Bristol Rovers 0-2 Reading: Foot On The Gas

Harry’s take as Reading took a gigantic leap towards League One survival on Tuesday night.

This club. This God-damned club.

Honestly, a few months ago I thought we were dead. Not just on the pitch in terms of staying in League One, but off the pitch too. I honestly thought this would be the last few months I had of watching my football club, our football club.

Look, we’re by no means out the wood in terms of our ownership, but tonight we took a huge step towards guaranteeing safety. It’s not over until the proverbial fat lady sings, but after tonight she’s on her way to the stage.

And what a way to do it as well. I saw a few tweets from fans during the game stating how it had been a long time since they saw Reading dominate a team like they did tonight. Immediately the Carlisle United game came to mind, but thinking about it I think that had a lot more to do with how bad Carlisle were.

We didn’t play badly that day by any means, but we never went out of first gear because we didn’t need to. Tonight, on the other hand, was proper domination - from minute one to minute 90. We were up and at them from the get go, and Bristol Rovers couldn’t handle it.

The first half was a particularly joyous watch I must say. Recency bias is a wonderful thing, but I don’t think I’ve been more impressed with a Reading performance in years.

We were full of composure and assurance at the back, hardly giving the hosts a sniff all evening, and we looked like scoring every single time we went forward. Only on two of those occasions did we actually put the ball in the net though.

It feels a bit wrong that both goals came from set-pieces when we were so fluid, aggressive and dynamic going forward in open play, but I can’t moan too much I suppose.

The first was a Sam Smith header after an Amadou Mbengue long throw, while the second was yet another screamer from, yep, you guessed it, that man Lewis Wing. I say ‘only’ on two occasions did we actually score because we could’ve bagged so many more.

In the first half alone Harvey Knibbs, Kelvin Ehibhatiomhan and Femi Azeez all had chances, and the second half followed suit as Smith could’ve sealed a brace, Azeez saw another effort thwarted and Wing nearly bagged another free-kick at the death. And those are only the ones I can remember off the top of my head.

And when we needed to, we came up trumps defensively too. Joel Pereira made a couple of really important stops and was really commanding between the sticks, and Tyler Bindon, as you’d expect, came up Millhouse too with a huge block on the line to keep the clean sheet intact.

So, all in all, a massive, massive result. As I said previous, the job isn’t finished, but we’re nearly there.

And, if I may, a word for the gaffer. My God I love this bloke. Earlier in the season, I thought he was done, out of his depth, beyond saving. We were a sinking ship and Ruben Selles was the helpless captain.

But somehow he’s managed to turn it around. Among all the chaos, the shambles that is Reading Football Club, he’s managed to invigorate a young, raw, inexperienced squad and turn them into a team that not only gives absolutely everything, but also knows how to get results.

And not only are they now getting results, they’re doing it the way Selles wants them to. We have an identity, a way of playing, and he’s the mastermind behind it. If there is a football god, the takeover goes through and Selles gets a fair shot at managing a functional football club. Because there’s some clear and obvious reasons to be very optimistic about what might be on the horizon with him in charge.