Peterborough United

Peterborough United v Reading

Sky Bet Championship
Weston Homes Stadium

Wednesday 16^th February 2022

7:45pm

Journey Time to the ground: 4 hours 15 minutes.  We left home just before 3:15pm and decided to drive the scenic route to Peterborough.  This was a bit of a mistake as the weather wasn't the best!  We had a half-hour stop for some food at McDonalds in Leighton Buzzard on the way and ended up parking up just before 7:30pm.  We parked up in Fairfield Road which is about two minutes walk from the ground.  It is permit-holders only but we took a chance as it was so close to kick-off!

Ticket Price: £28

Programme Price: £3.50

Attendance: 11,520 with 949 Reading fans.

It had been almost two years since my last away trip thanks to coronavirus.  The game was due to be played on Boxing Day but had been postponed due to the number of Coronavirus cases in the Reading camp.  This was handy for me as I worked Boxing Day so wouldn't have been able to make the original fixture date!  This was my first trip to the Weston Homes Stadium and we had tickets in the away end, which is one half of the Main North Stand at the side of the pitch.  The Main North Stand is a single-tiered all-seater stand that houses the team dug-outs at its front.  The view from mid-way up the stand was pretty good although the leg room was pretty tight but this didn't matter as we stood for the whole game.

To the left of the Main North Stand is the Deskgo Stand which is a single-tiered all-seater stand.  Opposite the Main North Stand is the BGL South Family Stand.  This is the largest stand at London Road and is a two-tiered all-seater stand with executive boxes running between the two tiers.  To the right of the Main North Stand is the Weston Homes London Road End, this is a single-tiered terrace and seemed to be where the most vociferous Peterborough fans were congregated.

This was a crucial game with both sides struggling towards the foot of the table, and a win for Reading would go a long way towards securing Championship football for next season, so I travelled in anticipation of an away win.  The weather wasn't conducive to good football with the wind swirling round the ground.  The closest either side came to scoring in the first-half was Tom Ince's free-kick from the edge of the area which was tipped over by Stephen Benda in the Peterborough goal 

In the second-half and it was Peterborough who were pushing for a goal that would take them out of the relegation zone and send Reading into the bottom three in the process.  They created a number of decent chances and Reading were indebted to goalkeeper Karl Hein and some last-ditch defending from Michael Morrison to keep the score 0-0.  Reading had a chance to nick a win at the end but Lucas Joao's finish was tame when he'd done all the hard work to slalom through the Peterborough defence.  The game finished goalless and both teams had to settle for a point.

Atmosphere: The atmosphere wasn't too bad.  The Peterborough fans aren't the loudest in the world but fans in the Weston Homes London Road End behind the goal did try a make some noise.  The fairly largeish away following also made some noise, although the atmosphere did start to turn a bit toxic with lots of Pauno out chants from midway through the second-half.

Journey Time home: 3 hours.  We left the ground as soon as the game finished and were back in the car by 9:40pm.  There wasn't too much traffic getting away from the ground and out of Peterborough so we managed to get back home just after 12:40am.

I really enjoyed my trip to Peterborough but only because it's been so long since I've been to an away game!  The ground is a decent size and good to visit but the game was awful!