The new look QPR face fellow strugglers Wolves at Loftus Road on Saturday knowing a victory will open up a six point gap between the sides at the bottom of the Premier League.
Barclays Premier League >>> Saturday February 4, 2012 >>> Kick Off 3pm >>> Loftus Road, London, W12
Back in my lonely, and impoverished, Sheffield University student days I decided one Tuesday evening to take myself off to the world’s enema entry point Stoke-on-Trent to see Queens Park Rangers play Port Vale. It was much like any other trip to Port Vale in that the weather was awful, the pub in the middle of Burslem still had that “please don’t spit on the pool table” sign up and QPR surrendered meekly to a 2-0 defeat.
The plan afterwards was to shelter with the homeless people of Manchester for a while until the overnight service from Manchester Airport pitched up, which it duly did at about a quarter past ridiculous o’clock. Surrounded by 300 very drunk Sheffield United fans, who had been to see their team at Wigan, singing “We’ve got Terry Phelen” to “I’ve got that loving feeling” I closed my eyes and hoped for a swift trip over the Pennines back to my grotty student bedsit and its resident silverfish infestation. That, naturally, didn’t happen. In fact the train trundled along until it was in the most inaccessible, highest, darkest and coldest part of the mountain range and then ground to a shuddering halt before spectacularly bursting into flames. This sort of thing used to happen to me a lot.
So today I couldn’t help but feel that life was changing for the better. There I was standing on the concourse at Euston Station, staring up at a departures board that displayed not a single north bound train for the next five hours. Somewhere around Bletchley a freight train had jumped the tracks, and for some reason that had closed all four tracks in both directions. Commuters and people desperate to go home for the weekend were helpless, and presumably somewhere north of them train loads of people were stationary in the middle of the countryside awaiting news. Two days earlier and that would have been the LoftforWords travelling crew, stuck somewhere around Northampton in the middle of the night, dreaming of loved ones and warm beds on the way home from Aston Villa. That’s what used to happen
Watching our team fly off into a two goal lead before being pegged back and ending up grateful for a point was very typical QPR, but a half day delay befalling a railway less than 48 hours after we were using it, rather than 20 minutes beforehand, was certainly not. I got the same feeling today as I did when Djibril Cisse drew back his boot and drilled a half chance into a QPR lead on Wednesday night – perhaps things are different now.
But then I had this feeling in September. Neil Warnock wasn’t so much “just grateful to be here” as “delighted to have this team at my disposal” and QPR weren’t so much “we’ll be alright once we’ve made some January signings” as “suck on this 3-0 home defeat.” When we last played Wolves we’d just demolished Newcastle without scoring, won 3-0 at Molineux and were about to go onto win at Stoke and at home to Chelsea. Buoyed by new signings the sky seemed the limit and yet by mid December we were all, including our manager, praying for January to strengthen again.
The QPR squad is made up of layers of players, each signed in a transfer window by or for a manager who wasn’t there more than six months to buy again. Hall, Buzsaky, Ephraim, Connolly and Agyemang were bought for Luigi De Canio, six months later Cerny and Ramage came in when Dowie was manager, then Helguson, Borrowdale and Taarabt for Sousa, then Faurlin and Taarabt again for Magilton and so it goes on. And so we have layered another expensive load of six players on top of that this January, all short term planning. This time though it actually feels like we’ve moved on a level.
I would say we’ll know by this time tomorrow, but then we thought we knew after the last Wolves game and it turned out the same old problems still lurked. Concerns can wait, points are crucial for now.
Links >>> Opposition Focus >>> History >>> Referee >>> Betting
Team News: Mark Hughes is likely to pair Bobby Zamora and Djibril Cisse in attack for the first time this weekend with Rob Hulse dropping down to the bench. Jay Bothroyd is fit enough to join him there but DJ Campbell and Heidar Helguson are still struggling. There is much interest in the role Adel Taarabt will play under Hughes, the Moroccan is back from the African Nation Cup along with Senegal’s Armand Traore who will form a partnership down the left with Taye Taiwo.
Wolves have Jamie O’Hara available again after a double hernia operation but his fellow central midfielder Karl Henry is still suspended. Sebastien Bassong, who almost joined QPR at the end of the summer transfer window, will make his debut at centre half after joining on loan from Spurs last week with Christophe Berra likely to drop out.
Elsewhere: The two top games this weekend have been bumped back by television and it’s pretty run of the mill stuff elsewhere before Man Utd host Chelsea on Sunday at 4pm and Tottenham travel to Liverpool for the Monday night football. United are favourites to win that crunch game at Old Trafford, and with Spurs and Liverpool facing each other it’s a great chance for Arsenal to play themselves back into Champions League contention with a home match against everybody’s favourite farce Blackburn Rovers.
Eyes at Loftus Road will be firmly fixed on results at the bottom end of the league as QPR and Wolves do battle in a six pointer. Bolton go to Norwich at 3pm on Saturday while Wigan host Everton – not easy games, but matches both teams need to be looking at for points if they’re to survive. West Brom are trying their hardest to get dragged into the mire, and they play Wolves in a derby match next weekend – for now they host in form Swansea looking to correct their abysmal run of results at the Hawthorns. There are midtable clashes between Newcastle and Villa, and Stoke and Sunderland to lull you gently to sleep if you’re staying at home by the fire this weekend. And if that doesn’t do it Man City’s inevitable home win over travel sick Fulham in the televised evening match should do the trick.
Referee: Whether the signing of five new players counts as yet another dawning of yet another new era at Loftus Road is open for debate, but Saturday promises to be an event of some sorts. And if there’s an event taking place in Queens Park Rangers history then you can bet your bottom dollar that Mark Clattenburg will be in town to referee. The man who presided over our only ever play off victory, our promotion winning game at Hillsborough, and the Leeds match last season where we lifted the Championship trophy is back this weekend. So far this season he has refereed our home draw with Blackburn and annual away defeat at Norwich. For a full case file please click here.
Wolves: They haven’t won in nine matches, have only won twice in 21 games stretching back to August and they haven’t kept a clean sheet in the league since a 0-0 draw with Aston Villa on the August Bank Holiday weekend which is their worst defensive run since 1962. They are the only Premiership team not to have scored in the first 15 minutes of a match this season, have conceded two goals or more on 15 occasions in the league and have shipped six in their last two games. By contrast they’ve scored more than once in just one game out of the last eight, and that ended in a 3-2 defeat against Aston Villa, and have failed to score at all in three of their last six. Away from home they’ve won only once (on the first day of the season at Blackburn) and scored just nine goals in 11 games. They have however gained more points than any other Premiership team from losing positions this season – ten.
Betting: To follow.
Prediction: There are striking similarities between this match and the first game with Wolves this season. A feel good factor, a clutch of new signings, optimism – QPR won 3-0 that day at Molineux and, shoot me down, I’m expecting something similar again on Saturday. Wolves are circling the drain at the moment and although the signings of Frimpong and Bassong correct a lot of their problems it just looks to me like Mick McCarthy’s last stand. I’m going for a comfortable QPR victory and managerial change at Molineux first thing on Monday.
QPR by two clear goals, 19/4 with Stan James
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Pictures – Action Images