View From The Town End: Bristol City

With Bristol City arriving at the Madejski Stadium tomorrow, we get the views of City fan Paul, you can follow him on Twitter @theexiledrobin.

Sum up your season so far?

We started really brightly, boosted by the goals of Tammy Abraham and a host of summer signings, but have tailed off a bit in recent weeks.

The main problem at the moment - as obvious as this sounds - is that we're conceding a goal every game but not creating the clear cut chances going forward, and on the occasions that we do we have stopped being as clinical as we were.

By the middle of October we'd had more goal attempts than any other team in the league, but either teams have worked us out a bit, or we've too many players not quite on form.

You mentioned Tammy Abraham who was earning plenty of plaudits earlier in the season, he seems to be on a bit of a cold streak?

Tammy's form & progress has somewhat mirrored that of the team, or perhaps vice-versa. He was THE hot property of the English game during his first dozen or so games, but is struggling to adapt a little to strong, experienced defenders who have worked out how to manage him, often by doubling up.

Certainly the better centre-halves around the division, such as Leeds' Jansson and Brighton's Lewis Dunk have swallowed him up quite easily. We've also left him isolated up front on his own too long, too often which hasn't helped with his overall contribution.

But he's still only 19 and has to learn how to play against those types of players if he's going to have a chance of making it in the big time. He also needs to work on his all-round game so that when he's in a run of not scoring, like now, he's contributing and bringing others into the game.

Who else should we be wary of tomorrow?

Lee Tomlin is our talisman and again, perhaps a dip in his form is key as to why we've gone off the boil a touch. On his day he's as good and talented as anyone in this division, and plays on the edge. If he's on form, we will be a threat.

In midfield Marlon Pack is fighting for his place after the summer arrival of Gary O'Neil but both he and local youngster Bobby Reid have impressed this season, and Pack in particular has stepped out of the shadows and proven his worth having been a bit of a boo boy's target in the past.

Have any Reading players caught your eye?

I'll be honest, I've seen very little of the Royals this season so not really able to comment, but will be interesting to see how Yann Kermorgant gets on if fit, as we were heavily linked in the summer and has always looked a tidy player.

Any good or bad memories of games between the sides?

The two obvious ones that stand out for me were the 2-0 win in February 2009 took us fourth in the league under Lee Johnson's Dad, Gary, and gave us great hope of reaching the promotion spots or play-offs for a second successive year. Unfortunately that was our high point of the season.

The other mention has to be Gerard Lavin's explosive start to his City career, when the right-back deliberately kicked the ball into the crowd on the opening 20 minutes or so of the 1999-2000 season, got sent off and we lost 3-1! One of those almost ironic 'I was there moments'!

But we usually take a good crowd up the M4 and it's a good day out for us.

Score prediction?

With our current struggles and Reading playing some good stuff under Big bad Jaap, I've got to go for a home win I'm afraid. 2-1 would be my shout.