Reading v Norwich – Match Chat (10/11/2012)

Reading v Norwich City
Saturday 10th November 2012 - Kick off 3.00 pm
Madejski Stadium
Premier League



Game Introduction

Away fans – if you’re coming to Reading, see our own special Royals Rendezvous Guide for Away fans – Travel and Drinks/Food :
http://royalsrendezvous.co.uk/topic/9220871/1


FORM GUIDE

Table Positions:
Reading 18th - 5 points (played 9 games)
Norwich 14th - 10 points (played 10 games)


Norwich Recent form:
Since two hard games against Liverpool and Chelsea where Norwich lost by three goal margins there has been a definite improvement. They are currently 4 games unbeaten; important wins against Arsenal, Spurs and Stoke have been completed by a draw at Villa. This gives them lower mid-table comfort now.

Reading Recent form:
Still without a win – in 9. Started well against both Arsenal and QPR but faded. At the moment it looks like a relegation battle, but things can quickly change. In no game have we had more than a two goal margin either way; but the play seems sluggish in the second half ...

Recent form table – last 8 games:
The bottom 5, reading from best to worst are: Stoke (7 pts), Swansea (6), Reading (4), Saints (4) and Q.P.R. (3). At the top Man Utd are best, best in last 8 only Man City edge past Chelsea and into 2nd place. Man City are also the only unbeaten club in last 8 games ...



THE BOSS – the current manager of Norwich City:
Christopher William Gerard "Chris" Hughton (born 11 December 1958)



WEB SITES

Official Norwich City Club Web Site:
http://www.canaries.co.uk



Unofficial individual club web sites – daib0’s suggestion:
Not 606 Norwich board - http://www.not606.com/forumdisplay.php/48-Norwich-City
I’ve looked at a number of Norwich independent club forum sites, and the truth is that none of them really convince me as much as the “Not 606 – Norwich” board. On Not 606 for Norwich, you have a strong but amiable moderation team who welcome genuine banter but thankfully don’t put up with the ‘wums’ or ‘trolls’ - there are many active posters too.


OPPOSING FANS SECTION

Rivalries and fan base:
Ipswich, Wolves and Sheffield United ...

Famous Fans:
I can mention a number of famous names who enjoy or have enjoyed supporting Norwich City in their spare time:
Prince Andrew – royalty; Cathy Dennis – singer; Sophie Ellis-Bextor – singer (The Audience, Spiller/Groovejet, solo); Sir David Frost – TV presenter; Stephen Fry – comedian/actor/author; Delia smith – TV chef and author; Carol Barnes - TV news presenter; Martin Bell - TV news reporter turned politician; Charlie Catchpole - TV critic in the Daily Express; Myleene Klass - member of Hear'Say; Hannah Spearitt - member of S Club 7; Sarah Thomas – supermodel; Simon Thomas - former Blue Peter presenter, now on Sky Sports News; Susan Tully - actress (EastEnders, Grange Hill); The Darkness – pop group, and Caitlin Stasey – actress ...

Nicknames and Mascots etc.
Only a couple of cases here – The “Canaries” is by far the most well-known term (and initially due to popularity of canary breeding in Norfolk, then later the home strips were the same colour as the bird, and this is now used in the club's logo). They’re also sometimes called ‘The Yellows’ … Originally, the club was nicknamed the Citizens ("Cits" for short), and played in light blue and white halved shirts, although the halves were inconsistent, but by as long ago as February 1907, the nickname Canaries had come into vogue!
“Camilla Canary” is the mascot. She is joined by a Captain Canary.



MATCH DAY EXPECTATIONS

Attendances:
No change – Reading’s average home gate this season is 24,080 – and we’re 99.5% of capacity levels so no chance of moving up the attendance tables – we’re 17th in that. By the way, Norwich are 14th with an average of nearly 26,700.

Squads and Team News:
Not available yet - please add any news in your posts and comments - one of the most important things to add here before kick-off!


They said it!

Norwich City manager Chris Hughton, talking after the Stoke game: "You cannot be too disappointed when you have won, but we could have made life better for ourselves. We needed to put a little more pressure on them. We could have done better when we had the ball and had two very good chances apart from scoring the goal. We should have pressed more, but that takes a lot of energy, especially when you are playing against a team like Stoke.”
The Norwich manager also said: “"We are not making the individual errors now that we had been. In the games where we conceded a lot of goals, we let them in at bad times, and because of that you have to open up a bit to try to get back into the game, as a consequence of that we conceded more. Now we look more compact.”

Meanwhile, Reading manager Brian McDermott said straight after the QPR game, "It's a positive point and a great reaction from what happened on Tuesday. We were 1-0 up today, could have gone further ahead and if we get a second it would have been done and dusted. We started brightly, it was an open game and our performance today was a good one away from home. We'll take the point and move on. As I mentioned it was a great reaction from the cup game. I know exactly what happened on Tuesday, at no point were we opened up in the 90 minutes, a couple of set plays and a long ball did us. That was just a freak game and I put virtually the same team out because I thought it was the right team for today. They did us proud, we were excellent at times, we really dug in, this is never an easy place to come, Chelsea have drawn here, Everton have drawn here as well.”



SCORE PREDICTIONS

My own verdict:
I feel we’ll get a win, we need it! But nail-biting as always. Reading 3 Norwich 2.

What do others say?
The Oddschecker site, listing nearly all the major betting companies, shows Reading are favourites - for once - of a win (6/5). Both a draw and a Norwich victory are at about 13/5.



FOR THE RECORD

Last Encounter
12th February 2011
Championship
Norwich City 2 Reading 1


Head-to-head Reading and Norwich City

Played in total 67 times: 26 Reading wins / 24 Norwich wins / 17 draws

Best Reading victory: January 2006 – Reading 4 Norwich 0

Best Norwich victory: October 1921 – Norwich 4 Reading 1

Also interesting: Jan 1909 – Norwich 3 Reading 2 (FA Cup) // Dec1922 – Reading 4 Norwich 1 // Jan 1933 – Reading 3 Norwich 2 // Dec 1933 – Norwich 3 Reading 2 // Dec 1946 – Reading 4 Norwich 3 // Mar 1948 – Reading 2 Norwich 4 // Mar 1950 – Reading 4 Norwich 1 // Nov 1953 – Norwich 2 Reading 3 // Mar 1954 – Reading 4 Norwich 4 // Feb 1957 – Norwich 2 Reading 5 // Aug 1959 – Norwich 4 Reading 2 // Dec 1995 – Norwich 3 Reading 3 // Nov 2010 – Reading 3 Norwich 3


THIS DATE in history

Reading has a good record on this day historically: we’ve played 14, won 8 of them, and drawn 3 and lost 3. Going way back, our worst defeat was in 1928 – a 7-0 drubbing away at Blackpool. That result left us bottom of the old Div 3, but we did avoid the drop that season! But we’ve had some entertaining wins as well: 5-2 (A) v Aldershot in 1934, 4-2 (H) v Colchester in 1951, and 3-0 against both Millwall (H) in 1956 and Hull (H) in 1979. Last time on today’s date was a 1-1 draw v Cardiff in 2010 –and a most controversial game. After Hunt had put Reading 1-0 up after 5 mins, did Cardiff actually equalize at the end of the game, as the ball came down from the bar?


How do Norwich do on 10th November? Not so good as Reading. They’ve played 18 times, with a W5 D4 L9 reading. Best result was a 5-0 home victory v Swansea in 1962 (Div. 2). Last game was in 2009, in the Associate Southern section Members cup 2009 (Johnstone’s Paint Trophy) - a 0-0 draw v Swindon after extra time, though Norwich won 5-3 on penalties.


For those who’d like to read a really detailed match presentation please pop over to the specialist Reading FC forum ‘Royals Rendezvous’ where you have even more sections covered and some of these current sections expanded (this present article is simply a resume) and many a photo up too … http://royalsrendezvous.co.uk/topic/9754931/1

Here’s to a good game, all comments welcome! Any snippet copied will be fully credited (and thanked) with your user name and the forum! ...

daib0

 

Just to say, please also check the Not 606 Norwich board - some nice Norwich fan comments can be found here:
http://www.not606.com/showthread.ph...-v-Norwich-(10-11-2012)?p=3725487#post3725487

 

Nice to see such a welcoming OP.
Thought I would answer the questions you asked on our board over here, just to spark some contributions on this thread!

-You'll have to watch out for Tettey, who has an unbelievable engine and is the solid rock in our midfield that everything good we've done in the last few games has been built on. Hoolahan is thriving at the moment, so he is the player you should fear the most- he is a bit light weight compared to most modern central midfielders, but given space he is outstandingly creative.
-Rudd and Steer are the two best current products of our academy, both very good goalkeepers who have represented England at various age ranges. In truth we haven't produced any premier league standard outfield players for years. As stated on the Norwich thread you started there are a handful of reasonable prospects currently.
-The general concensus on the Norwich board is that we will finish 12th to 15th. I think this might be a little optimistic and would be delighted with 16th.
-I think the general standard of the premier league this year is very high. Once Southampton and Reading adjust to the premier league and QPRs bunch of misfits start to gel there wont be any genuinely weak teams in the division (compared to Wolves and Blackburn last year).

Some questions for you gov' (you may recognise them!);
A] What are currently the strongest areas of YOUR squad, and who should Norwich individually look out for / fear most?
B] Any young stars coming through the academy that we should keep an eye on, now or in the future?
C] Realistically, where do you hope Reading might finish if all goes more-or-less well?
D] How strong do you see the general level of the premier this season? (especially in comparison to the much less predictable Championship)

 

Wow......................................#a

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This is our spine

 

A bit naughty (!), but OK, no problems:

A] Forwards; just about the only area where we've blessed with premier level in abundance; no worries with Jason Roberts, Pogrebniak, Hunt, Le Fondre (unproven at this level, but quickly proving ...), McCleary ...
Also goalies - McCarthy playing excellently at moment, though Federici is well up to it despite a few 'wobblies' early on ...

B] The academy is something we've placed great faith with over a number of years now, and it is bearing fruit. Lots of names, but if limited to just a couple I'd say please remember the names of Jordan Obita and Domenic Samuel, really great prospects who may well hit it really big in the future ...

C] We're a realistic lot on the whole, and virtually no Royals fan had us in the top half half of the table back in the close season. About half thought it'd be a fight against relegation and the other half sort of mid-table-ish. I was in that second group, I'm usually an optimist. But it's harder than we thought; perhaps we were expecting a repeat of 2006-07 when the record 106-pts team came up and only missed out on Europe by one place and one point...

D] Hard! It seems more professional when you're involved, and not looking in from the championship as a neutral! What's hardest is that you can play pretty well for the majority of the match, but in a ten-minute period when you slightly ease off the opponent might score two goals, little mistakes get punished, and premiership teams are much more ruthless than championship ones in taking advantage of little opportunities. I think just these 9 games (remember our Sunderland match was postponed) have opened our eyes up a lot!

Cheers!!

 

You are probably a little unlucky to catch us in a good patch.It began in the second half against Liverpool and since then our goals for and against tally is 8-8.The revival coincides with Holt rediscovering his scoring touch.My own expectation for Saturday is a draw.

 

Tumbleweeds abound over here, shame.

 

I know the match has finished, but I thought I'd let you know what I thought of this article - it's brilliant!

Just to pick up on your point that you have to play well for the full 90 to get a win in this division - I think that's certainly true. We won 12 games last season, and had to perform exceptionally in all but one - Wolves at home - to get the three points. It's an extremely tricky division, and every year we spend in it is a bonus, but the longer we're in it, the more chance we have of returning to it!