Birthday brace lifts Reading up to third
READING 2 STOKE 1
READING manager Paul Ince believes his side are becoming tougher after they defeated Stoke. Two goals for birthday boy Lucas Joao were enough at the Select Car Leasing Stadium, despite the visitors levelling before the break. A series of defensive blunders and a penalty gave the 29-year old the perfect gift.
The Royals have four wins out of four at home and are riding high in the Championship.
While Ince was happy with his striker, he felt his side are developing the ability to hold on to leads. He said: ‘What I’m seeing differently now with these players is a lot more confidence that we can see out games.
‘We’re learning how to do that, that’s important for me going forward.
‘For the first goal, it’s about time we got a gift. It was a good finish to be fair, but we needed that, we looked a bit nervy at the start. The goal settled us down.
‘Lucas was outstanding today.’ Stoke had an awful start after just two minutes, when goalkeeper Jack Bonham left his area to clear a long ball by Joe Lumley.
Joao took advantage of the shotstopper getting stranded and turned the ball goalwards. Aden Flint could only turn his attempted last-gasp clearance into the net.
The lead should have been doubled on 32 minutes, when Shane Long put the ball over the bar from under six yards out.
The miss proved costly and Stoke punished them just before the interval.
Flint made up for his earlier error by heading a corner into the path of Ben Wilmot. His powerful shot through the Reading defence deflected off Andy Yiadom and in. Joao made the decisive breakthrough from the spot when he was fouled by Wilmot on 56 minutes to earn his third goal of the campaign. It was enough for Reading to maintain their onehundred percent record at home, leading Stoke manager Alex neil concerned over the fatigue of his side. He said: ‘We need to be more threatening and fitter. In the second half we needed to play at a tempo to get back in the game.
‘Some of our lads looked really leggy and that was when we really needed to kick in to get something. ‘When you get tired in games, you’re start to make bad decisions. I thought we started the game brightly. It was mistake after mistake.’