Reading’s sale is still ongoing, leaving fans worried about the club’s future.
The Royals have had a relatively good start to the season and are within striking distance of the playoffs as 2025 approaches. However, The Guardian has claimed that current owner Dai Yongge’s efforts to sell the club have been impeded by his refusal to clear debts of approximately £55 million to a bank in his native China.
Reading fans are unlikely to remember the Yongge era fondly due to the club’s financial problems and relegation to League One in 2023.
The signing of Sone Aluko in 2017 was a wonderful representation of his tenure as Royals owner. The big sum meant that the Nigerian forward promised a lot but delivered very little, mirroring Reading’s loss of hope for a bright future under Yongge.
Sone Aluko’s Pre-reading Career
Aluko was born in London to Nigerian parents and is the younger brother of Eni, a pundit and former Lionesses player. He started his career at Birmingham City but rose to prominence in Scotland after playing for Aberdeen and Rangers.
Aluko joined Hull City in 2012, where he played consistently for an English team for the first time in his career. when joining Fulham for the 2016/17 season, he signed in Yongge’s first summer as Royals owner, when the Chinese entrepreneur and his sister, Dai Xiu Li, purchased 75% of the club in May of 2017. Aluko’s transfer cost was believed to be around £7.5 million.
He had appeared in the Cottagers’ first four games of the 2017/18 season before leaving, but his fee reflected the Berkshire club’s urgency to get him in. They had been narrowly defeated on penalties by Huddersfield Town in the previous season’s Championship play-off final, and they were hopeful that the arrival of Aluko would provide the club with what it needed to earn automatic promotion.
| Sone Aluko’s pre-Reading senior career, as per Transfermarkt | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Years | Club | Apps | Goals | Assists |
| 2007-2008 | Birmingham City | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| 2007-2008 | Aberdeen (Loan) | 29 | 4 | 2 |
| 2008 | Blackpool (Loan) | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| 2008-2011 | Aberdeen | 95 | 7 | 19 |
| 2011-2012 | Rangers | 23 | 12 | 5 |
| 2012-2016 | Hull City | 108 | 14 | 9 |
| 2016-2017 | Fulham | 54 | 9 | 12 |
| Total | 343 | |||
Sone Aluko disappointed with the Royals
Expectations were naturally high for an offensive player who primarily provided assists from the right wing while also scoring the occasional goal. Aluko’s first assist in blue and white came quickly, in a 1-1 draw against his former club Hull.
He added three more before scoring his first goal in November against Derby County. He added another goal and assist before the 2017/18 season ended. Despite a dismal start, many dismissed Aluko as a slow-burning project due to his four-year deal. This would be his best season with the Royals.
He had one goal and an assist the next season before being loaned to Beijing Renhe, another Dais-owned club, until the end of 2019. By this point, Reading had effectively paid £2.5 million for each goal Aluko had scored in blue and white.
After returning to the Royals in January, Aluko struggled to reintegrate with the team as the season was extended due to the COVID-19 pandemic, failing to score or assist in two Championship games.
He received more regular games for the 2020/21 season behind closed doors, but his numbers once again fell short of his high price. He was finally dismissed at the end of the season, having had little influence with the Royals.
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