Where do you start with Reading’s 2025/26 season? Well, I didn’t miss it when it finished, nor during the summer months, and certainly not now.
It really was a boring, tedious, uninspiring damp squib of a season, wasn’t it? And if there’s any one thing that’ll jump out for many supporters about last season, it was the lack of entertainment on offer. Going to Reading matches felt more like a weekly chore than the escapism football is supposed to be.
Results started off poorly under Noel Hunt and improved
for a time under replacement manager Leam Richardson before nosediving late on. Still, a 12th-placed finish was fine. And as for performances, generally the best you could hope for was an OK, good-enough showing. How many times were we genuinely impressed by a Royals display in 2025/26?
The crucial missing piece last season though – which fed into the lack of entertainment, mixed results and unconvincing performances – was the lack of a clear identity on the pitch.
I’d argue that football supporters can actually be remarkably forgiving and patient towards their team so long as they feel their investment of time, money and mental energy is worth it, and that largely comes from there being a clear team identity to buy into. It’s so much easier to relate to a team that knows what it wants to be.
Sure, ‘identity’ is much more about vibes than it is anything solid or quantifiable. The thing is though, you know when it isn’t there, and that was the case last season.
Reading had built and maintained a crystal-clear identity in the previous two seasons: that of a young, hard-working, likeable side that played positive, pressing football. While not perfect at all, you know what to expect from that team, and it was given extra edge by the siege mentality forced upon staff and players alike by the ruinously protracted takeover saga.
What would the Royals look like after the takeover though? A continuation of the above? Something else entirely?
To be fair, there were some unavoidable complications for the new owners in seeking to answer that question. The departures of key figures such as Ruben Selles, Sam Smith, Tyler Bindon, Amadou Mbengue and Harvey Knibbs meant the loss of people intrinsic to Reading’s on-field identity, while the timing of the takeover (mid-May) and messy inheritance for Rob Couhig and co only made their jobs harder.
However, that didn’t excuse the failure of club leadership from clearly communicating – through words or actions – what they were trying to do with the team’s identity. While Couhig spoke convincingly and extensively about how he intended to rejuvenate Reading in non-footballing areas (the matchday experience, media, commerce etc), I didn’t at the time get an equivalent sense from anyone on the footballing side (CEO Joe Jacobson or manager Hunt).
A director of football was conspicuous by their absence, though Hunt’s successor Richardson was clearer about a long-term vision for the team in the back half of the season. We saw encouraging signs of that play out in the January window when moves were pursued for young, talented, energetic players to be developed in the long run, but certainly not on the pitch.
Any optimism was largely lost amid a pathetic end to Reading’s 2025/26 playoff push. No wins in the last six matches was bad enough, but the numerous examples of Reading failing to rise to the occasion in the biggest, most consequential matches – or even to get shots on target – was painfully disappointing. That second half at Stevenage in particular still haunts me.
As for Richardson, his stock couldn’t have been much lower among supporters by the end of the season. Negative tactics, poor performances and sometimes bizarre post-match quotes which seemed to put him on a completely different page to fans meant he was booed and jeered by a hefty number of Loyal Royals in the last few games, while his approval rating score on this site was one of the lowest we’ve recorded.
The long and the short of it is that, in so many ways, the Reading Football Club of 2025/26 was difficult for fans to buy into. No surprise then the feelings of boredom, disillusionment and apathy grew as much as they did in the closing weeks of the season and excitement for 2026/27 was so low.
My big ask for this coming season is for as much of last season’s boredom, disillusionment and apathy as possible to be washed away. I don’t demand an amazing team, for Reading to get everything right or to get promoted. I do however want to genuinely enjoy the ride, to know what this club is trying to build and to be able to get on board with that.
This team needs an identity once again. So how’s the process of re-establishing one gone in the last few months?
Squad building
Let’s start with squad building, probably the most significant part of any club’s summer. Reading ended 2025/26 with a number of players departing on free transfers and others returning to parent clubs, leaving the overall group initially looking like this, as of mid-May:
There was more movement by the end of June. Tom Norcott and Kelvin Abrefa agreed two-year deals, Andy Rinomhota signed a one-year extension and Tyler Sackey put pen to paper on a three-year contract, while Matt Ritchie and Derrick Williams both retired.
All of that, plus the recruitment work already done in 2025/26, left Reading’s squad in a pretty decent state. It still needed first-team and depth additions in most departments, but not the wholesale rebuild we’ve seen in previous summers.
Reading kicked off their summer recruitment with a long-overdue purchase: that of Kyreece Lisbie. The young winger had been due to arrive at the end of January, but after Colchester United pulled the plug at the last minute, the Royals had to wait until late June to finally get their man.
Eight days later, in came Udoka Godwin-Malife, who was bought from Burton Albion. Reading then turned to the free-agent market to sign experienced forward Jacob Brown (formerly of Luton Town) before loaning in attacking midfielder Josh Stokes from Bristol City. As for outgoings, Kelvin Ehibhatiomhan swapped Berkshire for Denmark in late July.
At the time of writing (always an important proviso to include in the middle of an ongoing transfer window – knowing my luck we’ll sign seven players right before this piece is due to be published), that’s the extent of Reading’s significant summer business, which has understandably ruffled a fair few feathers in the fanbase. Weeks of inaction on the transfer window don’t appear to match up with the ambition of pushing for promotion to the Championship.
Let’s focus for now on what has happened so far. All four first-team summer signings – Lisbie, Godwin-Malife, Brown and Stokes – are quality players, capable of supporting a promotion push. They were also recruited early enough in the summer to get a proper pre-season: invaluable for fitness and tactical work.
A particularly crucial point is those players’ ability to fit into an intenser, more energetic brand of football both in and out of possession. Godwin-Malife and Lisbie are the best examples of that – highly mobile, positive players down the right flank – but Stokes and Brown also have excellent work rates.
If you want to employ a more attacking, pressing philosophy, you sign players in this mould. The stylistic contrast with some short-term January signings – particularly Ryan Nyambe and Will Keane – is stark.
As a side note, I’d argue that the three main first-team exits this summer (Ritchie, Williams and Ehibhatiomhan) helped with this tactical shift. While all three had their qualities, none were particularly suited to playing energetic football, especially the former two – somewhat evidenced by their decisions to retire. Getting the right replacements in is crucial, but Reading have the opportunity to refine the squad now that those three have departed.
How good is the squad right now as we head into a new season? It’s easiest if I answer this by splitting it into two.
1) The quality of our first team is up there with the better XIs in the division. Is it good enough to win the league? No, but it’s top-six-level and it’d give the very best sides a good game. Richardson can’t complain about a lack of ability in his starting XI.
He’s also been able to build a side in his image – one with a clear identity. In contrast to previous Reading teams which have been little more than a collection of standout individuals, this one is both well balanced and coherent. You know what it’s trying to be.
2) This side’s issue though is how sustainable it’ll be over the course of a full season. While depth looks healthy in some areas (down the right flank in particular), Reading badly need players capable of slotting in at centre-back and up top without the standard dropping. I’d also throw in another defender, number 10 and striker for depth.
The club have time to get their shopping done and, considering the opportunities which invariably open up in the transfer market in the dying days of summer (see Marriott’s arrival at the end of last August as an example), we could be in for a good few weeks.
That’s the theory, anyway. The bottom line though is that, if the club’s ownership truly are serious about competing at the top of League One, that must be reflected in the remainder of our transfer business.
Pre-season performances and results
Reading had an encouraging pre-season on the pitch for three main reasons: strong results, good performances and the emergence of a proper team identity.
The first two points are straightforward enough. Reading won five of their six matches over the summer – an excellent sets of results regardless of the opposition (we’d be complaining if some of those wins had been draws, after all) – and deserved to get each of those results. Plus, the performance in defeat to Getafe was good enough to have warranted a win if the Royals had managed it.
Pre-season is largely about instilling habits into a group of players, and there’s no better habit to be in than a winning one. Credit to Richardson for creating some momentum heading into the new season.
Furthermore, the stats show there’s substance underneath that winning habit. After conceding once in each of the first two friendlies (Farnborough and Getafe), Reading racked up four clean sheets on the bounce. That’s pretty much the inverse of 2025/26, when the Royals conceded three times in the first five before being tonked 4-0 by Portsmouth on the eve of the new campaign.
Reading consistently showed their ability to ride out opposition pressure (particularly in the Newport County and Crawley Town games) and get the clean sheet over the line. Yes, the Royals will be tested by better attacks on a regular basis in League One, but individual focus and collective organisation are still ideal traits to develop over the summer.
Down the other end, the Royals netted 12 times in their six pre-season friendlies. Again that’s better than last summer: eight scored in six, and five of those came against Hungerford Town.
That also leads into the third point – clear signs of an identity being established on the pitch – which has gone a fair way into making Reading look much better in possession, hence eight of those 12 goals scored being from open play.
Besides generally playing with a refreshing amount of positivity and belief, Reading now push their full-backs upfield more aggressively and with greater variety than before and create chances through pace and directness out wide.
This is a team in which Ashqar Ahmed, Godwin-Malife, Randell Williams, Lisbie and Daniel Kyerewaa (among others) can be properly unleashed – not shackled into a more negative system or shoehorned into the somewhat rigid 3-2-4-1 that Richardson generally rolled out as an in-possession formation last season.
Out of possession, the Royals don’t typically sit deep. Rather, there’s been a clear theme throughout the summer of Reading pressing aggressively (albeit not constantly) in a bid to go about regaining possession proactively. The performances against the stronger opposition sides – Getafe and Charlton – were the best examples of that.
The theme running through all of that is energy, which will be mightily pleasing for Richardson, given how much he spoke last season about wanting to improve his side’s fitness.
A full pre-season was his opportunity to do so, and progress has certainly been made in that period, thanks to those previously mentioned tactical changes on the training ground, the arrival of Mat Bramhall in March from Brentford as Reading’s new head of strength and conditioning and an intense set of friendly fixtures – four games in the last week.
Vibe, expectations and predictions
While there are so many question marks over how well players’ fitness will hold up, the remainder of our transfer business and the extent to which pre-season promise will translate into solid progress during the regular campaign, I’ve seen enough in the last couple of months to be able to look forward to going to games again.
That all flows from Reading now having a clear identity on the pitch. It’s such a welcome break from last season.
Setting expectations for the team’s performance is always a dangerous game when you’ve still got a few weeks of the window to run, but we should absolutely be aiming for a place in the playoffs. That’ll require the promise shown so far to be sustained by further recruitment, Richardson improving on his personal performance last season and the players themselves evolving and adapting across the campaign, but those are reasonable asks for an ambitious club.
Anyone who’s read this summer’s pre-season preview edition of Four Four Two will have seen my prediction for Reading to finish 14th, which for context was submitted in mid-June. Though that’s still possible, based on subsequent evidence, I’m revising my prediction up to eighth – based on the assumption that Reading bring in a few more players and improve as a side from last season, but lack consistency due to injury problems.
Hopefully I’m underselling how well this season actually pans out.
