READING Under 23s will play their Berks & Bucks Senior Cup semi-final with Maidenhead United at York Road next Tuesday.

The winners will have to wait a week before knowing their final opponents as Marlow host Slough Town on March 26.

The final is on Bank Holiday Monday, May 6, at a venue yet to be decided.

History could possibly repeat itself as Reading FC defeated Marlow 1-0 in the first ever B&B Cup final way back in the 1878-79 season when the game was played at Reading Cricket Club.

Since then, of course, Reading CC have switched to Sonning Lane along with the hockey club.

This season's Senior Cup final won't be staged there, but work is currently going on at the ground to expand the car park and more football could be accommodated.

Tim Mann, chairman of the hockey section, has revealed: "We have plans to do more in order to increase the size and frequency of sporting events here."

The ground, where Reading FC trained a couple of decades or so ago, now has junior football teams playing there on a Saturday morning on the cricket outfield. They are there on a trial basis, but Mann says they will meet the organisers to discuss the possibility of a longer-term arrangement.

Berks & Bucks are not the only organisation with a cup final booked for May 6. On the same day, the Hellenic League stage their League Cup final between Ascot United and Windsor, both having won their semi-final ties last weekend.

Rather bizarrely, these two east Berkshire rivals will have to travel 50 plus miles as the final is to be played at Ardley United's ground in Oxfordshire.

I was at Ascot's tie against Wantage and winning manager Jamie Tompkins told me he would even be prepared to concede ground advantage and play the tie at Windsor's Stag Meadow.

READING-BASED footballer Mitchell Parker looks to have found his perfect match at Hartley Wintney FC, having flirted with Bracknell Town and Basingstoke earlier in the season.

"I am enjoying my football since joining them," said the striker who is in red-hot form, with 10 goals and nine assists in his 10 games for the Evo-Stik League South side.