Interesting to read through this thread, including the vitriolic comments about the club
Unfortunately you appear to be right on quite a number of things. We never travel well to away games. I think it's just the fact the club historically has been a lower league one and the culture of it being a football-orientated place just isn't there. The only time we would travel well if it's a London club, Bristol City or maybe Portsmouth/Southampton for some reason. On that basis, I would imagine an away attendance of around 1000 fans.
The past 7-8 years have been really poor for the club generally. We've had some really serious ownership issues and also issues in the club, which led to us (rightly) receiving sanctions from the EFL. That has seriously screwed us up. Many fans are concerned about the future of the club and possible relegation, with continuing financial problems.
This is reflected in attendances. Go back about 6-7 years and we were getting about 18-20k at home (good for us) which was all Championship games. It dwindled and dropped to 15/14/13 and now about 12k at times. A lot of this is due to several years of just miserable football, boring, uninspiring games, wasted days out, an increasingly poor matchday experience. The list goes on.
I know we're not unique in all of these things, but any fan base will suffer when all of these things are thrown at them.
On to the game
We lost to Stoke
We won at home against Preston (they were abysmal)
We lost to Bristol City
We've just signed Junior Hoilett which is an amazing thing for us - firstly it's a player, an actual player which we've been struggling to get due to the restrictions and wage issues. He also looks a good signing for us.
We have numerous key individuals missing, Ejaria who is one of the best players I've seen at the club for years. Joao who has been fairly good.
Someone on here said "Keep swift quiet and we have nothing to worry about". I hope your manager hasn't noticed that too as I think it's spot on. Swift has been brilliant in all opening games and our saving grace. If you do keep him quiet, double mark we'll be entirely void of any ideas.
I'm not sure what the result will be. I would say you're the favourites, you seem to be on an upwards trajectory, especially now you're back at the home ground. I'm going to remain positive and say
1-2 to us.
Reading FC Video
Please do me a favour, stop posting that horrible video. I am still having night terrors about it.
Btw, I vague remember that the person singing was friends of the owner at the time - no previous association with the club. She just thought of herself as a singer and made up this son.
I first heard about it when they played it on the big screen in the ground. I nearly choked on my flat bread prawn sandwich, thankfully I had a smoothie there to recover.
Enjoy the game y'all