Former Reading winger Stephen Hunt has urged his old club’s supporters to stick together following the club’s relegation to League One, posting on Twitter last night.

The Royals have been poor for much of Dai Yongge’s tenure, with the Chinese businessman taking over back in May 2017 when the Berkshire outfit were on the verge of reaching the Premier League.

Overspending during the first couple of years of his ownership has proved to be costly, with the Berkshire outfit’s progress being hampered by two points deductions in recent years and an EFL business plan that has prevented them from spending transfer fees.

Although Hunt’s thoughts were with the Royals’ supporters following their relegation last night, he also gave a special mention to employees who could find themselves out of work because of this drop to the third tier.

He posted: “Very easy to point fingers tonight for Reading fans..(understand) sometimes it takes this to realise the mistakes that have been made…fans stick together and don’t forget the people behind the scenes at Reading that will lose their job when they shouldn’t have ..been coming.”

Who’s to blame for Reading’s relegation?

The owner Mr Dai does have to take a lot of responsibility for the Royals’ downfall because it isn’t just overspending that has killed the club.

Poor managerial decisions in recent years have also been costly, with Paul Ince being sacked far too late.

Former boss Ince also needs to take some responsibility because his negative approach during the latter stages of his tenure has been costly and Noel Hunt, understandably, hasn’t been able to fix fully fix the problems that the former England international created.

The players will need to look at themselves in the mirror as well because they have failed to win a single game since February and that’s why they deserve to go down, even though results have gone against them in recent times.

Reasons for optimism?

It’s difficult to see too many positives for the Royals at the moment but they do have the chance to rebuild and that should provide them with a fresh start.

With Mark Bowen, Brian Carey and Jared Dublin behind the scenes and with the club not needing to abide by a business plan anymore, the Berkshire outfit should be able to get some early transfer deals over the line this summer and that will be much-needed considering the number of players that will be required during the upcoming window.

They also have the chance to get likely high earners like Liam Moore, Lucas Joao and Yakou Meite off the wage bill, although the Royals will miss the latter two.

The club will need to appoint a new manager too and if they can get this appointment right, they could enjoy a reasonably bright future.

They can’t afford to underestimate League One though because it took Sunderland a long time to get back to the Championship and Sheffield Wednesday are struggling too.