Back from the pain

[Zip]

The first goal was crucial tonight. It looks like Sinclair was offside but he has come back to haunt us.

Rafael 6 Good pen save. Distribution terrible early on
Esteves 5 Out of position on occasions. Put a great cross in for Joao
Richards 6 Did ok. One or two decent crosses
Morrison 5 Sloppy start to the game.Was part of a badly stretched back four
McIntyre 4 Horrible night for Tom. Constantly caught on the wrong side of his opponent
Rinomhota 5 Struggled to make much impact
Laurent 5 See above
Olise 6 Some nice passes but efforts on goal disappointing
Aluko 7 Probably our best player. Unlucky not to score
Semedo 5 Surprised he stayed on.Busy but ineffective
Joao 5 All round play was good but he had to bury at least one tonight
Puscas 5 Missed a couple of decent chances
Baldock 5 Busy but no end product as usual
Yiadom 6 Looked lively.

[Sutekh]

Had chances which were not taken. Dreadfully painful, awful slow start yet again. Score flattered Preston but Reading really are struggling badly with injuries in key areas giving no ability to maintain freshness.

Really hope something can be got from a good Stoke team on Saturday otherwise Reading‘s season could well become a bit of a struggle - again.

[NewCorkSeth]

Just did the old freeze frame on ifollow. Goal was onside. Richards foot trailed putting him a few inches onside.

[Millsy]

FIRSTLY WE ARE TOP OF THE LEAGUE AFTER 10 GAMES - GET IN!!!!!!!!

This game was unfortunate.

They high pressed first 30mins and we soaked it up as usual. We were actually very good otherwise, but I know the negativists will laugh at this.

Unlucky uncharacteristic poor finishing by Joao.

Possibly offside goal. McIntyre f**king overrated shit, gave away a shit penalty, couldn't keep up, at fault for 2nd goal, shit for 3rd goal. Paceless CB? F**k off.

MASSIVELY MISSING MEITE
Missing Ejaria as an option
MASSIVELY MISSING MOORE ++++++++++++++

A team looking to stay top needs proper CB cover.

Biggest pluses for me: Yiadom returning. Number 1 right back for me head and shoulders above "cut-inside" Esteves or anyone else. And Aluko - he was great today. I wonder if anyone is going to scapegoat him again?

[bcubed]

Just did the old freeze frame on ifollow. Goal was onside. Richards foot trailed putting him a few inches onside.

As I said on the match thread, I've done it twice now and think Estevez kept him on
Either way I think we can stop saying it was off

[Hound]

Only saw the highlights but shit defending + missing good chances mean you lose

McIntyre looked dreadful sadly. And Joao will be kicking himself pretty hard tonight

[NewCorkSeth]

Just did the old freeze frame on ifollow. Goal was onside. Richards foot trailed putting him a few inches onside.

As I said on the match thread, I've done it twice now and think Estevez kept him on
Either way I think we can stop saying it was off

Estevez looks well away from keeping him offside on my screen.

[Notts Royal]

I did question those who said McIntyre was 1st choice over Moore in the summer. Will be big lesson for Tom tonight, I’m sure he’ll learn from it & become better.

Let’s be honest, top of the league is a tremendous return

[Simmops]

I couldn't give a shit about the result. We are first on Quest!!!

[Crowbar6753]

McIntyre had a shocker tonight, however, he's young and these things happen with young players and i'm sure he'll learn from these mistakes. It might be worth giving Gibson a shout for Saturday, he was very highly rated at Fleetwood last season and must be worth a look at.
We played well at times tonight, but only in spurts, and when we played well we created enough chances to have won the game!! however, football is cruel and Preston are a steady side who have a good away record thus far.
If we can get something out of the Stoke game and then regroup during the International break we should be ok.
Yids has to start on Saturday and Meite for Semedo if fit, if not Ovie.
On a side note, i thought Aluko played well tonight and would keep him on the left with Meite on the right and Olise playing off the shoulder of Joao.

[TiagoIlori]

Defence was shocking and Semedo... less said about him the better. Not too far away from being an okay side but it’s incredibly difficult to argue we didn’t deserve to lose tonight.

Some Reading fans have a habit of abusing players on social media so I hope particularly Tom McIntyre isn’t getting sent anything as we speak. Quite clearly not good enough at the moment and that’s ok, the potential is so obviously there he just really wasn’t at it tonight.

Aluko again a shining light in periods of the game. Could be a big asset to sub on in close games.

[Zip]

Defence was shocking and Semedo... less said about him the better. Not too far away from being an okay side but it’s incredibly difficult to argue we didn’t deserve to lose tonight.

Some Reading fans have a habit of abusing players on social media so I hope particularly Tom McIntyre isn’t getting sent anything as we speak. Quite clearly not good enough at the moment and that’s ok, the potential is so obviously there he just really wasn’t at it tonight.

Aluko again a shining light in periods of the game. Could be a big asset to sub on in close games.

Fully agree on Tommy Mac. It will be disgusting if he gets any grief tonight. He will learn from tonight.

[Royal_jimmy]

I want to be furious tonight. That was a very poor result.

But we're without Swift, Ejaria, Meite and Moore. Hardly any side we've ever faced at this level have had all their key players injured. Disgusting set of injuries and the players we've struggled with injuries over the last 6-7 years are far worse than the average club at this level.

McIntyre isn't up to this level at all. Don't care if he's from Reading. I'm from this town but he's not upto the standard at this level yet. Gibson should have played.

[URZZZZ]

Echo the sentiments in here. We’re top of the league, four points ahead of 3rd, with five key players all out injured. Whilst playing a side who have got 10 points from 12 away from home, including a fantastic 4-2 away win at Brentford

As a certain Clement would say it was a game of fine margins where we didn’t take our chances and they did

Will be nice to have a couple of weeks off to give our players a little breather before another intense period. You’ve got to factor in Morrison, Richards, Rinomhota and Laurent have all played 6 games in two and a half weeks, the injuries have prevented us from rotating, Joao and Olise have also played a fair bit too

Re. McIntyre, disappointed to see some of the reaction towards him, often takes a while for a player to adjust, let’s not forget he’s barely played. Don’t think dropping him would be the best call for Saturday, although I wouldn’t be against a back three until Meite is back because Aluko, Olise and Ejaria are all fairly similar

[Lower West]

Defensively we lack pace. Going forward we lack creativity. Honeymoon is over.

Desperately need Meite back. Swift is a huge loss.

[URZZZZ]

Defensively we lack pace. Going forward we lack creativity. Honeymoon is over.

Desperately need Meite back. Swift is a huge loss.

Do we really lack creativity going forward?

Or are we creating a similar quantity of chances as we were before but not taking them any more?

[andrew1957]

Yes folks please give young Mcinytre a chance. He has been excellent most times I have watched him at all levels from U18 onwards. He will know he had an awful match tonight.

Think we have been very unlucky in the last two games overall.

[alfie9]

I am also here to back Big Tom. His first half was good, and he struggled after the slip that gave away the pen. Strangely I remember there not being very many complaints about him playing ahead of the club captain last season. The guy has one bad half of football and fans want him out, ridiculous. Although I don't disagree that we should give Lewis Gibson a chance vs Stoke (assuming Moore is out).

From late first half to the first Preston goal we completely dominated them and Joao didn't score on a couple good chances. It happens. That said we put up a solid period of sustained pressure with no Ejaria and no Meite. We put away one of those chances and all the patterns this season suggest we win the game.

Need to dismiss this result as a fluke and move on. Have to beat Stoke now or the momentum is completely gone. Last time off the international break we started out cold in front of goal and I worry that we could be in for a massive slide down the table.

[SCIAG]

Player had 20 good games: yeah happy for him to play if we get an injury

Player has one bad game: f***ing overrated shit, paceless, f*** off, let’s play an unproven kid instead, not up to this level!

[Stranded]

Defensively we lack pace. Going forward we lack creativity. Honeymoon is over.

Desperately need Meite back. Swift is a huge loss.

Do we really lack creativity going forward?

Or are we creating a similar quantity of chances as we were before but not taking them any more?

I would say we created more chances last night than we have for a while. Combination of poor finishing and good keeping stopped us from getting a couple of goals last night.

There really wasn't too much to get annoyed by last night in terms of forward play bar finishing, we also put a lot of crosses into dangerous areas. Fine margins.

Defensively, the opener was bad luck. Sinclair was onside but that ball got to him from a tackle by a PNE player. Ball could have gone anywhere but went to him, shit happens. 2nd TMaC was caught out badly just after we had changed things up, poor but that goal doesn't happen following their bit of luck a minute earlier and 90th min 3rd goals are neither here nor there.

So yeah, lots to work on but nothing to get too upset about either.