Reading 4-1 Northampton Town: ‘Ding Won Merrily

Festive cheer in Berkshire as goals from Harvey Knibbs, Sam Smith, Charlie Savage and Mamadi Camara hand the Royals a comfortable Boxing Day win.

The Noel Hunt era is finally up and running! At the fifth time of asking - or the 10th if you include his caretaker spell in the Reading dugout - Hunty has a first win under his belt. And on his birthday too!

Those in attendance at a cold, misty SCL weren’t treated to a festive extravaganza, despite what the scoreline may have you believe. Reading were fine really: good enough on the whole to see off a desperately poor Northampton Town side that didn’t manage a shot on target until the late stages, and ruthless enough in the final third to add some icing on the proverbial Christmas cake.

Any better than fine, bar the goals? Not really, but that’s not particularly important. The two big priorities for Reading today were to win (obviously) and to put the Blackpool/Lincoln City double debacle behind us with a noticeably improved performance. Check, check.

The Royals looked awfully short of confidence on Saturday up at Sincil Bank, but today’s performance was a pleasing step in the right direction on this front. Fluency and quality in possession were often lacking, but Reading grew into the game as it progressed and - crucially - tried things.

A clever pass from Lewis Wing here, a dribble from Chem Campbell there, a drive upfield or two into the opposition half from Amadou Mbengue, a heart-attack-inducing bit of skill with the ball at his feet from Joel Pereira: the simple, fun things that a team with confidence does and a team without it doesn’t. Hunt seems to have added some of the spark back into this team - a spark which was so absent against Blackpool and particularly at Lincoln.

And it was particularly reassuring that, despite the recent change in manager and two big blips, Reading were still capable of performing a familiar script. ‘Playing OK on the whole but adding in several moments of attacking quality to win convincingly against naff visitors’ has been done various times before - Carlisle United last season, Burton Albion this season as two examples - and came out again today.

An excellent ball in behind by Lewis Wing for the second, some composed finishes by experienced forwards Harvey Knibbs (1-0) and Sam Smith (2-0) and a long-range peach from Charlie Savage (3-0) were all reminders of the individual ability this squad has (until January at least). The fourth, in which Jayden Wareham and Andre Garcia combined intelligently to set up Mamadi Camara, wasn’t bad either.

The performance could have been better and the clean sheet could have been kept intact, but those feel like unimportant points in the grand scheme of things. Reading have points on the board, have an enjoyable Boxing Day result to celebrate, and can look forward to Sunday’s home tie against Mansfield Town with noticeably more confidence than we had in stock a few days ago.

And we’re even back into the top six!

The afternoon started with Hunt making a couple of changes to Saturday’s starting XI. Abraham Kanu interestingly got the nod at left-back, replacing Garcia in a repeat of Saturday’s second-half substitution, which had worked pretty well to shore things up defensively. Mbengue also returned to the team following an enforced absence due to concussion against Blackpool, while Tivonge Rushesha made the bench after a long spell on the sidelines.

Reading (4-3-3): Pereira; Craig, Mbengue, Bindon, Kanu; Knibbs, Wing, Savage; Campbell, Smith, Camara

Subs: Button, Ahmed, Dean, Garcia, Sackey, Rushesha, Wareham

It took only a few minutes for Reading to settle any nerves and get their noses in front. Charlie Savage lofted a free-kick into the box from the right, and after a few headers inside the Cobblers’ box, the ball eventually fell for Knibbs to slot home from a tight angle for 1-0.

There wasn’t a huge amount of action or quality at either end in the rest of the half in truth, with both sides lacking quality in possession and neither ‘keeper being tested all that much. While the visitors had a decent amount of the ball, they didn’t work the Royals’ back line all that convincingly, with Pereira able for most of the half to get his phone out to rewatch yesterday’s Wallace and Gromit. Seriously, if you haven’t seen it, do so. It was really good.

A few times Reading turned on the quality, and when they did, they realised they could get at Northampton. Mbengue went on a marauding run from the back into the Cobblers’ half before having a shot from range, while Wing aaaalmost had an assist when he whipped in a gorgeous cross that Smith nodded wide.

Shortly after, in the 28th minute, he had his assist. Wing picked the ball up in his own half and lofted a beautiful pass over the top for the onrushing Smith. Clean through and with no Northampton defender anywhere near him, Smith had the easiest job of slotting home for 2-0.

Northampton had no response before the break, and Reading went in at half-time in a nice, comfy position.

The second half picked up where the first had left off, with a similar pattern for the first 15 minutes or so after the restart: a pretty flat, low-quality encounter all round. However, Reading were growing in confidence as the half progressed, increasingly knocking the ball about well and getting it forward.

With a quarter of an hour to go, Reading had their third of the afternoon. Camara burst in from the right wing and fed Savage, in space around 25 yards out, and he whipped it gorgeously into the bottom corner for 3-0. As I said to Bobbins after the game, it’s a goal I feel I’ve seen Savage score 10 times before; it’s already become his party trick.

Northampton had something to shout about shortly after though. In the 81st minute, Mbengue struggled to deal with a long ball, being muscled out by big centre-forward Tom Eaves, who slotted home past Pereira from a tight angle. 3-1, and all of a sudden you wondered if the visitors could make a game of the final nine minutes or so.

Luckily for us the Cobblers showed as much attacking quality at 3-1 as they had earlier in the game: barely enough to trouble Pereira. Reading saw the lead out easily enough and even had a fourth in the 87th minute.

Substitutes Garcia and Wareham (who’d replaced Kanu and Smith in the 79th minute, at 3-0) combined down the left. The latter played the former into space, with Garcia pushing into the box and setting up Camara in the middle, who had time to control the ball before thrashing it past the ‘keeper for 4-1.

In the final significant action of the game, Hunt made a triple substitution to give some players a bit of a break. Off went Knibbs, Campbell and Savage, with Rushesha, Ashqar Ahmed and Harlee Dean coming on, meaning Reading saw the game out in a 3-5-2. As Ross pointed out in the ratings, that was one interesting example of Hunt beginning to put his tactical fingerprints on this side - after all, going to a back three/five late on was something Ruben Selles tended to avoid.

So Reading end Boxing Day back inside the top six, one point ahead of seventh-placed Barnsley and three ahead of Sunday’s opponents Mansfield, who have a game in hand. As enjoyable it is to see the Royals this high up the table, with so much uncertainty behind the scenes, it’s still predominantly a case now of getting to 50 points as quickly as possible to stay in the league.

Reading are on 34 at the moment and have just over half the season to get the final 16, plus any more points which may be required if the EFL slap on another deduction for whatever reason. Increasing the tally will surely get harder after January, when players are expected to be sold, but if we can repeat today’s efficient and effective performance four or five times more then we should be fine come the end of the season.