Kwesi Appiah makes first Reading start

Ghana international Kwesi Appiah made his first start for Reading as they drew 1-1 away at Championship strugglers Blackpool.

The Black Star made his debut for the Royals in their home draw against Cardiff City on Saturday, coming on for the last 22 minutes of the 1-1 stalemate.

Against Blackpool, Steve Clarke completely rearranged his attacking options, dropping Jamie Mackie and Pavel Pogrebnyak to the bench and promoting Appiah and Nigerian striker Aiyegbeni Yakubu to the starting XI.

The move didn’t completely come off, and against already-relegated Blackpool, they failed to secure three points.

Jamie O’Hara opened the scoring for the home side with a penalty on six minutes before Reading drew level just before the break when the unfortunate Grant Hall scored an own goal.

Both Appiah and Yakubu were removed at the break as Clarke brought on Mackie and Pogrebnyak.

The Ghana striker will have every reason to be disappointed with his 45 minutes; he managed zero shots during his cameo, registered zero key passes and largely struggled to get involved in the match. By contrast, he recorded a 72.7 percent pass-success rate according to WhoScored—the best of all the Reading players.

After the match, coach Clarke expressed disappointment at the result and explained his decision to replace his strikers at half time.

“It wasn’t a good game, the pitch was dreadful and the first half from us was dreadful,” he began, as reported by Reading’s official website.

“The second half at least we got off to a flying start after a couple of changes. I felt at half time I should put on a little bit more power, a little bit more directness onto the game. It paid off immediately but then there were a couple of long injury delays that seemed to take our momentum away.”

Appiah moved to Reading from Crystal Palace at the end of March.

Despite impressing for the Black Stars at the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations, he wasn’t registered in the Eagles’ Premier League squad and was forced to seek a temporary deal in order to get playing time before the season’s end.