A David Nugent goal midway through the second half sealed a 1-0 win for Leicester against QPR on Easter Saturday.
In a week when a series of shock results have all but handed Liverpool their first league title in 20 years, it was somehow comforting and reassuring that down in the Championship QPR did everything that was expected of them at Leicester City on Saturday.
At least with Rangers at the moment you know exactly where you stand.
No youth players shall be selected for the first team. Ever. Even when faced with a run of totally meaningless games at the end of the season, which many managers would see as an ideal chance to blood a few youth teamers that the club actually owns, Harry Redknapp would sooner pick Luke Young at centre back.
On Saturday at champions-elect Leicester City the tombola machine, into which only senior players and loan signings are ever entered, kicked out a side that included two left backs. That’s because another thing you can be very sure of with QPR at the moment is that whenever he’s fit and available for selection, Benoit Assou Ekotto will be in the side. That despite an obvious decline in his performance level and a lamentable attitude to his work since a much-tipped return to parent club Spurs failed to materialise in January.
Against the Foxes he embarked on a one man mission to get Easter Monday off. Eight minutes before half time he went over the ball on Rihad Mahrez and was lucky that referee Scott Duncan only saw that as a yellow card — Karl Henry did him a big favour, holding a crowd of Leicester players at bay and calming the situation so it didn’t appear as bad as it was. Rather than make the most of his let off, the Cameroon full back launched into another ridiculous tackle midway through the second half on Andy King and trooped straight off down the tunnel with a gormless smile on his face.
Harry Redknapp looked less than impressed, but while he continues to select a player who is clearly no longer bothered about playing for QPR he can have few complaints.
Redknapp also believes Mobido Maiga can start up front for QPR regularly. The Mali international has been an absolute disaster zone since arriving in this country last summer, first with West Ham and now on loan at Loftus Road. His touch is abysmal and technique amateurish. His game awareness is laughable — at one point in the first half against Leicester he was caught standing still, gazing around in dumb struck awe, five yards offside. He’s in danger of going down as one of QPR’s all-time worst players if he cannot show miraculous improvement in the closing games and it’s getting to the stage now where he’s so utterly shambolic that the club should really be Tweeting a warning in advance if Redknapp is intending to start with him so supporters know not to both attending.
He was unfortunate in three minutes of first half stoppage time to see a shot deflect just wide of Kasper Schmeichel’s post with the keeper beaten — referee Duncan mistakenly awarded a goal kick instead of a corner — and prior to that he’d been involved in a nice one two with Super Size Niko Kranjcar whose shot was parried over the bar. But mostly he was awful, dragging shots wide and interrupting moves with poor touches before his inevitable withdrawal 20 minutes from time so Bobby Zamora could have a run out.
Maiga was so dreadful at Bournemouth on his last start that at one point he even seemed to offer a hand of apology to the travelling support after one particular moment of crass incompetence. But, again, while he continues to be selected, what complaint can we have or change can we expect? He’s simply not good enough, and the only mystery is how many more times we’re going to have to suffer his presence before Redknapp accepts that himself.
It would also seem that we can now start to write off the away matches — at least until the play offs start. Rangers have lost seven of their last nine on the road, and four of their last five. Since Leicester and Burnley disappeared over the horizon, and with a massive gap back down to seventh and a play-off spot all but secured, the road trips have become almost a total waste of time for supporters. Sometimes QPR have been unlucky — they played well in defeat at Brighton and had good cause to believe that Derby’s winning goal should have been disallowed — but sometimes they’ve been poor — Charlton, Blackburn — and on other occasions absolutely abject and embarrassing — Sheffield Wednesday.
This latest game at Leicester probably fits into the unfortunate category. Despite another weird and wonderful team selection QPR gave a good account of themselves, particularly in the first half. Niko Kranjcar’s weight gain since the start of the season has been alarming and he’s now built like a cast member from a Croatian re-make of Big Momma’s House. He too was fortunate not to be sent off — booked on the stroke of half time for a foul on Danny Drinkwater and then guilty of a late lunge every bit as daft as Assou-Ekotto’s in the second but referee Duncan didn’t even award a free kick. But he made QPR tick when they had the ball before half time and caused Leicester’s muscular but skilfully limited defence all manner of difficulties. He had an early shot deflected over, another saved by Schmeichel, and teed Maiga up for varying forms of disaster on several occasions.
The closest he came to a goal was on the half hour when Yun Suk-Young, selected out of position on the left wing with promising youngster Mike Petrasso not even on the bench, delivered a free kick which caused panic in the six yard box and Kranjcar saw an instinctive shot blocked by Schmeichel. The Croat didn’t deserve to be on the losing side.
Neither did Nedum Onuoha, selected at centre half alongside Aaron Hughes. A last ditch goalline clearance five minutes before half time after Rob Green and Karl Henry had contrived to turn a goal kick into a one on one shooting opportunity for Andy King was the most eye catching moment of his display. But a block on Anthony Knockaert as the perma tanned Frenchman seized on a loose ball in the area in injury time summed him up more — always in the right place, always strong and composed. The thing is, one of the other things we also know about QPR and Harry Redknapp at the moment, is that Richard Dunne starts, and Onuoha’s presense here was only to rest the Irishman for the bigger games ahead.
Personally I think we have to find a way for Onuoha to start at centre half, preferably alongside Clint Hill, because it allows us to push further up the field and, frankly, he’s in much better form than Dunne anyway. I won’t hold my breath.
And that’s the thing isn’t it? What’s the point in holding our breath about any of this? What’s the point in getting het up about youngsters not playing, or Benoit Assou-Ekotto always starting and showing a piss rank attitude, or Mobido Maiga earning all this money for these dreadful performances, or the lamentable approach of the team as a whole to away games? The matches are largely meaningless at the moment and none of the above is coming as a surprise. Did anybody really go to Brighton, Sheffield Wednesday, Blackburn, Bournemouth and now Leicester expecting anything different?
Apathy oozes from every pore of the club at the moment — the players, management and support all look like they wish it was the summer already — and even though the performance in Leicester wasn’t too bad, the R’s still contrived to lose the match 1-0.
Mahrez volleyed wide via a deflection after Schlupp’s cross in the very first minute of the game and then Knockaert skewed a shot horribly wide after Nugent’s immaculate touch and lay off when found with a high ball. Andy King volleyed towards goal from 12 yards out but Rob Green produced a smart save and held the ball.
Redknapp sent on the lesser-spotted Shaun Wright-Phillips for Yossi Benayoun at half time — surely an injury related change given that the Israeli was QPR’s only midfielder who could actually run around on Saturday — and he won an early challenge that sent the ball skewing into the path of Maiga to, yet again, drag a shot hopelessly wide. Then, after Gary O’Neil won a ball back in his own half and fed Kranjcar, the Croat crossed for Maiga at the back post who had all the time he could ever possibly want to pick a spot and the spot he picked was somewhere halfway up the stand behind the goal. Enough of this now Redknapp please. Mercy Redknapp. Mercy.
Ok, maybe it is worth getting a little het up about.
The difference between the sides, just as it was at Loftus Road, turned out to be clinical finishing. Midway through the second half David Nugent started and finished a move that concluded with a through ball from Drinkwater and a crisp finish from the former Preston striker, across Rob Green and into the far corner of the net. A carbon copy of Jamie Vardy’s winner at Loftus Road in the corresponding fixture, and enough to seal all three points for the Foxes with Assou-Ekotto’s red card a short time later finishing the visitors’ off.
The closest they came to an equaliser was Suk-Young lobbing a through ball towards an empty goal as Kasper Schmiechel charged towards him. The ball bounced wide but referee Duncan, perhaps a little harshly given that the keep made an honest play for a loose ball, brought play back, booked Schmeichel and awarded a free kick that Kranjcar struck into the wall.
But for a late save at the near post from Green to deny Mahrez it could have been a good deal worse.
Disappointing, but fairly inevitable, and not a bit surprising.
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Leicester: Schmeichel 7; De Laet 6, Morgan 6, Wasilewski 7, Schlupp 6 (Moore 77, 6); Hammond 6 (James 67, 6), King 6, Drinkwater 7, Mahrez 7; Nugent 7, Knockaert 6 (Dyer 68, 6)
Subs not used: Taylor-Fletcher, Logan, Phillips, Wood
Goals: Nugent 67 (assisted Drinkwater)
Bookings: Schmeichel 72 (foul)
QPR: Green 6; Simpson 6, Onuoha 7, Hughes 6, Assou-Ekotto 4; Henry 6, O’Neil 5; Benayoun 6 (Wright-Phillips 46, 5), Kranjcar 7 (Morrison 82, -), Suk-Young 6; Maiga 4 (Zamora 72, 6)
Subs not used: Dunne, Keane, Murphy, Donaldson
Red Cards: Assou-Ekotto 77 (two yellows)
Bookings: Assou-Ekotto 38 (foul), Kranjcar 44 (foul), O’Neil 56 (foul), Assou-Ekotto 77 (foul)
QPR Star Man — Nedum Onuoha 7 A straight fight between Niko Kranjcar and Nedum Onuoha, and had the Croatian’s finishing been a little bit sharper he’d have been a clear winner, but as it was Onuoha provided a solid centre to a makeshift defence and furthered his case for play-off inclusion ahead of the out of form Richard Dunne.
Referee — Scott Duncan (Northumberland) 7 I liked him. QPR could certainly have no complaints about the Assou-Ekotto sending off, and in fact he was very generous with Niko Kranjcar who could also have been red carded so a point off for that. He was calm, not swayed by player reaction, gave himself time to think, got the big decisions right.
Attendance — 27,386
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