Newport County 0-4 Reading: Another Step Fourwards

Reading built on Saturday’s 2-0 win at Woking with another, this time even more commanding, victory on Tuesday night. Jacob Brown, Josh Stokes and Jerae Jones (x2) found the net as the Royals ran out 4-0 winners away to Newport County.

Interestingly, despite strongly suggesting that he’d play Saturday’s ‘second XI’ for the first hour of this game (after they’d got the final 30 minutes on Saturday), Leam Richardson actually mixed things up and put out almost his strongest-possible side. Here’s how the team looked at Newport:

Reading’s XI for the first half: Pereira; Godwin-Malife, O’Connor, Ward, Dorsett; Wing, Rinomhota; Lisbie, Stokes, Osho; Brown

Half-time change: Ahmed for Godwin-Malife – an enforced swap due to injury (more on this later)

Reading’s XI for the final 30 minutes: Stevens; Ahmed, Beacroft, Duah, Lane; Fraser, Savage; Williams, Sackey, Kyerewaa; Jones

85th-minute change: Howard for Sackey, a straight swap in the number 10 role

A few players were absent entirely on Tuesday. Jack Marriott, Haydon Roberts and Kelvin Abrefa are still out, but Richardson’s comments after the match suggested that none will be on the sidelines for too long.

Sean Patton wasn’t involved and is rumoured to have been sidelined for six to eight weeks, while there’s no news on Abraham Kanu and John Ryan. You’d have thought both of them would have been involved in pre-season, but both have been missing – not confirmed to be due to injury but that feels like a safe assumption.

It was a real physical battle, for sure. That’s not necessarily a bad thing – Richardson spoke after the game about the value of this kind of pre-season test, and Newport certainly put the Royals through their paces throughout the contest.

The first half started off slowly for Reading, with just the one major development in the opening quarter of the game (before a mercifully brief hydration break on a warm evening). I can tell you Jacob Brown made it 0-1, flicking the ball past the ‘keeper, but nothing else as that just happened to be the moment I was texting someone (pre-season practice is there for people live-tweeting as much as it is for the players…).

The Royals grew into the contest later in the half and particularly got joy through Kyreece Lisbie, who found space in the final third down the right wing a few times. One of those occasions led to a nice cross to the back post, finding left-winger Emmanuel Osho, whose header hit the side netting.

There were a few other half opportunities for Reading, including a harmlessly off-target Brown finish from a Jeriel Dorsett cross, but not a lot in the way of final-third-quality. Despite that, the Royals were again showing confidence and positivity in possession, looking well balanced as an attacking side and progressing the ball out of the back intelligently.

Down the other end, Joel Pereira didn’t have a huge amount to do. Newport put pressure on a few times but lacked the cutting edge to work Reading’s ‘keeper.

The big story of the first half was an injury blow, unfortunately. Godwin-Malife (aka ‘Dokes’) had already gone down a couple of times when, shortly before the break, he took a robust challenge from a Newport player. After a few minutes of treatment he hobbled off the pitch, before being replaced at the interval by Ashqar Ahmed.

Reading doubled their lead a few minutes after the restart. Lisbie built on his bright first-half showing by crossing low for Stokes, who finished from close range for 0-2.

The Royals’ mass changes on the hour mark swapped out everyone not named Ahmed, given he’d only been introduced 15 minutes earlier. With no back-up striker available, Richardson opted to play under-21s winger Jones up top, but the rest of the outfielders took up the same roles they’d had against Woking (some of them in the original ‘first XI’, some of them in the ‘second XI’).

And it only took Jones a few minutes to add to the scoring. A Reading corner from the left wasn’t dealt with, and the ball eventually dropped for Jones to slam in, essentially killing the contest off. 0-3.

Newport put pressure on at that point, looking for a way back into the game, but Reading withstood all the pressure thrown at them. Again, the Royals’ goalie (this time Jack Stevens) wasn’t forced into any major heroics.

Luke Howard was introduced with five minutes to go, for Sackey, but Jones had the final say of the evening. Ahmed did excellently down the right wing and crossed in for the makeshift centre-forward, who finished coolly for 0-4.

“We don’t have to be perfect now or play excellent sides off the pitch, just move in the right direction tactically. And we’re doing that.” That’s what I wrote about Reading’s showing at Woking on Saturday and, reassuringly, I got the same impression from the Newport game.

Sure, it’s not a high standard of opposition and it’s only pre-season, but Reading are trying to play positive football (we’re no longer just hoofing it), have a clear style (getting the full-backs up the pitch and focusing on using the wingers) and are getting some joy (goals two and four of the evening were particularly easy-on-the-eye open-play goals).

I’m not just seeing a team overly relying on individuals, but rather a side that knows how it wants to play collectively and has a few variations on how to do that. It’s pretty much the inverse of much of my (and other people’s) criticisms of Richardson in his first season, so it’s only right to give credit now that he’s making substantial and welcome tactical progress.

While there’s a lot to like about Reading’s central players (defenders, midfielders and striker), it’s the full-backs and wingers that are really standing out for me at the moment. An unfortunate double-edged sword here is the performance of Dokes, who was again a real offensive asset from right-back – which was a notable help for Lisbie ahead of him – only for Dokes to go off with a nasty-looking injury.

Pleasingly though, Ahmed picked up in the second half where Dokes left off, pushing forwards really well and getting the assist of the evening late on, setting up Jones after some tenacious work in the final third on the right wing.

It’s great to see Ahmed getting a chance to impress in pre-season and taking it. Though he faded from first-team contention last season and was eventually sent out on loan to Forest Green Rovers, he remains a hugely promising attacking full-back, and this more positive brand of football suits him down to the ground. Any absence for Dokes would be a huge blow, but Reading have a talented understudy waiting in the wings.

I love it when an academy player gets the headlines, you love it when an academy player gets the headlines, but let’s not get carried away.

Jerae Jones, a 19-year-old winger who’s been in the under-21s and only just started to get involvement with the first team this summer, absolutely has potential but the last thing he needs is too much pressure being put on him right away. A nicely taken second-half brace is welcome indeed, but doesn’t change the bigger picture for his development.

I hope he gets more game time in pre-season and he very probably will, given Reading have back-to-back friendlies this weekend: Crawley Town away on Friday night, Charlton Athletic at home on Saturday afternoon. He could well also be involved with the first team in the League Cup or Papa McPizza Vase Shield.

That should happen gradually though. Despite a mini crisis up top for the first team due to injury and the impending departure of Kelvin Ehibhatiomhan, Reading shouldn’t be rushing young players in to fill the gaps – let’s prioritise sensible development, as is happening with young centre-forward Reece Evans getting lower-league loan experience.