MATCH SUMMARY : South Reading Royal (27 August 2016)

<p>Keen to give the boys a real challenge in our first friendly back from<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />a break and they certainly got that. South reading are a team we've<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />been evenly matched with previously but with the addition of 3 strong<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />forward players to the Royals they had the edge on the Phantoms.<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />The game was fairly even for first few minutes, but once the Royals<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />scored from the penalty spot we looked very vulnerable defensively and<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />essentially hung on to be 2-0 down at half time.<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />Score went to 3-0 after ball was switched wide and then a good finish.<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />Last 15-20 mins was our best spell as we started to maintain<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />possession. The pressure lead to 1 back for Phantoms after some good<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />wing play. Final goal was for Royals an outstanding strike from the<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />left leaving the keeper no chance. Long distances goals likely to be<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />quite common this year in the league.<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />Interesting game today. Reading playing a counter attacking game,<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />relying heavily on getting the ball directly to their exceptional<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />front three. This caused much panic as we struggled with our defensive<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />shape during transition. In possession we played in small areas of<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />pitch where reading keenly pressed/swarmed to win the ball. Some work<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />required to understand how to compress space out of possession.<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />We're going through quite a change as we move to 11 aside from 9<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />aside. Four new players, changes to the keeping situation with JF<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />and RE sharing the goalkeeping. With players absent today, a few<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />players were in new positions or not their preferred role. Also, one<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />or two of our more technical players were not match sharp. However,<br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" />the attitude from all the boys was excellent.