The Royals picked up a point on the road, but it could have been all three, following a 2-2 draw against Wycombe Wanderers at Adams Park on Saturday.
Paudie O’Connor gave Reading the lead early in the second half before Jayden Wareham levelled for the hosts. Jacob Brown restored the Royals’ advantage with 10 minutes remaining, but Danny Ings struck in the 90th minute to ensure the points were shared.
Manager Leam Richardson was left disappointed with the result, feeling his side had done enough to
come away with all three points.
He spoke to Royals TV after the final whistle. Here’s what he had to say…
Richardson on the feeling after the draw
“It does feel like a defeat, yeah, and that’s the disappointing thing because I thought first half we were excellent in the way we performed and controlled the game. We’ve got to be better in those moments to make sure we capitalise on that.
“We obviously worked hard to get 1-0 in front and I said to the players at half-time, just make sure when we are doing our fundamental work, we do it 10 times out of 10.
“Then we switched off a little bit. It’s something we’ll work on and something we’ll address, because we have to.
“If we want to be successful, we have to make sure we’re good in those moments. The emotions are running high at the minute and, as you said, it feels like a defeat.
“But ultimately, we’ve come away from home, had a really good, solid performance in a lot of moments and we take an extra point back to our stadium on Saturday.”
Richardson on being ruthless
“We’ve got quite a few young lads as well. Even young Kyreece has been excellent for us, by the way.
“We have a big, big chance at 1-0 to go 2-0 up, one-v-one, and in those moments you’ve got to be ruthless because 30 seconds later it’s in the back of our net.
“It’s a learning curve for us, for himself and for the lads around him. In those moments, we’ve got to make sure we are ruthless and we stick to what we’re doing. Then the game becomes 2-0, 3-0, game over.
“But there are a lot of positives, whether that’s individual moments or collectively, but there are certainly things that we still need to work on.”
Richardson on Jack Marriott
“We’ll have to wait until tomorrow. Like I say, he works tremendously hard and came close again to scoring, as Jack does. He continues to be a thorn in their side all the time.
“He just rocked his ankle, so we watched him for five or 10 minutes after that and he didn’t seem to be moving as well as we thought.
“So, precaution as always. We’ve got two lads on the bench in Jamie Reid and Jacob Brown. Obviously, Brown has gone on to score again, so thankfully we can make sure we spread the workload out.”
Richardson on Jacob Brown’s impact
“I’ve just said to Tim now, ‘Ole Gunnar Brown’, I think, at the minute! So, yeah, if he keeps doing that, he’ll keep being on the pitch.
“Listen, we speak about it all the time. Whatever role you play on the day, whether you’re starting, on the bench, out of the squad or staff, make sure you play that role and play that role as well as you can.
“Jacob’s been very good at that. I thought the lads who came onto the pitch did excellently well again.
“Obviously, the goals are disappointing, really disappointing, but it’s something we’ll address quickly because, if we want to be successful, we have to.
“But, yeah, I thought in the main there were some real positives and we’ll take that into next Saturday.”
Richardson on the goals conceded
“It is very similar to Cambridge. We’ve got to be better fundamentally within that because we can stop it at source. We can stop it at the top end of the pitch.
“It was probably the first time in the game we decided not to press in the right way, with certain people coming out of their jobs, and at these levels they’ll punish you.
“Like I said, I thought our press was fantastic first half. I thought we caused them all sorts of problems with the ball and I thought we had real control.
“Then the emotion takes over and we’ve got to be better in those moments. Even in my time here, when we get emotional, we need a few leaders to stop the game, go back to the fundamentals of what we’re trying to do, control the game and then see it out.”
Richardson on the decision not to postpone the game
“Absolutely, I would have done it regardless because, like I say, the likes of Liam Fraser and Josh Stokes, they’ve not been in the squad and they’ve watched the lads.
“I thought they were both excellent today, by the way. I thought they were outstanding.
“But their performances come off the back of the way they’ve trained, the way they’ve been as professionals and the tactical information they’ve been taking in. It’s no surprise.
“I thought we were value for more than what we got today. But listen, we’ll lick our wounds a little bit because, like you say, it feels like a defeat.
“But we’ve drawn away from home against a good team who were in a good vein of form, and we’ll take a lot from it.”
Richardson on George Earthy
“George has suffered an injury, so he’ll be out for some weeks. That’s a bit of a disappointment because we felt we were getting him up and running.
“I think the medical term is a torn plantar fascia, so the muscle in the bottom of his foot. We still don’t know the extent of that, but it’ll be a few weeks.
“It’s disappointing, but like I say, we’ll overcome, we’ll adapt and we’ll move on.”
Richardson on looking ahead to Bradford
“Absolutely, it’s one we’re looking forward to. Once I get today out of my system, because we want to be better every week.
“Every time we take to the pitch, every Monday morning, we want to be a better team and better individuals, and I think we are doing that.
“Again, we’ve come away from home and had 20-plus shots against a team who are in form. If you keep doing that, and keep showing that consistency – I’ve spoken before about being consistently consistent, if that’s the right word – then we’ll win more games than we don’t.”
Richardson on the travelling Royals
“I was just speaking to Joe Jacobson then and I thought they were fantastic all the way through the game.
“You do feel you want to win it, in the main, for the club and for the fans. I said to the players today, ‘Let’s make a statement.’
“Obviously, we could have called the game off. We chose to keep the momentum, which we’ve still got, by the way, with another positive result. Albeit we didn’t win, there was some real positivity.
“You can feel that coming onto the pitch from the fans. When the two goals go in, it’s fantastic. They’re the moments you live for.
“We just need to keep them out at the other end and cut out the basic errors that we’ve made today.”
