McDermott taking positives

Brian McDermott: Taking positives from Chelsea defeat

Brian McDermott says Reading will carry positives from Wednesday night's 4-2 defeat at Chelsea into their trip to Sunderland at the weekend.

The Royals came from behind to lead 2-1 at one stage against the European champions before eventually succumbing to a defeat, albeit in controversial circumstances.

Chelsea forward Fernando Torres looked offside as he poked the Blues 3-2 ahead and, according to McDermott, the decision cost his side a draw but he also admitted he will take a lot from the performance.

Positivity

He said: "For what it is worth it still rankles but there is not a lot you can do about it now.

"You have to hope the decisions are right because if they were right (at Chelsea) we would have got at least a point.

"I have taken a lot from it in the way we played and the way the players carried out their instructions and gameplan, but we have had that here for a long time now.

"We set up for whichever team we play against and try to set up to the strengths of our team, we did that and to go a goal down at Chelsea is never easy but great resilience to come back and score a second goal - that gives us a lot of hope and positivity going into the Sunderland game."

McDermott also refuted claims that his players could suffer from a lack of confidence at the Stadium of Light after their valiant efforts went unrewarded.

Threat

"The players are resilient, you have to be resilient. You get dips, you get highs and you get lows," he said.

"The thing we have here, we have never become too high or too low, we won loads of games last year but never got carried away and we won't get carried away by a defeat, we will just carry on doing the right things."

New signing Pavel Pogrebnyak scored Reading's first goal to level the scores at Stamford Bridge and Sunderland could also be boasting a completely fresh strikeforce in time for kick-off on Saturday.

With Louis Saha already on board the club are closing in on Wolves forward Steven Fletcher and, although McDermott feels the Scotland international could prove dangerous, he is confident in his own team's abilities.

McDermott said of Fletcher: "He has not signed yet and whether he starts on Saturday, I don't know.

"I know Fletcher really well and he is a good player but how do you deal with the threat of (Fernando) Torres, how do you deal with the threat of (Peter) Crouch?

"It is the same story, you have to deal with the threat, we have a gameplan and we will work on that and we have players who can score as well."