Aitor Karanka full of praise for Lee Tomlin after draw with Reading - 7M sport

Aitor Karanka full of praise for Lee Tomlin after draw with Reading



Posted Wednesday, February 21, 2018 by PA

Aitor Karanka full of praise for Lee Tomlin after draw with Reading

Nottingham Forest boss Aitor Karanka hailed Lee Tomlin after the on-loan Cardiff playmaker finally ended the Reds’ City Ground goal drought by grabbing a late equaliser in a 1-1 draw with Reading.

Tomlin was one of several players brought in by Karanka during the January transfer window and his excellent performance was topped off by a clinical finish five minutes from time as Forest netted their first home goal in the Sky Bet Championship since December 9 to end a run of five home defeats in the league.

The late strike, though, rather ruined Omar Richards’ night as the young Reading left-back, who only turned 20 last week, scored his first career goal 10 minutes from the break to hand the visitors the initiative, which they only relinquished in the dying embers of the match.

“I like him a lot as he’s the kind of player who can drive yourself crazy and then the following moment he can score a goal,” said Karanka of Tomlin, a player he also managed at Middlesbrough.

Karanka revealed the past few games have been a “nightmare” and he was pleased with the final result, although he admitted he had to deliver a stern pep talk at half-time after the Royals edged the opening 45 minutes.

“The second half was amazing – the players needed to put in a performance like that as the last few games at home have been a nightmare,” said Karanka.

“The first half, though, was a different matter. I couldn’t understand why they played like that after such a good second half.

“I told the players at half-time that we needed to change. In the past I said we didn’t have the characters in the squad we needed, but we now have different players and I knew we were going to have a reaction.

“We needed to have the ball and be aggressive against a good team like Reading – we didn’t do that in the first half, but the second half was really good.”

It was ultimately a frustrating night for Reading manager Jaap Stam, whose side looked to have weathered the storm before eventually succumbing to Tomlin’s strike.

“It wasn’t never going to be easy to get the win, but I thought we played very well in the first half,” he said.

“We created opportunities to score more goals than just the one, and we should have done. It is disappointing then to end the game with just one point.

“They pressed us up the pitch a bit more in the second half. In doing that we stopped playing, and stopped doing the things we did well in the first and our movement wasn’t as quick, which put us under pressure.

“They created more opportunities and in the end we gave them too much space, they scored and the game ends 1-1. Unfortunately, we just couldn’t hang on”

On goalscorer Richards, Stam added: “He’s still very young and he’s got the ability. I feel sometimes higher up the pitch he knows how to score a goal.

“He’s comfortable on the ball, he’s got pace, he’s got good positioning, he handled the physicality of the game very well and he’s a very promising player for us.”

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