The season of goodwill to all men ended down the M4 this afternoon as referee James Linington helped set Reading on their way to a narrow 2-1 home win.
City had travelled west to the Madejski in high spirit after the Boxing Day demolition of Millwall. Seventh in the table with belief and confidence flowing through players and supporters alike, all appeared to be set fair for another decent result.
But the best-laid plans of Neil Adams and Co began to unravel in the 24th minute as two-goal Lions hero Bradley Johnson was harshly adjudged to have fouled Michael Hector.
The City midfielder received a yellow card to add his troubles as Hal Robson-Kanu sent John Ruddy the wrong way from the spot-kick and once Simon Cox had added a second nine minutes later, so the Canaries were left with the proverbial mountain to climb.
They would climb a foothill or two before the end, but nothing to deny Reading the victory. The result left City stuck fast in seventh with Bournemouth now some 11 points distant at the top following their latest success.
Given both the stage of the season and the nature of the league in the sense of anyone being able to beat anyone else on their day, everything remains to play for. And City are back amongst the goals. Which helps.
Though the sound of sharpening knives could be heard once more in the background.
“We came up short today,” the City chief admitted afterwards.
“I did think it was a soft penalty – whether Bradley had caught him or turned him, but the lad did appear to be facing his own goal when the penalty was given. But then we’ve gone and conceded a second and given ourselves a mountain to climb.”
In Adams’ eyes City never really looked enough of a threat going forward.
That’s where the problems lay this afternoon.
“We weren’t good enough today – its as simple as that,” he told BBC Radio Norfolk.
“We huffed and puffed in the second-half but to be two-nil down in the manner that we were is not good enough for us,” said Adams, as City’s recent four-game revival spluttered to a halt.
The conundrum remained the same as it has all season; trying to mix attacking ambition and flair with defensive resilience. The fact that N Redmond was back on the bench again summed up the manager’s on-going dilemmas.
To stick or twist? And the Wesley fan club will also point to the fact that their boy remains surplus to the manager’s initial attacking requirements.
“For me, we came up short in the middle and final thirds. Normally you can sense that maybe a goal is coming – I didn’t genuinely feel that today. That was the most disappointing thing. We have to be better than that.”
It was a tough return to front-line duty for Ryan Bennett as Carlos Cuellar missed out thanks to a pre-match calf strain.
Adams also restored Alexander Tettey to that previously stubborn midfield – only to have to revise his plans again at the interval as Wes Hoolahan and Nathan Redmond were thrown hastily into the fray as the visitors sought to find a way back into the contest.
City always needed to be at their clinical best on a pig of a surface, but with Cameron Jerome in particular drilling wide of the mark when first-half opportunity beckoned so the Canaries struggled to gain a decent foothold and lift themselves back into the game.
Just after the hour mark Adams made his final change of the afternoon as Lewis Grabban replaced Jerome.
City were in need of inspiration from somewhere if their recent upward momentum was to be maintained. But huff and puff as they might, the Royals continued to maintain their first-half advantage.
Right up until the moment that Johnson picked his spot from outside the box in the 77th minute and grabbed his seventh goal of the season. The 27-year-old has had his critics this season, but if there was one man built for the Championship’s trench warfare it is the combative North Londoner.
And when he finds his range shooting-wise, he can turn games like today on their head.
Alas there wasn’t a second to follow as Reading, inevitably, shut up shop and saw out the win – Hoolahan almost stealing a point in the fifth minute of added-on time with a low, corner-bound effort that was touched away to safety.
On this occasion, there was to be no last-gasp hero riding to Norfolk’s rescue.
First of all, I am a Reading supporter and therefore my comments may appear biased in the Royals favour. But trying to take the middle road here, If Norwich had stole appoint today, that is exactly what it would have been . Theft with a capital T. The only reason you got one back was because of a major refereeing mistake. Reading with 10 men on the pitch in the process of making a substitution, the ref allows the game to restart with the Reading players stationary waiting for the substitution to complete. And McCleary hobbling off as a second substitution, so effectively 9 men on the pitch.
Also Reading fans remembered the Adams comment after the Carrow Road defeat,. “We really shouldn’t be losing to sides like Reading at home. Well such arrogance deserves what it got. Reading do the double. So Reading fans are feeling justice has been served tonight.
Blaming the pitch, blaming the referee but not himself , his selection or his motivational powers. Today we saw yet again why the sentimental appointment of a man who had only previously managed in boys football, was a mistake. We will not be able to put a run together to even make the play offs whilst Adams remains in charge which given the resources available to him, would be abject failure. Act now or risk losing another season by an inability to grasp the nettle early on.
We will not be going anywhere untill the radio presenter recieves his p45 , a mile behind Ipswich now and that Adams is an utter disgrace much like your management ability.
All the recent talk of having “turned a corner” may have been justified if we’d won today, but we lost, so we haven’t. These away-day no-shows are too much of a regular occurrence for us to have any designs on the top two places now.
Maybe the Reading fan is right. Rather than take confidence from some decent results, this team instead becomes arrogant. They think they can just turn up against struggling sides and roll them over, rather than put in the hard work that it takes in this league. It’s no good raising your game for a trip to Derby if you’re going to succumb with a whimper at Reading.
What a depressing day. And with Bournemouth, Cardiff and Brentford coming up the wheels could really come off our season before we even hit February.
All but given up on this season – board have shown their hand with appointment of Phelan.
Imagine what a half decent manager could do with this squad.
While I agree that we didn’t deserve anything today, I think it’s a massive leap to say we would have have ‘stolen’ a point. That would imply Reading were in complete control of the game & had multiple chances to score – I’m not convinced either was the case. You could argue they were marginally the better side.
Regarding the referee, today was one of those rare occasions where both sets of fans thought he was poor and both were right. The ‘mistake’ for our goal was probably not helped by the Reading player not being able to decide whether he could walk or not, thereby giving doubt to the level of his injury. I haven’t seen any replays yet so can’t comment with any degree of certainty but the penalty appeared soft & unclear on who pushed who. There also appeared to be a clear push in the area in the lead up to the 2nd goal & therefore it should have been ruled out.
Interesting that the mini run coming to an end has meant the immediate return of the management debate. I hope this won’t mean multiple & tedious articles/comments about it but I fear it is inevitable.
We were due a reverse so good to get that one out the way. 10 points from last five games is fine. We will be in the mix come the end of the season which should be exciting and a dam sight more enjoyable than struggling against premiership relegation! NA is learning at this level for goodness sake be patient and back him we don’t have any God given right to beat anyone. Sack Pellegrini as they only drew at home to Burnley?
I’d have taken 7th after 24 games at start of season, enjoy the journey !
The season continues in a similar mould to before. For every Huddersfield and Millwall there is a Reading or a Middlesboro. The team can play absolutely excellent football, they can also be plain rubbish.
So what is to be done? To my mind we still lack a real leader on the pitch, comparing to Grant Holt isn’t necessarily fair but he is the sort of player we need in my opinion. I can’t think of a single scrappy win, the sort we grabbed in the last minute seemingly all the time in our last promotion season. Maybe Derby away? Although I put that down as another game we dominated and should have taken three points but didn’t.
All in all we can probably point to ten or twelve games we should have won but didn’t. Automatic promotion now looks beyond us. We are so far from the consistency required its laughable, the playoffs? They look mighty far but do remain possible. Right now someone needs to get to grips with the team, both off and perhaps more particularly on the pitch.
I fear the championship looms again next year, which is so frustrating given how the team can play when they get it right.
OTBC fingers still crossed!
I agree with Colin (7) to an extent, in that we are still in the mix, and have dropped a lot of points in games where we’ve played well. It’s just this lack of consistency which is so frustrating. Ipsw*ch have one defeat in 19. Bournemouth are unbeaten in 14. That’s not a fluke. We should aspire to that level. Teams with supposedly inferior squads are outperforming us.