Blackburn Rovers 2-2 Reading: The Alternative View

Reading managed something on Wednesday night that they haven’t managed since... God knows - going 2-0 up away from home. However, if you defend like school boys, you get treated as such with two punishing penalties as Reading went from a potential three points to at the end clinging on to one.

The Rovers fans, as you can imagine after their solid start to the season, were a little miffed to be 2-0 down at halftime, especially as the first goal was well against the run of play. Putting this down to a combination of injuries and poor play, at halftime most of them were ready to move on to Saturday’s game against Brentford.

No song this week - it seems that the Rovers fans are the most social animals in the world. The media were once again quite low on the uptake, but the Rovers fans seemed to have a bit of an issue with Sky’s coverage on the red button or more the quality of it.

Social

It’s Wednesday, on TV, in the North-West and we can’t buy a win - ok...

From 2-0 down and disappointed?

Who needs to watch games anymore? Transfers and results are all done by armchair fans on FIFA these days...

Nowt like being positive...

Looks like there’s a few forwards missing...

Not convinced by this...

He still a footballer?

Media

There are a few articles this week, and why not start overseas with Complete Sport Nigeria? They are covering all the Nigerian players which includes Sone Aluko - they say we squandered a two-goal lead and that Aluko was withdrawn to give Sims his debut.

Sky Sports have their match coverage with 2 min 26 seconds of game time, saying that Paul McShane needlessly gave the two penalties away.

Quiz time and the only player to score for Reading this season is who? Yep, it’s our very own Jon Dadi Bodvarsson and the BBC make a point of this, alongside giving the thought that we held on to secure a point.

There’s a new one this week and BT Sport make the point that the last time Blackburn lost at home was September and Reading haven’t won away since January. There you go, article made!

As always Football.London have a good wrap-up of the game and a strange one is from HITC who picked up the tweet of a Reading fan trying to offload Paul McShane to Posh boss Darragh MacAnthony, who politely declined.

Summary

Well it’s a point, more than we had when we came. For Blackburn, they are looking at the top half of the league, whereas Reading on the other hand are probably looking at survival. I could be wrong as this league can change dramatically very easily, I mean the last time we were promoted to the promised land, I’m pretty sure we didn’t start playing till September!

Clement said after the Bolton game there would be changes, but the main subject matter seemed to be the lack of a certain Tiago Ilori in the squad. Whether his absence came from injury or smokescreen is debatable, what is for certain is that one of the best defenders in the squad is out of the team when we desperately need some steel in defence.

Apart from that the changes that Clement alluded to never really happened, I mean Bacuna for Meyler was hardly earth shattering. Saying that, what did we expect? With little options within the team wholesale changes are not on the horizon, and unless something pretty dramatic happens within the next week or so then that’s it.

With Sims being brought in and making his debut within 48 hours (something pretty unheard of in recent times at Reading) it seems that either the injuries surrounding Reading’s midfield are a little more worrying than first thought or that Clement doesn’t have faith in the wingers – probably the latter as Aluko has flattered to deceive and Meite as much as being a fans’ favourite will miss more opportunities than he will convert.

What is for sure is that something needs to happen, maybe a good away win at Villa again will help us kick start the season.