Bond, Darren Bond, in charge of Forest visit - Referee
Thursday, 22nd Feb 2018 20:26 by Clive Whittingham

Darren Bond, who booked eight but was rated highly when we lost at Middlesbrough in September, is the referee for our game with Forest on Saturday.

Referee >>> Darren Bond (Lancashire), last two QPR appointments have ended in 3-2 defeats for the R’s.

Assistants >>> Jonathan Hunt (Merseyside) and Ian Cooper (Kent)

Fourth Official >>> Graham Horwood (Bedfordshire)

History

Middlesbrough 3 QPR 2, Saturday September 16, 2017, Championship

QPR have been good this season. They pose an attacking threat, pass the ball nicely, play through opponents effectively and are good to watch. But even when their first choice defence was playing, they’ve proven vulnerable during those ten minute pleasure windows every team has in a game. Sheff Wed, Norwich, Millwall and now Middlesbrough have stuck five goals through Rangers in the 15 minutes immediately after half time when, ideally, you want to be soaking up anything new the opposition manager has to offer, quietening the crowd back down, working your position back into the game and then setting about playing through the final half hour. An Alex Smithies yellow card for timewasting as early as the fifty second minute betrayed the team’s nervousness with the situation, despite their accomplished performance to that point.

Game retrieved, Boro rather went back into their shells after that — though Assombalonga skied a wonderful chance to make it 4-2 high over the bar and off towards the docks on 72 minutes and Smithies spectacularly tipped over from the impressive Baker. Jamie Mackie’s scrap with Cyrus Christie, for which both players were yellow carded by excellent referee Darren Bond, showed Rangers weren’t done yet and Holloway sent on Idrissa Sylla to add more presence and threat to the attack.

Boro: Randolph 5; Christie 6, Fry 6, Gibson 6, Fabio 5; Leadbitter 6 (Howson 56, 6), Clayton 6 (Fletcher 46, 7); Baker 8, Downing 6 (Forshaw 78, 6), Johnson 8; Assombalonga 7

Subs not used: Konstantopoulos, Friend, Shotton, Bamford

Goals: Baker 36 (assisted Johnson), Fletcher 55 (assisted Christie), Assombalonga 60 (assisted Johnson)

Yellows: Clayton 34 (foul), Leadbitter 39 (foul), Christie 66 (unsporting), Baker 66 (foul)

QPR: Smithies 7; Furlong 6, Baptiste 6, Robinson 6, Bidwell 6; Luongo 8, Freeman 7, Manning 7; Lua Lua 6 (Wszolek 45, 6), Smith 6 (Mackie 45, 6), Wheeler 6 (Sylla 68, 6)

Subs not used: Borysiuk, Ngbakoto, Lumley, Osayi-Samuel

Goals: Wheeler 2 (assisted Freeman), Mackie 50 (unassisted)

Yellows: Luongo 32 (foul), Wszolek 47 (foul), Smithies 52 (timewasting), Mackie 66 (unsporting)

Referee — Darren Bond (Lancashire) 8 A lot of cards (eight) in a game that didn’t really feel like one of those but overall I thought he was excellent, in keeping with the unusually high standard of officiating we’ve had from the Championship officials in our games so far this season. Really contributed to the flow of an enjoyable game.

Barnsley 3 QPR 2, Wednesday August 17, 2016, Championsip

Our only moment of excitement in the first half came from a Chery free kick. From about 20 yards he curled a lovely effort which clipped the top of the bar and went out for a goal kick. That was it for us and it was with some relief the half ended with only a one goal deficit and we could hope for an improvement in the second half.

We didn’t have to wait long. A lovely ball around the centre half by Chery and Polter was away and heading towards goal. Through a mixture of shirt pulling and tripping Polter was thwarted and the referee pointed to the spot. Chery easily converted and the away end finally awoke from their sleepy state and our spirits were rightly raised.

But before any changes could be made Rangers found themselves in front. Some neat passing and a dangerous cross from the right came to N’Gbakato who drew a foolish challenge and the referee once again pointed correctly to the spot. There were concerned looks around us as Chery threw the ball to Polter to take the penalty. Why? Chery had already nailed three pens this season surely he should be taking this one too? Oh no, Polter’s bound to miss. Bang! 2- 1 to the R’s and “We’re top of the league!” boomed out of the away end.

Only fifteen minutes to go and leading through our only two efforts on target, let’s show that strength and steel that was in evidence on Sunday and put this game to bed. Or let’s give away a ridiculous free kick in dangerous position when an attacker is moving away from goal. It may have been soft but why give the opponent a reason to fall flat on his face and the referee a decision to make? We’ve just taken the lead and Barnsley have struggled to break us down in the second half. Utter stupidity and naivety to make any kind of challenge there and you know the rest. From an almost identical position as Chery’s free kick in the first half, Hourihane belts an absolute beauty passed the helpless Smithies and the momentum swung back to the home side.

Hasselbaink tried to freshen things up by replacing the tired N’Gbakoto with El Khayati, who I don’t think touched the ball in the ten minutes he was on for. We had tossed the lead away but a point was still a good result and we move on to Saturday still unbeaten. Yeah right. Last minute winner for Barnsley.

From our angle it looked like Hall had been fouled in the lead up to the goal but the officials were unmoved and Oakwell was predominantly jubilant. Washington replaced the ineffective and knackered Cousins and Hall was rightly shown a second yellow followed by the red for deliberately stopping a late Barnsley break on the halfway line. That really was the icing on the cake for a disappointing last 15 minutes and the game drifted to defeat.

Hasselbaink is moaning about the officials but he needs to look more closely at his game management. Cousins needed replacing far earlier and we seemed content to let the game drift for long periods rather than trying something different. We certainly didn’t play well enough to deserve the win and we need to get more people forward more quickly. Too often our midfield slowed the game down and passed backwards. Henry was particularly guilty of this and kept putting us under pressure with misplaced passes, terrible crosses or fouls. I also hope the real Smithies returns on Saturday as I didn’t enjoy his Rob Green impersonation at all.

Barnsley: Davies NA; Bree 6; Roberts 6, Mawson 7, White 7; Kent 8; Scowen 7; Hourihane 8; Hammil 5; Watkins 6 (D’Almeida 82, -); Bradshaw 5 (Payne 63, 6)
Subs not used: Macdonald, Moncur, Lee, Townsend, Yiadom

Goals: Watkins 4 (assisted Hourihane/Roberts), Hourihane 77 (free kick won Hourihane, conceded Luongo), Scowen 89 (assisted Payne, mistake Hall)

Bookings: Roberts 46 (foul)

QPR: Smithies 4; Onuoha 7, Caulker 6, Hall 4, Bidwell 6; N’Gbakoto 6 (El Khayati 83, -), Henry 4, Luongo 5, Cousins 5 (Washington 91, -); Chery 7 ; Polter 7
Subs not used: Ingram, Perch, Petrasso, Shodipo, Kakay

Goals: Chery 47 (penalty, won Polter), Polter 75 (penalty, won N’Gbakoto)

Red Cards: Hall 90+5 (two bookings)

Bookings: Onuoha 90+3 (foul), Hall 61 (foul), 90+5 (foul)

Referee — Darren Bond (Lancashire) 7 He has taken a bit of flak from JFH (and the fans around me) about the soft free kick and not awarding a foul in the run up to their winner, but I quite liked the way he ran the game. I’m not sure what game JFH was watching but Barnsley were not a dirty team. The ref let the game flow, he was not fussy, played the advantage well and when he had to make the big calls (the two pens) he made them. How many time does the away team get two pens? His bookings and sending off were spot on. The free kick may have been soft for their equaliser but the fault lies with the challenge. It looked a foul in the run-up to the winner but the assistant was closer and didn’t flag and it’s not clear on the tv highlights anyway. So I’m happy to not criticise here.

Stats

Five red cards from 32 appearances this season for Bond, but four of those have come very recently with two in his last three games, three in his last seven and four in his last 12. Is everything alright at home? He’s booked 113 players with our game at Middlesbrough leading the way with eight, and two others pulling seven. He’s refereed Forest in losses at Ipswich (4-2) and at home to Sunderland (1-0).

The Grant Hall red card at Barnsley last August was one of six Bond showed across the season in 40 appointments. The total of 117 yellows was an average of 2.925 a game and led by the seven shown in Wolves’ ridiculous 4-4 draw with Fulham in the Championship.