QPR are in contention this season, and therefore naturally have run out of goalkeepers going through March. With Lee Camp unavailable, who you gonna call?
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Smithers, there's no way I can lose this bet unless, of course, my nine all-stars fall victim to nine separate misfortunes and are unable to play tomorrow. But that will never happen. Three misfortunes, that's possible. Seven misfortunes, there's an outside chance. But nine misfortunes? I'd like to see that!
Seny Dieng was nobbled by Sam Gallagher in a challenge that received nowhere near enough attention from match officials and television pundits at the time. David Marshall, whose expressed ambition for the move was to win his place back in the Scotland squad ahead of the World Cup, jeopardised that by battling through a hamstring injury to try and get us something from a lost cause at Forest resulting in a full blow out — that should always be remembered when assessing his brief time here. I thought we’d had a bit of a touch when the mostly terrifying Jordan Archer suffered a shoulder explosion saving a penalty against Rotherham in the FA Cup resulting in the arrival of a far better goalkeeper, but not so much now. Joe Walsh, impressive in fleeting glimpses of pre-season, has had his hand pinned. Mike Scioscia may not live through the night. Not many teams will field more goalkeepers than they do centre forwards in a season, but here we are — my beautiful Queens Park Rangers, being very Queens Park Rangers indeed.
Come on down Keiren Westwood, literally as old as me. As a fellow short-arsed goalkeeper myself (Westwood is down as 6ft 2ins, and that feels very strongly like his agent has been editing his Wikipedia) I’ve always admired him for his athletic, all-action, often unorthodox, Paddy Kenny-style command of the box, as well as prodigious kicking ability. He often played well against QPR, particularly in his Coventry days. One of only two people to win Sheff Wed’s Player of the Year award more than once. But let’s be real here, he’s 37 now, his last outing for anybody was May 8 last year when he shipped three in the Owls’ relegation game at Derby. Our dearly missed Sheff Wed correspondent Lovely Jon Hore simply messaged "injured in the warm up, he’d do it all the time, used to properly fuck me off”. And this is not a man who got that nickname easily. It takes plenty to upset Lovely Jon. I’ve seen him stoically sit through A. LOT. Still, surely even QPR can’t make a second emergency goalkeeper signing in one season and injure him as well? Can they? Hello. Hello? Is this thing on?
My first question is: why isn’t this Lee Camp? I mean, the actual answer to this is he signed for Clitheroe (me neither) in February and therefore wasn’t available, but that’s particularly stupid on his part. If we’ve learned anything through repeatedly getting that sodding 08.00 train from Euston to follow QPR up and down the country for the last 30 years it’s that they’re rarely involved at either top or bottom of the table through March and April but, on the occasions it does happen, they always somehow accidentally run out of goalkeepers at this point of the year and Lee Camp always rocks up and just styles the whole thing out for us. We can go through years and years of finishing sixteenth where the goalkeeper never gets injured at all but as soon as it does matter of course every goalkeeper within 20 miles of the place is immediately killed to death - because it’s QPR. Not to worry - you’ll find a Lee Camp under your seat for just such an eventuality. Please do not inflate your Lee Camp until you are clear of the aircraft as it may impede your exit from the division. He should have looked at the Championship table and just sat by the phone.
Who can forget the trip to Hartlepool, in the best-days-of-our-lives 2003/04 promotion winning season, when Chris Day and physio Prav came up with the bright idea of a homemade rudimentary lance for a boil on his shin during the downtime of Thursday afternoon and ruled him out for the season with understudy Nick Culkin already cold in the ground? One emergency scan of Mel Johnson’s little black book later and Campy was picked up by the team coach at a motorway service station on the way up to the North East. His magnificent performance, pouring oil on troubled first half waters, and the misfortune of finally conceding a consolation goal after a brilliant double save, the second-best memory of a crucial 4-1 away win behind the morbidly obese gentleman’s encounter with the deckchairs at half time.
Four years later, club back on its arse, John Gregory’s team faced an almost certain relegation after a televised February 5-0 bum gobbing at Southend. Campy was summoned from Derby again and produced a goalkeeping display for the ages in what looked like an impossible Tuesday night 0-0 up at Elland Road. Time wasting that would make Preston North End blush. As the locals seethed, he paraded around in front of the tiny away following up in the cheese wedge, absolutely loving life. From a 5-0 at Roots Hall QPR won five and drew four of the next 12, keeping four clean sheets, to secure a Championship safety that nobody — nobody - had thought even slightly likely before that night. When people reflect back on Lee Camp, some of the politics late in his time here, some of the stuff that went on, some of the performances, and some of the libellous tripe that was pedalled on certain websites for the benefit of certain parties, I always think it’s worth remembering what a seriously fucking good goalkeeper he was for us in seasons and moments that actually really mattered. Twice he strode in here as a loan in an hour of need and just absolutely owned the shirt and the task in hand, relishing the challenge and chucking himself at the supporters and the culture here. He was treated appallingly after Radek Cerny’s signing. Way too small for a goalkeeper, like Paddy Kenny who followed him, he embodied what it is to play for QPR — it’s tough, you’re here because there’s something wrong with you or you’d be somewhere else, relish it - and absolutely loved it here. Giving it the big ‘un in front of the away end as a teenager on debut at Hartlepool, striding across towards us at the end of that Leeds clean sheet those years later. Yes please. Love the man. Was looking forward to seeing him on Sunday.
The second question is: why can’t Dillon Barnes play? The signing of Barnes, as both regular readers will know, has niggled me from the start. This is a goalkeeper who wasn’t particularly good in his 31 appearances for League Two strugglers Colchester, and was brought in at a time when we already had Joe Lumley and Liam Kelly, with youth team goalkeepers behind them, and were supposed to be hacking back at costs. He’s not particularly young, we’re not going to develop him to sell, he very seldom gets an outing for the U23s or B Team, and on the multiple loans he goes out on he either doesn’t play and doesn’t impress when he does. I’m uncomfortable with the idea of the goalkeeper recruitment being separate from the other player recruitment anyway, largely down to the goalkeeper coaches and not the head of recruitment. For a club that is constantly trying to educate its supporters on its limited budget, and the challenges of playing in a parachute-payment-dominated division while trying to operate sensibly, spending whatever Barnes’ weekly wage is on a keeper obviously not good enough for this level and isn’t going anywhere in his career, who as it turns out they’re reluctant to even put on the bench for Championship games even when desperate, doesn’t pass the smell test. We’ve renewed his contract in that period as well. I didn’t like it then, and if you can’t pick him now when you’ve rinsed through as many keepers as we have, I like it even less.
Why, regulatory wise, have we been allowed to bring a keeper in over his head? The EFL guidelines on emergency keeper loans say anybody who has more than five first team appearances is counted as an option in such circumstances, and like I say Barnes did flap his way through 30-odd outings for Colchester. The fact he’s played for Yeovil and Aldershot on loan this year is irrelevant - usually you’re not allowed to play for three clubs in a season but that doesn’t apply to non-league (six appearances, zero wins, 13 goals conceded, by the way).
For this, we’ve actually done some ringing around in an attempt to not just be internet twats mouthing off about things we have no knowledge of (shut up). As I understand it, this comes down to a separate bit of needless EFL bureaucracy in the ‘25-man-squad rule’, which has been quietly introduced at this level recently for no obviously good reason other than they saw the Premier League had done it and copied. QPR have a 24-man squad for the second half of the season, deliberately leaving a place open for emergency loan signings, because they’d clocked, and now been vindicated in their belief, that the process for adding an emergency loan signing was a lot quicker and simpler than trying to add an existing squad member to your 25 ‘out of hours’. Had they attempted to register Barnes post-Forest as that twenty-fifth man and potentially failed to do so before Friday lunchtime, they’d have been faced with playing a child in goal against Peterborough on Sunday — probably JK Rowling-wrote-an-Irish-character Murphy Mahoney. The process for bringing in an experienced emergency loan is shorter, simpler, and with a more friendly deadline (Westwood was eventually announced at 18.00), so that’s the process they went down. The question of why Barnes is here, why we’re spending that wage money on him, when he’s not even any use in this situation, or in the 25-man-squad to begin with, remains extremely valid for me. I didn’t think there was any point to him before, and I certainly don’t now. But, had they failed to get Barnes through the laborious process of being belatedly added to that squad by lunchtime Friday, the Westwood option would have been lost to them. Even Lee Camp can’t save you then. Welcome to the EFL.
Still, it’s only bottom-of-the-table Peterborough here this weekend, and that hasn’t been a problem before.
Darryl Strawberry is still here.
Links >>> Sad Championship return — Interview >>> Late Gallen heroics — History >>> David Webb again — Referee >>> Posh Official Website >>> Peterborough Telegraph — Local Press >>> London Road — Forum
Team News: So, deep breath, Keiren Westwood is in goal. We know that Seny Dieng, David Marshall, Joe Walsh and Jordan Archer are all out. Lyndon Dykes is being targeted at the Fulham game on the other side of the international break — with Scotland still at this point insisting that he will be called up for their forthcoming meaningless friendlies. QPR must repel all boarders on this one. I’m proud to have internationals in our team, and as we develop players to sell for money international call ups are a valuable weapon in our armoury — if Dykes had happened to score a couple at the Euros last summer you watch the stupid money that would have turned up in a world where Kenneth Zohore and Gary Madine are worth £8m and Salomon Rondon more than £20m. But Dykes hasn’t been able to play for us for more than a month now, and patently wasn’t fit when he did then at Millwall. Scotland have rinsed him over the last two years, frequently picking him in all three of the games during the ridiculous condensed fixture list during the Covid-19 lockdown. He has played 95 times from the start of last season to now, and with the situation in Ukraine meaning this forthcoming international break is largely meaningless for Steve Clarke’s side it’s time to start stamping our feet a little bit. The Ukraine play-off qualifier, and a potential final decider with the winner of Wales and Austria, have been punted back to June because of the Russian invasion there which means that in a rare summer without a tournament, Scotland and Lyndon now face the prospect of six quick-fire games in June with two Nations League games with Armenia, one with Ireland and another match with Ukraine already on the calendar. Come on Clarke, we’ve all had a drink. He stays here this time. After that it’s just working out how Jeff Hendrick fits into the team and we’re good to go.
Ricky-Jade Jones, who scored against us in the FA Cup tie, has got lost in the woods.
Elsewhere: In this final round of fixtures before a much-needed international break, sixth-placed QPR go last on Sunday morning.
Their two immediate chasers — Middlesbrough in seventh also on 59 points and Forest on eighth on 58 — play in the FA Cup this weekend in mouth-watering ties against the Putin Warmongers and Liverpool, so cannot go past Rangers. Middlesbrough’s approach to the Money Laundry asking for the game to be played behind closed doors - from Steve Gibson being allowed to go off-piste free of the usual PR influenced-platitudes about Abramovic’s invidious influence in British football, to putting the away end on sale to home supporters, and today donating all the profits from a lucrative cup quarter final to Ukrainian charities - will be taught in media degrees for years to come. Textbook. Against a club with more media and PR professionals on staff than Boro have players. Sheffield Red Strip (58) can, and likely will overtake us, with a Saturday lunchtime home derby game against Barnsley. Wawwlll (57) can also knock us down a place if they add another victory to an unbeaten run of eight (six wins) with an eminently winnable match at Stoke, although that looks the most obvious draw the coupon has ever seen. Overall though this is probably the last of the ‘great opportunities’ QPR have mostly burned through in recent weeks to post points and cement their top-six position while the rivals are busy doing other things — we’ve been in the ‘fifties’ since the last week of January.
Ahead of us, now by one place and one point, Lutown. If you were in any doubt as to Nathan Jones’ context when he talked about QPR "celebrating in a certain way” last weekend, that it was just all about how far they’d come, then he sought to double down on that after a midweek win against Preston saying: "They were very disrespectful to us, the way they celebrated, they won a game, but I think they got rattled as they’re QPR and they should be up the top of the league. But they came here below Luton Town and how dare Luton Town be above QPR?" Again, given the way Jones celebrates goals and victories, charging off into the stand behind the goal this season against Swansea and Bournemouth, beating his chest over a 0-0 he got at Loftus Road with a multi-million-pound Stoke side, I just can’t credit the Chelsea-levels of self-awareness. Still, Hull City away this weekend a great chance for them to push on further into the six. They’re one point behind Blackburn in fourth, though they’ve only got the gimme at Reading so you’d expect that situation to remain the same and QPR to be punished with a widening gap if they can’t win their equivalent.
Sporting Huddersfield, piling on and not giving a fuck what you and your podcast mates think about them, are at home to faltering Bournemouth in the game of the weekend. If Scott Parker’s latest attempt to buy a promotion while playing the most grimy form of shithouse football falls flat on its arse from this position then I’m at risk of laughing myself to death, and this could be an important step towards that sweet, sweet relief. Leaders Fulham are one of those with the week off.
Wayne Rooney’s Derby County gave a good account of themselves in the first half at Blackburn and led during the week, but looked completely gassed in the second half and were ultimately blown away by a team that had scored once in nine games. It’s Coventry’s round in their Last Chance Saloon this Saturday lunchtime, and I’m backing an away win. Hopefully Mel’s Got You On Strings FC will be fully spent by the time they get to Loftus Road next month.
Birmingham City are doing their usual thing of staying up while never beating anybody, and their away match at Swanselona this weekend looks like the sort of desperate slop only the compulsives would bother with. You’re very welcome here.
Type ‘Bristol City’ into the promotional box for a free three points — this week, West Brom, though if you’d back that shower to check for a voucher code before purchase you’re a more optimistic man than I.
Referee: I can’t say I was at all impressed with David Webb’s handling of our FA Cup tie at London Road, and QPR have won just one of nine games with this official, but here he is again all the same. Details.
QPR: Our man Jack Supple took time out from his regular Friday night routine of just being a thoroughly decent lad to let us know the last time we used four senior keepers in a season was 2015/16 when Robert Green and his chunky knit, King Alex Smithies, Joe Lumley and Matt Ingram all got a go at one point or another. Rangers have gone from an unbeaten January of five wins and two draws from seven, to a sequence of two wins from ten which started with a 2-0 loss at Peterborough in the FA Cup. Rangers had won nine of 14 games, and drawn three of the others, prior to that, losing just four of 21, but have now won two and lost six of ten following the midweek 3-1 at Nottingham Forest. The 2-1 loss to Cardiff last time out was their first home defeat in eight. Luton and Forest have now joined them as third top scorers in the league on 53 behind Bournemouth (56) and Fulham (90, ridiculous). Andre Gray has scored three goals in three appearances after three in his previous 14 — he now has a creditable record of eight QPR goals in 14 starts and 11 sub apps.
Peterborough: No team in the league has won as few (five), lost as many (24) and conceded as many (75) as Peterborough this season. Only Barnsley (28) have scored fewer than their 29. Since Peterborough beat Millwall at home 2-1 on December 11 they have won just twice, against Bristol Rovers and QPR at home in the FA Cup. Posh have lost 11 and drawn four of 14 Championship matches. They have won just seven of 41 league and cup fixtures this season — QPR account for 20% of their league victories, 28.5% of their wins overall, and 12% of their league and cup goals scored having somehow lost twice at London Road in league and cup conceding four in the process. Those two matches included in just 12 occasions when Peterborough have scored more than one in a game — although two of those have been the last two outings in a 2-2 with Stoke and 2-3 loss at home to Swansea. They have lost 4-0 on three occasions, including the League One Plymouth in the League Cup, and have a 4-1 at home to Coventry and 6-2 at Sheff Utd on top of that. They have won one, drawn two and lost 16 of their away games so far, at least three defeats worse than the next poorest record in the division — the only victory coming at Hull. They have conceded 49 goals in 19 away games. Their goal difference is -46, 104 different from league leaders Fulham. Jonson Clarke-Harris is top scorer here with seven. If QPR can score early, it might be half the job done — Peterborough have conceded ten times in the first quarter of an hour of games this season, losing eight and winning just one when it has occurred.
Prediction: We’re indebted to The Art of Football for once again agreeing to sponsor our Prediction League and provide prizes. You can get involved by lodging your prediction here or sample the merch from our sponsor’s QPR collection here. Last year’s champion Mick_S was the only person in the world who called the Luton score right and this week says…
"This is a close to a must win game as there is. I’ve just told myself off for using that expression, but to not win will leave a mountain to climb and a few less cliches to use. I don’t want to be a dick about this, but we should win this - we do need to, given our run in and the two horrible injuries Rangers suffered midweek. I’m going to go with a nervy 2-1, with Dickie to smash one in.”
Mick’s Prediction: QPR 2-1 Peterborough. Scorer — Rob Dickie
LFW’s Prediction: QPR 1-0 Peterborough. Scorer — Lee Camp
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