Reading v Wycombe ... "proper local derby"
From today's Newbury Weekly News...
"It was the first time Reading had played a proper local derby in the league since 2002.
Surprisingly Wycombe were the opponents that season.
You must go back even further since Oxford United or Swindon played in the same league as Reading.
It is a 26-mile drive from Adams Park to the Madejski Stadium, making it the closest league ground to Reading.
There may not be the fierce historic rivalry between Reading and Wycombe, but geography means it must be considered a proper derby game.
They have only met nine times before in the league, with Reading winning seven of those games, so there is some way to go before we have 'fierce rivalry'.
Of course, the shame is once again no fans were at the ground to watch the game.
In normal times we could have expected upwards of 18,000 at the game and a raucous, tense atmosphere.
These are nothing like normal times - Reading are top of the Championship."
Comments
Made me laugh on the ITV Meridian evening news last night as they described the match as a local derby despite not covering Wycombe as part of their local coverage each week
Before I had the good sense to remember that you could switch the iFollow commentary from ‘home’ to ‘away’, I heard the Reading commentators make some inane comment about how although this wouldn’t be considered an important game for them, we’d probably look up to the mighty RFC as our cup final.
Patronising twats.
Can't remember whether it's BBC South or ITV Meridian, or possibly both, but they feature all the usual southern clubs, plus Oxford and MK Dons, but not Wycombe. Some weird geographical boundaries going on there. I might be wrong, but I don't think we're featured on the London channels either, which makes it all the more weird.
It's laughable they'd think that. The only appeal of playing Reading is that its local for an away day - when all games are behind closed doors that becomes irrelevant.
They're the side I least care about playing or beating outside of that. The most boring Championship club going.
The 1976 Fa cup game at Loakes Park v Reading was extremely 'Spicy' off the field.
The fact we never played them again for approx 20 years, and not to often since, is probably the major reason that no real rivalry has developed.
I find this really frustrating @NewburyWanderer. Living in North Bucks I get BBC South news about Franchise, PNL and all clubs to the south coast. I'm in the ITV Meridian region, a similar story, except that they also cover all the way over to Kent at times. Wonderful. I see news items down to Risborough and Wendover, but no further south. I take solace in the unsurpassed coverage of @bluntphil.
These coverage maps suggest that Wycombe is definitely in the London region for both BBC and ITV, I would be interested in knowing if they do cover the club. I have noticed that I get BBC London if I watch BBC1 live on iPlayer, if I can remember to to switch over.
https://ukfree.tv/maps/bbc
https://ukfree.tv/maps/itv
We've had quite a few features on ITV London
Wycombe has fallen into a geographic no-mans land, which extends to press coverage.
We're not London, we're not midlands, we're not west country, we're not really even 'south east'.
It's a fair comment. Maybe we should start a Chair Metropolis independence campaign? A new city state ...
How on earth did I miss that? Fabulous. Only the chair arch could enhance it.
@our_frank It's from quite a while back, but I saved it. I meant to ask if he ever did t-shirts.
I have to say ITV news have done a few little stories...admittedly often including the obligatory chair factory footage.
Lawrie Sanchez once aptly described us as being in 'the Bermuda triangle' of media coverage