New Headline: "Boxing Legend Defeats Top Fighting Dog in Historic Match!

Boy, did we need that. We’ll get into the nitty gritty as we go along here, but there isn’t too much we can be disgruntled about tonight, although Kelvin Ehibhatiomhan’s late goal is doing a lot of heavy lifting to allow me to say that. It was an ugly game.

There were some bold calls from Leam Richardson in his starting XI, with Sean Patton handed a first league start and Paddy Lane finding himself back on the bench despite putting in arguably his best performance in a Reading shirt against Plymouth Argyle on Saturday. Reading (3-5-2): Pereira; O’Connor, Dez Williams, Ward; Yiadom, Doyle, Wing, Savage, Randell Williams; Keane, Patton Subs: Rhone, Burns, Fraser, Ritchie, Lane, Young, Ehibhatiomhan I wasn’t there on Saturday, but by all accounts it was an entertaining affair in which we created plenty of chances, and had Jack Marriott been around to finish some of those off, we perhaps would’ve walked away with all three points. Tonight was almost the complete opposite of that.

In some ways that is a shame: Kamari Doyle’s equaliser showed we have the quality in the team to make lighter work of games than we perhaps need to. However, I can also understand – just about – what seemed like a conscious decision by Richardson to make the game a scrappy one. That’s fine, as long as you do it effectively.

Too many times in the first half we were over-eager in hooking it down the channels for a very willing but inexperienced Patton to chase. And, again, there were one too many shaky moments at the back – I’m looking at no-one in particular Joel Pereira – for my liking. Clear-cut chances were few and far between for the entire 90 minutes, so perhaps it is no surprise that it took a moment of magic from – checks notes – George Evans (yes, that one) to open the deadlock.