5 Star Royals cruise past Wednesday

The Royals put in their best league performance of the season and demolished Sheffield Wednesday at the Madejski Stadium on Saturday. Jimmy Kebe and Grzegorz Rasiak both scored twice, and Simon Church also got himself on the score sheet to cap a brilliant display.

Brian McDermott had to make a couple of changes to his starting 11 that beat West Brom in midweek, Matt Mills missed out still suffering from the bang to the head he got in that game, whilst Grzegorz Rasiak came in for the suspended Jobi McAnuff with a return to 4-4-2.

Rasiak was looking lively on his return to the starting 11 and he almost scored early on when he connected with a Gylfi Sigurdsson set piece. It was end to end stuff with Adam Federici called into a couple of saves from long rangers and Rasiak was again involved at the other end forcing Lee Grant to tip over.

With the game so open and chances coming thick and fast, it was a surprise then that it took until the 42nd minute for the opening goal and it was not a surprise that it was the home side taking the lead. Jay Tabb knocked on for Kebe, who turned and shot and saw his effort take a wicked deflection of an Owls defender and into the net. It continued a fantastic run of goal scoring form for the Malian, who is thriving under McDermott.

Before the interval, it got even better for the Royals when Sigurdsson broke into the area down the left hand side. He pulled it back to Church but his effort was blocked before falling to Rasiak who turned the ball into the net.

Sigurdsson started the second half where he left off in the first and forced Grant into an excellent save from another set piece, but it wasn`t long before the third goal of the afternoon arrived. Rasiak was involved but the hard work was all done by Church who turned his marker 20 yards from goal and fired a fantastic low drive into the corner of the net off the post.

The goals continued to come and Kebe showed a brilliant turn of pace again down the right and he crossed across the face of goal where Rasiak had a simple tap in at the far post. Good movement by the excellent Church created the space for the Polish striker.

Kebe continued to shine and calamitous defending from Wednesday allowed him to race through and hammer the ball into the roof of the net for his second of the afternoon soon after. He was soon replaced by James Henry and Brian McDermott also brought on Hal Robson Kanu and the fit again Marek Matejovsky as his side cruised to another fine win.

You can't really give it to anyone other than Kebe, because he made the difference in the final third. Two goals and an assist says it all.

Notable mentions to Church and Rasiak who were excellent up top, and Jay Tabb and Brian Howard in the middle of the park.

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