reminder. It was a nothing result in the context of the season, but great revenge.

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Re: 25 years ago today

by Millsy » 08 Jun 2020 12:18

Horrible day. Worse than any other. Truly gutting. Northern tossers goading us on the walk to the car wasn't fun.

But unlike many I did get over it, when Bolton came down to Elm Park a couple of years later and we beat them despite having to put Jimmy Quinn in goal and them IIRC being top of the table.

We goaded the shit out of the f**kers around the ground after that game and got more than our own back to wipe away any hurt from the playoff.

Now when I think of Bolton I don't think Archie's miss, I think of the looks of the angry Bolton faces when we beat them at Elm Park. :lol: Truly cathartic day.

EDIT: sorry I've just seen Sutekh and Jerry making the same point in the post above. Good to see that game got rid of quite a few demons :)

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Re: 25 years ago today

by Snowflake Royal » 08 Jun 2020 12:46

Mid Sussex Royal
Notts Royal It was too much to take for an 8 year old!


I think for anyone who was there it l must rank as their worst day watching Reading...far worse than the other three finals:

Walsall - unfortunate circumstances with the own goal but we went up next season anyway
Swansea - expected us to lose to a much better side
Hudds - missed opportunity and upsetting at the end but we didn't deserve anything from the game

It was my first ever game so it will always be etched in my memory as one of the best footballing experiences I've had.

I just assumed at the time we'd be right up there the next season seeing as we'd finished second and come so close.

Walsall much worse for me as I knew much more and we really should have beaten them. We were much more a tier 2 side than them, as we've since proven.

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Re: 25 years ago today

by Snowflake Royal » 08 Jun 2020 13:05

Jackson Corner That was such a sad end to what had been such a great season. Our support was epic that day and the team were brilliant in the first half Nogans’s goal was a thing of beauty. If Archie had scored that would have been it. There way they would have come back. I was sick could not even talk for a week, don’t give me it’s only a game rubbish we all new that was our shot at the big time and we blew it. I even went into town the following night to see the parade, how many teams have a parade for losing the play off final? I just went as I new I would never see Shaka, Osborne and Scott Taylor again. As the seasons passed one by one that team Dismantled Kerr, Williams, Darius Nogan Archie all left and we dropped down in our last season at Elm Park.
It would be 20 long years before we made it to the promised land. And as epic as that was just to have seen Elm Park in the premier league even it was just for one season would have a perfect end to that three year journey.

10 years


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