THE style of play Jaap Stam has chosen has not gone down well with a small, yet vocal set of fans.

They have been booing Stam’s patient approach, saying it is boring and does not translate into goals.

It’s clear that when players lose patience, they needlessly give away the ball through risky choices.

Birmingham defended deep on Tuesday, often with nine men behind the ball. This meant Reading had to consider the risks as their opposition’s defence was difficult to break down.

However, fans needn’t be so cynical so early in the season. With a new manager, a new style of play and a few new players, only two defeats in our first seven games is quite a success.

This is impressive as we’ve played four of the current top eight teams in the Championship and only two from the bottom eight.

Our possession in the last two games has been 63% against Ipswich and 71% against Birmingham. Yet despite dominating, goals have been hard to come by.

We needed two penalties to beat Ipswich and registered a mere three shots on target against Birmingham.

We’ve scored just a single league goal from open play this season (against Cardiff) which is a worry.

We are definitely an attacking team, with 12 corners on Tuesday night. But you can’t blame the lack of goals on a lack of opportunities.

Yet there are concerns over a lack of proven striker.

Yann Kermorgant isn’t getting any younger, or quicker for that matter, Deniss Rakels is injured until after Christmas and Joseph Mendes is yet to get off the mark. Dominic Samuel is our only other out-and-out striker.

We also looked vulnerable on the counter attack with Ali Al-Habsi the busier of the two keepers in both games of the last week.

But Royals are still unbeaten at home in the league after seven games which is promising with fixtures against Barnsley (A), Brighton (A) in the EFL Cup, Huddersfield (H) and then the short trip to Brentford (A) fast approaching.

But first up is high-flying Barnsley this Saturday.

Reading will have to sharpen up as the Tykes have won their last three league games, conceding once and scoring 10.