Noel Hunt was delighted with how his Reading side stood firm on their way to a 3-1 victory at Cambridge.
The Royals recorded only their third away win of the season in League One and moved up to fifth. By contrast, Cambridge’s defeat was their fourth in a row and at the halfway stage of the campaign they sit second from bottom.
Former Cambridge players scored all of the goals in Reading’s success, with Sam Smith’s superb late goal sealing the points after a brace from Harvey Knibbs, despite the hosts creating the majority of the chances.
“The boys have been outstanding,” Hunt said. “We said from the get-go when we stepped in that we have to out-work, out-fight, out-play teams eventually but we have to get that out-work, out-run and out-fight bit first.
“The game was a really great test for us in terms of how we defended as a team.
“Everyone pulled together because they had a spell from the start and we defended it really well. Then we just talk about moments of quality in the final third.
“I’m really pleased with it in terms of how they approached it. Then we took a blow second half, they came out fast. After that we got our heads together and we worked really well.
“Smith has been superb, I’m not going to stand here and say anything else. I love him, he’s a fantastic number nine, he leads the line so well. He’s pivotal in what we do. He deserved that goal today.”
Garry Monk defended much of Cambridge’s performance, despite the U’s falling to another defeat.
“It’s disappointing in terms of result but I thought the performance was where it needed to be,” said Monk.
“That was a brutal result, to receive that considering everything we’ve put into the game and the way we went about it.
“It’s (about) crucial moments, both ends of the boxes. We have so many good periods of the game, we were on top of them and we just couldn’t get that ball in enough when we should have done.
“They relied on moments, a few moments, and that was the difference.
“It was a performance where normally we would be stood here saying we’re quite proud of that performance, the effort, the quality we showed at times. It’s a tough result to take considering everything we put into it.
“What we’ve lacked is the quality in moments, when we’ve been around the box, been on top of teams and got the ascendancy, which we had a lot of today for really good periods.
“They only had a few moments and it ends in the back of the net. That’s been the difference across the season.”
