Reading were relegated from the Premier League despite earning a 4-0 win over bottom club Derby with a professional performance at Pride Park.

James Harper gave them the lead on 14 minutes with a curling effort past Roy Carroll after a determined start from the visiting side.

Dave Kitson tapped home on the hour mark to make it 2-0, with substitute Kevin Doyle and Leroy Lita making sure of the win.

But news of Danny Murphy's winning goal for Fulham at Portsmouth filtered through with just over 10 minutes remaining, and when an equaliser failed to materialise the Reading fans knew they were down.

Reading had gone into the game needing to better Fulham's result in order to avoid relegation and they started brightly with striker Lita guilty of a series of glaring misses.

After five minutes he was just beaten to a through-ball by Derby goalkeeper Carroll, and after the lively Marek Matejovsky had driven a shot across goal and wide Lita was denied as he shaped to shoot by a sliding challenge from Tyrone Mears.

But after 15 minutes Reading found the goal they craved, with Kitson touching the ball to Harper on the right-hand edge of the box and Harper shaping a lovely left-footed effort past Carroll and into the top-left corner.

Lita could have extended the visitors' advantage shortly afterwards but a clumsy first touch allowed Eddie Lewis to intervene, and Lita felt he should have been awarded a penalty on 33 minutes when he headed the ball past Carroll before being knocked to the ground.

Derby rarely threatened in the first period, and it took until the 41st minute for them to register a shot on target, with David Jones drawing a good save from Marcus Hahnemann with a low drive from distance.

The second period got off to a tentative opening, but on the hour mark Kitson gave Reading some breathing space when he tapped home Lita's centre after Nicky Shorey's shot from the edge of the box had been spilled by Carroll.

Kitson was then replaced by Doyle, and he extended the Royals' lead shortly after coming on by nudging the ball past Carroll after his low cross from the right was not properly cleared.

But jubilation turned to despair as news of Murphy's goal reached Pride Park, meaning Lita's late header from Stephen Hunt's inswinging cross served as nothing more than a footnote to Reading's two-year Premier League adventure.

Tom Williams / Eurosport