Premier League Betting: Dont read too much into Royals bad start

Keep faith in Brian McDermott, Reading fans!
Plenty of people are will to write off Reading this season after just three games, but Ralph Ellis isn't amongst them. Here's why he thinks the Royals could survive this year...
I had a text from a friend who had been at The Madejski Stadium on Sunday. It said: "I have seen the club that will finish 20th."
Now I don't think he was talking about Spurs. I know I've got my doubts about Andre Villas Boas, and I don't think he'll deliver a Champions League place at White Hart Lane, but then again I don't see him finishing bottom either. And I tipped Jermain Defoe a month ago to be in the top four Premier League scorers. So that means he must have meant Reading.
And clearly he's not alone in his view. Brian McDermott's side, who have traded at around 8.07/1 to finish rock bottom, have come in to 4.47/2 after a fairly dismal 3-1 defeat at home to Tottenham. With fellow Premier League new boys Southampton they are joint favourites at 1.8910/11 for relegation.
At the start of your first Premier League campaign you need a bit of luck, and to maintain the momentum that got you there in the first place. Nobody had more momentum at the back end of last season than the Royals, who put together an astonishing run of 15 wins in 17 games from the end of January to take the Championship title.
When they drew 1-1 with Stoke in their first game it was a promising start. But since then the fates have conspired. They had to fit in an extra fixture at Stamford Bridge to help Chelsea play their European Super Cup final, and then travelled all the way to Sunderland only for the game to get called off for a waterlogged pitch (how come nobody at the Stadium of Light thought to put some covers on, incidentally?)
Take out some time for international week, and the momentum has gone, leaving McDermott to pick up the pieces this week and deal with his first big challenge as a Premier League boss.
Can he do it? I think so. This Reading team is not unlike the one that Steve Coppell brought into the top-flight in 2006. They don't have too many star names, but they do have good organisation and a well established pattern of play. There is a balance to the team, and in Pavel Pogrebnyak they have a striker who has proved he can score goals.
I also think Adam Federici is an outstanding goalkeeper. McDermott left out the Australian on Sunday to try to take some pressure off him following a couple of early season blunders. He has been playing with an injury, but when he's fit he'll be back and has both the ability and the strength of character to find his form.
There is also some stability at the club - unlike at Southampton where the spectre of an out of work Harry Redknapp is already casting a shadow across the prospects of Nigel Adkins. Reading might also be a fairly short trip from Harry's Bournemouth home, but you sense McDermott is far less likely to suffer from owners who are itchy to make a change. The club has been built under Sir John Madejski on a policy of patience, and even though there is now a new and more ambitious owner in Russian Anton Zingarevich the principles remain the same.
Of course there are no easy fixtures in the Premier League. But Reading have from now until December before they meet any more of last season's top four. That can give them time to find their feet. Then comes the January window when some of the Zingarevich cash can be used to strengthen further.
Nobody is suggesting it will be an easy season. But finishing 20th? I fancy my friend has got it wrong.