All eyes will be on Nigel Adkins when he welcomes former club Southampton to his new home of the Madejski Stadium as Reading manager in Saturday's lunchtime kickoff.

The Liverpool-born coach will come face-to-face with the former Championship club that sacked him in January, with the Royals fighting to move from the bottom of the table in the Premier League.

This is only the second match that Adkins has been in charge of since replacing Brian McDermott - the first game resulting in a damaging 4-1 defeat at the hands of Arsenal.

The Saints, who are now led by Mauricio Pochettino, are in a similar, yet not as serious, predicament as Saturday's opponents, as they reside four points away from the drop zone with seven games left to play.

Adkins was able to steer a slender 1-0 victory earlier on in the season over Reading while he was at the helm of Southampton, and he will have to repeat that feat on the other side following the Royals' run of consecutive defeats.

Neither side are expected to make drastic changes to their teams from last weekend.

Recent form

Reading: LLLLL

Southampton: WWDLL

Possible starting lineups

Reading: Taylor; Kelly, Pearce, Mariappa, Shorey; Leigertwood, Karacan, Guthrie, McAnuff, Robson-Kanu; Pogrebnyak

Southampton: Boruc; Clyne, Yoshida, Hooiveld, Shaw; Puncheon, Schneiderlin, Cork, Davis, Rodriguez; Lambert

Sports Mole says: 1-1

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