JAAP STAM says victory at Wembley on Monday would represent one of his greatest achievements in football.
The Dutchman enjoyed an illustrious playing career winning four league titles, four domestic cups and the Champions League during spells with Manchester United, Ajax, PSV and Lazio.
But he says securing promotion to the Premier League with Reading with play-off final victory over Huddersfield Town in his first season in senior management would rank alongside those memorable feats.
“If we succeed, it’s going to be one of my biggest achievements, of course,” said Stam.
“For the club, when we started the ambition was to eventually go back to the Premier League.
“You need to have a certain structure, a certain way of thinking in achieving that and that’s what we spoke about at the beginning of the season.
“Nobody expected us to end up in the top six this season but we’ve done it because of the quality we have in every rank within the club.”
He added: “Every time you get results, the confidence gets bigger and bigger.
“That makes it sometimes easier to get results. We had our setbacks as well in losing games, sometimes with big scores.
“But sometimes that’s good as well to be put back down to earth again.
“You need to keep working to get results.”
Despite this being his first job as a first team manager, Stam says he came to Reading sure of his own ability.
And while talk pre-season was about trying to seal a top 10 spot, the 44-year-old has surpassed any expectations.
“I was always confident in what I can do,” said Stam.
“I’ve always had the belief in myself. It’s not only up to me, it’s up to my staff and the people who work with me. Any manager can’t do it on his own.
“I’m very happy that we achieved this already in the first season.
“Achieving this in your first season is going to build the expectation for next season as well.
“We need to be realistic that to do this two times in a row is going to be very hard.
“But let’s enjoy it for now. Let’s work towards the game on Monday and get that result.”
Reading have been written off on numerous occasions throughout the season.
And after heavy defeats at the likes of Norwich City (7-1), Brentford (4-1) and Fulham (5-0), that is perhaps unsurprising.
However, whenever it looked as though the Royals may slip out of play-off contention, they dug out a big performance and result.
“I think the players have learned throughout the season,” said Stam.
“I think they’ve made progress.
“We’ve had several games during the season which were very important and that we needed to win and they’ve done it.
“These games were very important.
“Like the last two games against Fulham for instance, like the game at home to Leeds (a 1-0 win), the game away at Sheffield Wednesday (a 2-0 win), that we needed to win.”
He continued: “We’ve learned from the experience at Old Trafford (a 4-0 FA Cup loss in January).
“A big game, big occasion, very big crowd, great pitch, different atmosphere playing against a very good side.
“In the first half we did not play how we can play because we thought players were frozen a bit under the influence of the occasion.
“I think players learned from that and players know what they can do.
“We always talk with them about what they need to. It’s about having the belief and being allowed to make mistakes.
“You don’t want to make mistakes but you need to keep believing in what you do.
“I think if you can do that with the mentality that we have, then we can do well.”
