Steve Coppell hopes to have a clean bill of health for Friday's Sky televised showdown at the Madejski Stadium.

Bobby Zamora and Danny Cullip continue to make encouraging progress from their respective hamstring injuries and are expected to face Reading.

Dean Blackwell is also expected to recover from an ankle problem and should take his place in an unchanged back three alongside Cullip and Ivar Ingimarsson.

"Bobby's reasonably confident, Danny is again reasonably confident and I hope that Dean will train tomorrow," Coppell said.

Ivar Ingimarsson was given an extra day off yesterday after featuring in Iceland's European Championship qualifying defeat against Scotland at Hampden Park on Saturday.

Graham Barrett is still with the Republic of Ireland senior squad for tomorrow night's qualifier in Albania "I won't have him until Friday," Coppell said.

"The gap since the Palace game last Tuesday has been good to lick wounds and get the internationals sorted but in terms of actually preparing us for the next month it has not been effective because we've not been together."