Pre Season Friendly Fixture - 30th July 2005 Madejski Stadium, 3:00pm kick-off
 

TEAM LINE-UP'S

Reading - Hahnemann, Murty, Hunt, Sonko, Ingimarsson, Convey, Little, Harper, Sidwell, Doyle, Lita

Tottenham - Cerny, Kelly, Ziegler, King, Gardner, Mendes, Tainio, Routledge, Reid, Mido, Defoe

MATCH REVIEW

Steve Coppell started with his strongest eleven handing home debuts to Hunt, Doyle and Lita.  However Graham Stack missed out through a hand injury suffered in training on Friday and is now a doubt for next Saturday's opening League fixture against Plymouth Argyle.

Reading started brightly with Leroy Lita and Bobby Convey involved heavily early on. Though it was the visitors who got the early breakthrough when Mido broke through the Reading back line and finished coolly giving Spurs a 1:0 lead. Mido was given plenty of space and was left unmarked by the Reading defence which is sure to worry manager Steve Coppell with only a week to go until the matches start counting for points.

The goals settled Spurs down and the Londoners begun playing neat passing forward with new signing Wayne Routledge causing problems with his pace and trickery.

Reading's closest attempt to an equaliser came from a set piece, A Bobby Convey in swinging corner was met with the head of Steve Sidwell, but his shot came back off the post and cleared. Convey was involved in most things all afternoon looking determined to earn a start next Saturday.

Just as the first half came to a close, Tottenham doubled their lead with a fluky strike by Jermaine Defoe which deflected off Ivar Ingimarsson sending the ball one way and Hahnemann the other.

Into the second half and another Bobby Convey's set piece forced substitute keeper Rob Burch into a good save to deny Ingimarsson before Kevin Doyle was put through by good work from Convey but the Irishman dragged his shot wide of the post.

Convey created yet another opening this time for Ibrahima Sonko but again Burch did well to deny The Royals a goal. Steve Coppell's men had a goal disallowed to the bemusement of many Reading players, Steve Sidwell headed home a cross by Stephen Hunt but the linesman had his flag up for offside.

Convey then nearly scored for himself with an opportunist effort. His free kick, more then 30 yards out was struck towards the near post and the American was only denied a goal by the post.

Late on Tottenham may have added to their lead through the dangerous Jermaine Defoe but a combination of good goalkeeping and poor shooting kept the score at 2:0.

Although Reading lost 2:0 and failed to get on the score sheet, Steve Coppell must have been pleased with a lot of Reading's football. In particular the performances of Kevin Doyle, Stephen Hunt and Bobby Convey who deserved the man of the match award this afternoon.

Man Of The Match - Bobby Convey
Attendance - 18,281

NEXT OPPONENTS

League - Plymouth Argyle (H) - Saturday 6th August 2005, 3pm Kick Off

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