Maybe I remember incorrectly but Arsenal accepted our offer and reading matched it and it was up to the player where he went.
" In January 2003 Brighton and Stoke City both had bids for Sidwell rejected by Arsenal but an offer from Reading was accepted" - that's more how I remember it, but that reference is to Wikipedia, so I won't push it too hard! To be fair, if Sidwell chose Reading at the time, it was probably because they were 'bigger' than we were at the time, and he was not being unreasonably ambitious.