Charles Breakspear, an experienced Football League assistant referee, takes the whistle at Loftus Road for the second time in his career on Tuesday evening v Northampton.
Referee >>> Charles Breakspear (Surrey), has run the line multiple times at Loftus Road and had his first outing as a referee here v Ipswich in February 2016.
Assistants >>> Mark Derrien (Dorset) and John Farries (Oxfordshire)
Fourth Official >>> Craig Hicks (Surrey)
QPR 1 Ipswich 0, Saturday February 6, 2016, Championship
Ipswich’s main tactic in the first half seemed to revolve around kicking Ale Faurlin out of the game. The influential Argentinean was belted hard twice in the first seven minutes, the second occasion resulting in a yellow card for Kevin Bru. To add insult to an injury that left him limping badly for the rest of the half he was later booked himself for a tackle in front of the Ellerslie Road stand that looked well timed and took the ball cleanly — referee Charles Breakspear bowing to the vocal pressure of six Ipswich players who immediately surrounded him demanding a card.
When they did finally force Alex Smithies into a save, it was a spectacular one — the former Huddersfield keeper chucking himself into the air to spectacularly divert a header over the bar just as it seemed to have looped beyond him. But even that was just for show, as the long throw that lead to the chance had been deemed foul by the referee, so the goal wouldn’t have counted in any case.
Sensing there was suddenly something here for his team, McCarthy made two changes — striker Daryl Murphy and former QPR junior Giles Coke on for the anonymous Varney and Cole Skuse. But the veteran manager and his players were indebted to referee Breakspear on the hour when their tendency to manhandle Polter and Hall as they attacked corners got out of hand, and the latter nearly had his shirt lifted clean over his head as he tried to nod home at the back post. Standing there, arms wide, bare chested in the near gale force winds, it was difficult to understand what else Hall had to do to be awarded a spot kick in that situation. Polter, meanwhile, probably enjoys less frequent affectionate contact from Mrs Polter than he got from Christophe Berra on Saturday. All unpunished, and therefore encouraged to continue at every corner.
Breakspear further endeared himself to the home crowd by waving away a bad foul on Hoilett before he went off, then booking Onuoha for a body check on Sears.
QPR: Smithies 8; Perch 6, Hall 7, Onuoha 6, Konchesky 6; Phillips 6, Luongo 7, Faurlin 6 (Tozser 59, 7), Hoilett 7 (Mackie 70, 7); Washington 7 (El Khayti 80, 7), Polter 6
Subs not used: Chery, Angella, Ingram, Petrasso
Goals: Phillips 88 (assisted El Khayti)
Bookings: Faurlin 34 (foul) Onuoha 60 (foul)
Ipswich: Bialkowski 8; Chambers 6, Smith 6, Berra 7, Knudsen 6; Bru 5, Skuse 5 (Coke 58, 7), Fraser 6 (Toure 90+6, -), Sears 6; Pitman 4, Varney 5 (Murphy 57, 6)
Subs not used: Maitland-Niles, Henly, Digby, Foley
Bookings: Bru 7 (foul)
Referee — Charles Breakspear (Surrey) 5 A fairly bog-standard Championship effort. Allowed absolutely blatant fouls to go unpunished as most corners were delivered, booked Ale Faurlin for winning the ball, failed to book several players for hammering Faurlin the other way, ignored a horrendous tackle on Hoilett in the second half altogether… then to put the tin hat on the whole thing he added a very hefty five minutes to the end of the game and played seven. The stuff he stared straight at but ignored at corners was remarkable — most notably the incident where Hall almost had his shirt completely liberated from his torso by Berra as he attacked a ball at the back post.
Breakspear showed a fairly hefty 165 yellows in his 40 games last year including ten yellows at Swindon v Bury, eight at Barnet v Cambridge and seven at Crawley v Cheltenham. Ten reds across the season on top of that, including two to Northampton players in the penultimate match of the season when they drew 1-1 with Shrewsbury despite finishing the game with nine men.
He showed 142 and seven in 37 games the season before and 97 and nine in 29 in 2014 having started the season with six reds in his first ten fixtures.
League Cup >>> Trevor Kettle still lurks in the lower reaches of the Football League list and has Grimsby v Derby in the cup.
The Twitter @loftforwords
Pictures — Action Images