Back in the bottom three but still well in touch with the sides above them, QPR face a daunting home match with Manchester United on Saturday with Harry Redknapp reportedly on the brink of the sack.

Queens Park Rangers (19th) v Manchester United (4th)

They call him Harry Houdini, and he'll do well to escape from this. The walls are closing in.

'They' often refers to the media to whom QPR manager Harry Redknapp turns to further his own cause, state his case, unsettle a player, or call out an underachiever. The media like him because he winds his car window down while other drive past. He's quotable, even when it's not true. He's good for copy. When QPR were last relegated from the Premier League in a shambolic state after a dreadful 0-0 draw at Reading, the Daily Mail ran with a puff piece absolving Redknapp of blame. Compare that to the coverage Alan Pardew had at Newcastle, where the criticism began before he'd even agreed to join.

You know Harry Redknapp's in trouble when even the press start to turn on him. Jason Burt's piece for the Telegraph this week was a rare piece of accurate, informed coverage from a national paper about QPR. Tonight Dave McIntyre, who has his finger on the pulse at Loftus Road more than any other journalist you'll read, has written about Redknapp's fast diminishing position at Loftus Road thanks to strained relationships with his players and director of football Les Ferdinand. The jungle drums are rumbling.

It could well turn out that Harry Redknapp is right, and that nobody else could do as well as he is at a club with zero infrastructure, no youth set up to speak of, a non-existent scouting network, a rank bad training ground, a board of directors with a chronic lack of football knowledge and all the other things that were a problem when Tony Fernandes took over the club and remain so today, three and a half years and the thick end of £200m later. The set up, and the board's desire to see QPR buying big names and proven players, finds managers out. Mark Hughes may be the devil incarnate as far as the good people of Shepherd's Bush are concerned, but he's managing very nicely at Stoke, just as he previously did at Blackburn and Fulham. Perhaps it's all Redknapp can do to keep QPR as competitive as they are.

Even if that's not the case, the manager is a symptom of QPR's disease, not the tumour itself. All of those oft-stated issues at QPR and the way the club is being run will still be the case on Monday morning if Redknapp isn't here. Tim Sherwood is almost certain to be the replacement, the third time Fernandes and his board will have made a swift appointment of the obvious candidate from a shortlist of one, and his incessant chat about his win percentage during six months minding the shop at Tottenham will not do him much good when he finds that none of the facilities, youth academy, European scouting network and talented first team squad he inherited at White Hart Lane exist in Queens Park Rangers.

Harry Redknapp's demeanour on matchdays, in press conferences, and in all public appearances during the last 18 months have been in stark contrast to his reputation as a bubbly, talkative, occasionally sharp tongued media personality famed for his man management. May's play-offs and a couple of weeks in October when it looked like he might get the sack apart, he's appeared bored since the club made the mistake of keeping him on for a tilt at the second tier last season when they should have gone their separate ways and started afresh the previous summer. You can't help thinking he probably should have retired to the television studios when he didn't get the England job he so clearly had his heart set on, and his friends in the press made him a shoo-in for. A new voice and energy could freshen the place up and kick QPR up to safety — Sherwood certainly wasn't shy of a word or three, or making his touchline presence felt, last season.

But, given the situation at QPR and the way the club is run, would anybody put any money at all on us being in exactly the same position 12 months from now, talking about potentially replacing Sherwood with whichever flavour of the month is in the papers a lot at that point? If the media reports that the board are waiting to see what response the players give against Manchester United tomorrow before making a decision on the manager are true doesn't that tell you just how short term QPR address their problems and strategy? "Well we thought we had enough to sack him on Friday, but we played quite well on Saturday, so now we're keeping him." That's not even a five minute plan.

But it seems for many fans, judging by the pub talk, the message boards, the Twitter, and everything else, that they've had enough. Fears that the club is incapable of staging a proper search and interview process for the best possible replacement, fears that Tim Sherwood isn't nearly as fantastic as Tim Sherwood clearly believes he is, fears that a less experienced manager will struggle to keep a club with a League One infrastructure in the Premier League, fears that mid-January transfer window is probably too late to be making a managerial change are, increasingly, being set aside. Lots of people are fed up of Redknapp.

They're fed up of his attitude that players win football matches rather than systems or tactics, which has seen QPR totally surrender against the division's better teams away from home this year rather than try to come up with some semblance of plan to counteract them. Watching Southampton execute a perfect game plan and secure a 1-0 win at Old Trafford last week I was reminded, and message board regular Anti Heinola brought it up on this site, of Karl Henry's comments post 4-0 defeat in our game up there in September: "We didn't know whether to press or stand off and kind of got caught in the middle." QPR against Manchester United weren't aware whether the plan was to press them high, or sit off them deep. Drink that in for a moment.

They're fed up of losing away games, previously justified by the high league positions of the opposition but now also occurring at lowly Burnley where, for the second half, Rangers slung Bobby Zamora up front with a collection of assorted other attackers milling around behind him offering no sort of shape or width and apparently with no real idea where anybody was meant to be or what they were supposed to be doing other than standing in the Burnley half and trying to score if the ball arrived with them.

They're fed up of the excuses, half truths, and outright lies. Some of the things Redknapp has come out with this season are so easy to disprove it's laughable.

Redknapp has repeatedly stated that he only had 12 first team players for a pre-season tour of Ireland two weeks before the start of the season. The club's official website (still) lists those 12 players as: Rob Green, Brian Murphy, Joe Lumley, Rio Ferdinand, Steven Caulker, Clint Hill, Armand Traore, Ale Faurlin, Danny Simpson, Nedum Onuoha, Richard Dunne, Joey Barton, Yun Suk-Young, Karl Henry, Junior Hoilett, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Matt Phillips, Charlie Austin, Adel Taarabt and Bobby Zamora.

After the Burnley defeat, Redknapp pointed out that QPR finished miles behind Leicester and Burnley in the Championship last season (when he was the manager, spending ten times as much as Sean Dyche on wages and transfer fees, buying Burnley's best player at the start of the season) and are still using much the same team therefore the struggles are to be expected. But since then QPR have signed Rio Ferdinand, Steven Caulker, Jordon Mutch, Leroy Fer, Jack Robinson, Alex McCarthy, Sandro, Eduardo Vargas, Mauricio Isla and Mauro Zarate for fees in the region of £30m. Burnley have signed eight players for £4.5m. Burnley have signed eight players for £10m.

Once again today he straight batted questions about Charlie Austin's contract situation by saying he has no idea how negotiations are going, doesn't get involved, doesn't know how much Charlie earns or how much he's been offered and doesn't deal with the money side at all. Almost in the same breath, he then started to talk about how much Shaun Wright-Phillips earns. He's previously publicly stated that Adel Taarabt earns £60,000 a week and he's done it before for Jose Bosingwa as well. So does he know or doesn't he? There's not wanting to get drawn into quotes about Charlie Austin, and there's making yourself, and the club, look daft.

He said QPR lost to Sheffield United because of the amount of games they'd had to play in a short period of time. Sheff Utd had played 11 more matches than QPR by that point and in the Hooped starting 11 for that match were seven players who'd started two games or fewer in the whole of December.

He said Sandro injured his knee celebrating a goal in training and later had to admit that wasn't true. He said that Niko Kranjcar practises free kicks all the time in training 30 seconds before the Croatian told the same Sky reporter he does no such thing. He staged a very public tit-for-tat row with one of his players over how much he weighs.

Even for his supporters, or those who fear that things will not improve under the inevitable replacement, this sort of thing steadily grinds away until you're every bit as bored and lethargic about QPR as Redknapp himself appears to be. It's getting to the stage where people would sack him just because they're fed up and to hell with the consequences. If coverage this evening is to be believed a few of those people work for the club.

And it's only Manchester United tomorrow. It would be some escape act.

Links >>> A hyped-up work in progress — opposition profile >>> Webb's winner — history >>> Teething problems — interview >>> The Toronto connection — podcast >>> Swabrick takes United clash — referee >>> 'Presser'

Andy Impey and Simon Barker rush to congratulate Danny Dichio for his opening goal against Manchester United at Loftus Road in 1996. Relegation threatened Rangers looked on course for a famous, vital win against the champions elect but later that week Eric Cantona headed in an equaliser to secure a 1-1 draw.

Saturday

Robin Van Persie's ankle injury sustained in the defeat to Southampton could mean a recall for Radamel Falcao after he was left out altogether against the Saints. Rafael and Marcos Rojo are both fit to return to United's "troubled" defence.

Elsewhere: Join with me faithful few, for that part of the week where we feign interest in what's happening elsewhere in what Richard Keys might call the "best league in the world" before smashing some bird.

Manchester City v Arsenal is the "game that matters", kicking off at 16.00 on Sunday immediately after Big Fat Sam's Big Fat Brand of Entertaining Football v Tigers Tigers Rah Rah Rah which, on its own, is the least super Super Sunday since that day you found out your parents were splitting up because dad had been knobbing the au pair. The City v Arsenal game has been "spiced up" by Jose Mourinho's latest crucially important input into nothing to do with him whatsoever, hinting that the Wilfried Bony transfer from Swansea and ongoing Frank Lampard saga* are all part of a conspiracy to allow City to break the financial fair play rules to the detriment of Mourinho's brave, financially prudent squad of carefully nurtured free transfers and youth team graduates. Big Racist John and the Boys are at Swansea this weekend.

* he's leaving a bit later than he said he would.

From a QPR point of view it's all eyes on Burnley v Pards Pardew's Palace at Turf More, and Interesting Nige's Leicester City at home to Meticulous Mark and the Taffia. Villa are drawing a blank against The Men of Liverpool Together Collectively as One while Little Boy Jermaine will be resting up tonight on his bed of money surrounded by many beautiful ladies ahead of his inevitable debut goal for Sunderland at Tottenham.

Newcastle v Southampton is an attractive Saturday evening fixture as the John Carver reign (P3 W0) continues apace and Everton v Tony Pulis' West Brom is the Monday Night Football offering.

Or you could, you know, read a book, spend time with your kids, go for a walk, see the countryside…

Referee: Manchester United haven't had a penalty kick this season and to right this obvious wrong the authorities have dispatched Lancashire's Neil Swarbrick back to a ground where he's upset the paying punters on more than one occasion to take charge of this fixture. Mind you, having sat through an enthralling West Ham v Everton cup tie during the week, I'm njot actually convinced Swabrick knows what constitutes a penalty in open play. We shall see. Full case file available here.

Form

Man Utd United's loss to Southampton was their first in 12 matches of which they won eight, but a record of 37 points from 21 games is still nbo better than the much-maligned David Moyes era had achieved this time a year ago, and Moyes had to contend with European fixtures as well as Premier League. They have won just one of their last five league games, drawing three. They are nevertheless on course to return to the Champions League next season, currently lying fourth. United are unbeaten in six away games in all competitions.

Prediction: Reigning Prediction League champion WestonSuperR tells us…

"I'm finding it increasingly difficult to be positive about our chances at the moment and a very poor performance at Burnley has only added my worries that our "away loss specialists" could struggle over the coming weeks.

"I've had a think and come up with three points which may just make me believe we can get a result: we are unbeaten at home in the League since Liverpool; Man Utd lost their last match; and Dennis Bailey scored a hat-trick against these lot once. Other than that, I think we have problems. Rooney and co must be salivating at the prospect of running at our ageing and leaky defence. Surely they will score it's just a question of whether we can mange at least as many as them. I'm not convinced with them defensively either so can see Austin scoring again but think Man Utd will also do so and probably more than once."

Brian's Prediction: QPR 1-2 Man Utd. Goalscorer: Charlie Austin

LFW's Prediction: QPR 1-3 Man Utd. Goalscorer: Charlie Austin

The Twitter @loftforwords

Pictures — Action Images

Photo: Action Images

ShotKneesHoop added 20:47 - Jan 16 Norf. A first class distillation of all the recent anguished posts on LFW this week. No point in reading the Saturday or Sunday papers after this assessment of a hopeless cause. Only QPR Dave, Boston R and Worn Shyte Flips might disagree with your summary of all that's wrong with QPR. I'm afraid that the whole structure and set up of the club is so out of whack with the way a proper club should be run that if Jesus Christ, Mohammed, Buddah, Douglas Bader, John Wayne, Superman and Sue Perkins were offered the chance to show they could work miracles, they'd say "hang on, I think solving Global Warming is a better bet" I will still be hoping and praying for a result tomorrow but it seems we support QPR because of what they used to be, not what they and and certainly what they look likely to be. The next Portsmouth. A real leader would tell 'Arry to get on with it, he's got the job to the end of the season, but like SWP he can smell the end is nigh so he's starting to work his passage. (Not a pretty thought)

0

AgedR added 21:50 - Jan 16 It's not a good place to be...again Don't think it'll get as poisonous as Hughes v Soton...but Jesus we need someone to follow a plan
0

TacticalR added 23:28 - Jan 16 Thanks for your summing up the current state of things. Whatever the level of disatisfaction, I can't see Redknapp getting sacked for not beating a team we haven't beaten for twenty years.
0

HastingsRanger added 00:31 - Jan 17 Whilst all is in turmoil at the R's with a fault ridden team and management, the LFWs site still provides top quality. Well done and thanks to all! My worry is more long term than Rednapp, in that TF did have a stab at addressing the infrastructure here and has been rebuffed regarding both Warren Farm and Old Oak. The situation is that QPR have become a poor Premiership club (all be it briefly) but with the funding we are getting, so could Burton Albion. Sooner or later, he's going to realise this haemorrhaging money is pointless when there are other clubs (or businesses) who could bring him much better reward. Assuming this happens, this is where the lack of infrastructure kicks in and we will easily soon slip down a couple of divisions, without an owner willing to invest in the club. It is a familiar malaise from an unchanged formula. Of course, if we win tomorrow, all this would be history, until the next dreadful defeat.

1

pedrosqpr added 07:43 - Jan 17 As we often hear from the QPR team media that moral is good and personally they all including Adel don't seem like a bad bunch,I also think we have enough in the team to stay up. However Harry is to blame for the away form, tactically anyone including Gary Neville today in the Telegraph can see 4 42 home and away. Harry's press conferences he seems faraway and disinterested. Can't help thinking that something has changed since his trip to see Tony discussing transfer options. Btw hate the bs in the press conferences when he claims not to know something. Time to retire Harry you have had a good innings .

0

francisbowles added 11:21 - Jan 17 I think Harry's immediate future is in the hands of his team selection. A reasonable performance, even in defeat, and he is safe for now. However, a capitulation and he is driving home to Bournemouth to wait for a phone call.
0

Blogs 31 bloggers

Queens Park Rangers Polls