Five things we learned as Huddersfield Town won promotion to the Premier League after defeating Reading

Significant summer for Stam

In his first campaign in charge at the Madejski Stadium, manager Jaap Stam can undoubtedly hold his head high.

The 44-year-old, who led The Royals to third in the Championship this season, eight points adrift of the automatic promotion spots, has overachieved and exceeded expectations with Reading, who finished 17th in the second-flight only this time last year.

Stam, who is most famous for being part of Manchester United’s treble-winning side of 1999, ultimately could not claim his first managerial honour this afternoon, but no one predicted The Royals to improve this significantly under the Dutchman inside the space of 10 months.

Again, like Wagner and Huddersfield, Reading will need to strengthen in the summer if they are to challenge for promotion once more. Though this time, as ever, avoiding the play-offs would be ideal given their monstrous poor record in the process.

But as well as recruiting wisely and efficiently, Stam may have a difficult task of keeping hold of his best players from any potential suitors.

And finally, the man himself. Given his impressive debut term at the Madejski, who says other clubs, whether they are ‘bigger’ or higher up than Reading right now, won’t be interested in Stam’s services this summer?

After transforming The Royals from relegation candidates to Premier League hopefuls, speculation could brew around the Dutchman’s future at Reading given his admirable start to life as a manager.