As the manager says, the team has responded every time he has asked them. So let's see what you can do now! Yes we're lacking in confidence but raise the intensity again and talk to each other, guys! Several passes yesterday went astray.
Leroy tried had yesterday, Kits still looked to be ill and Doyler tried his best with little supply. When you get near the goal chaps, have a shot! Cisse looks good with Ivar and Marcus did everything he could. Marek had a good full debut although he tended to be a little conservative. So it's not all doom and gloom. We just need to get back to playing with intensity for 90 mins - we did this for first ten mins really getting in to Notlob but as soon as they began to attack us, the heads dropped.
And a word about us, the so called crowd. We made a noise when Marcus saved the pen but sitting in the South Stand, it was like a morgue. I tried making some noise but the people in front stared at me as if I was an alien. All those pleas from Steve and Murts in the programme. Ridiculous. If you don't want to make a noise, watch the bloody thing on televison! Team needs to raise the crowd but the crowd needs to do its part too. Number 13 were largely awol yesterday.
Worzel, West Sussex

Without doubt the lowest point of our short Premiership adventure. We all knew the importance of this game and you could sense the nerves before the game , the players didn't seem up for it and they too appeared very nervous. With a few exceptions it was men against boys .Reading were dreadful and even the joy of a penalty save could not spur us on. There's no point at this stage dwelling on the reasons we find ourselves in the bear pit of the relegation zone, the transfer window is closed and whatever we achieve now has to be done with what we've got. It's now one hard dogfight from now on, no time for flowing football, simply scrapping for every point, hoping for the odd goal then clinging on for dear life. We look so fragile at the back it's desperately worrying how we can prevent goals, I find it so hard to find any positives and reasons to be optimistic, only one I can find is Matejovsky who was different class yesterday. He really does look a great player and I just pray he's not come in too late.
Nick Newbury

So perhaps the last performance last season against Watford was, after all, a sign of things to come. So much for giving MU their toughest game of the season. So much for signing players for the long term - are we planning for the Championship already? The Christmas programme was a wake up call we haven't heeded. We needed Prem experienced rugged players - Savage would have been a good buy. Maybe we don't pay enough, maybe no one wants to come to Reading but the team need a lift and having failed to deliver it, it's hard to see where the next point is coming from. And I think the players are beginning to believe that as well. The peformance against Bolton was as bad as we've seen for a long time. Nothing there at all. Virtually no attempts on goal. And sad to say, but where's the commitment - at least go down fighting. And it's teams like this we need to do well against. Clubs that have been here before, like Bolton, or Pompey a season or two ago, have added dogs of war to their squads and preserved Prem status and they've then built from there, bit by bit. Better to build in the Prem than outside of it. However, without such additions we're now down to our own bottle and yesterday it was missing. Finally, why did we think long balls in the air was going to do for Bolton who, um, do that year in year out themselves?
Nick Tilehurst.

READING have now lost their past six Premier League games, while Bolton achieved their first away win of the season despite missing an early penalty. At Stamford Bridge last week, Reading came to life in the second half after their first-half torpor. Yesterday, after a brief spell at the beginning of the first half and another at the start of the second, they relapsed into dull mediocrity... As for Coppell, he admitted: “It was poor. I can’t really explain why. We didn’t look sharp from the first whistle. In the second half, we had a few things flying across the goal, but not any kind of performance that would give us comfort for the future... “What a great challenge,” said Coppell of the task of staying in the Premier League. “We’ve got to rise to it.” But can they?
Brian Glanville, The Times

Both of these teams are in the sludge. Neither of them having won since Christmas, they dropped into the primordial swamp that begins just above Birmingham. But after a game that Bolton won despite missing a penalty it is Reading who have slipped deeper into the quagmire. They are not a bad side, but they showed little heart and will need to show plenty more spirit if they are to struggle to safety.
Will Buckley, The Observer