QPR have made a bold play at solving their long-standing striker issues, sticking a £2.75m bet on Wycombe’s Ivorian forward Richard Kone to lead their line.

Facts

Richard Kone is a 22-year-old forward from Abidjan in the Ivory Coast with a unique back story.

He arrived in the UK in 2019 as a 17-year-old to represent the Ivory Coast in the annual Homeless World Cup, a charitable tournament that advocates the end of homelessness through sport and features teams of homeless people from all around the world.

After the tournament he began appearing from Lopes Tavares, a Dagenham-based non-league side more recently renamed Athletic Newham. His goalscoring exploits here were formidable. He scored 20 goals in 31 appearances in his first season. Following promotion to thew Essex Senior League in 2021 he bagged 42 in 48 games in all competitions and 31 in the league which made him the competition top scorer. The following season he scored 40 in all competitions. A trial with Colchester United followed.

After starting the 2023/24 campaign with another 21 goals he was picked up by Wycombe in January following an extended trial period. On January 9, 2024, he scored on his professional debut in a 2-1 win against West Ham U21s in the EFL Trophy – Wycombe would eventually finish runners up and Kone played 76 minutes of a Wembley final which Wycombe led until Peterborough scored twice in the final five minutes. A couple of weeks and games later he scored a first league goal in a 2-2 draw at home to Fleetwood. Goals followed later that season in wins away at Shrewsbury and Carlile and he finished the season with nine starts and 12 sub appearances in all comps, scoring four times.

Things really started taking off last season. Kone scored in his opening game of the season in a 3-2 defeat at big-spending Wrexham. By the end of September he’d scored to knock Championship side Swansea out of the League Cup, in the league away at Northampton and Barnsley, and in the EFL Trophy against Aston Villa’s kids. October brought a first senior hat trick against Peterborough and by January he’d scored 15 times in all comps. With Wycombe manager Matt Bloomfield then poached by Luton, the former Premier League side came knocking with a series of January transfer bids rumoured to be up north of £6m. Wycombe, still in the hunt for promotion back to the Championship rebuffed the approaches.

By the end of the season Kone had scored 22 times in 37 starts and 15 sub appearances. He was named the league’s player of the season and young player of the season. Ivory Coast called him up to their U23 squad for the first time in May. With Wycombe still in League One and just a year left on his contract a litany of bigger clubs have been linked this summer including Swansea and Leicester in the Championship and Toulouse in France.

Amazingly, it’s QPR who have won the race, paying a reported £2.75m up front that can potentially rise to £5m with various add ons.

Analysis @greg_spires

Not for the first time this window, QPR have landed a player in demand by clubs with significantly bigger budgets, bigger names and playing in more attractive competitions. The addition of Richard Kone is extremely exciting, but I worry many have mis-profiled him. Let’s delve into his game and see what he can bring to QPR…

Physicality and Finishing

Richard Kone shone in League One with 18 goals and three assists in the league, thanks to his physical frame and instinctive work in the box. Standing just above 6ft, Kone isn’t enormous or built like a wrestler, but he is so naturally strong that defenders can bounce of him. Furthermore, Kone looked clinical when finishing chances from turnovers – able to punish opposition mistakes. It’s something QPR have been missing for a long-time and I believe Kone could be an effective finisher that’s able to score off few chances. He varies his movement in the box, enabling him to ask questions of defenders – with some of his goals coming from excellent movement between centre-backs before finishing well first-time. Kone has shown an ability to be effective aerially and is able to adjust his body really well to score headers from challenging angles.

A powerful runner in open space, Kone can hold off defenders and enjoys the physical challenge/competition, making him a robust and exciting forward. Kone is able to generate significant power on his shots despite relatively low back lift, a trait of a player that can certainly survive at a higher level (coupled with his other attributes obviously). He finishes relatively well to corners when given time, but a handful of his goals came from reacting quickly to loose balls and poaching within ten yards of goal. One could argue there is a bias to his game, scoring a majority of his goals low to the left-hand corner. For me, this isn’t a major issue because the angles that Kone takes shots from – the left-hand side of the box – which enable him to hit either corner & be somewhat unpredictable coming inside from the left. Watching his goal against Charlton below, you can see his physical strength to pin the defender then intelligence to create separation and finish to the far corner. Kone has a variety of finishes and it's reflective of his ability to play many roles as a lone forward.

‘Proper Number 9’ Forward Play

Kone uses his physical frame superbly to pin defenders and receive passes to feet or chest. He is excellent at trapping the ball and either setting for a midfielder or sliding runners through on goal. Kone is so physically strong and able to clamp defenders; an effective backboard to play into. Inconsistency in his first touch when physically tussling is an area to improve but there were few better in League One last season at securing long balls into them. The ability to be a focal point for direct balls into front and the trust his teammates have that he can be an effective hold-up striker is enormous for QPR’s style of play. His body positioning may need a bit of work, occasionally getting too square which gives defenders a chance to disrupt the balls into him. Furthermore, he has the ball-playing ability to set the ball off for a teammate or to slide runners through in transition. The varied skillset he possesses, combined with the physical qualities, make him an extremely desirable striker and Kone can run channels well too.

While he doesn’t accelerate rapidly, Kone consistently runs into the channels outside of centre-backs to threaten the space in-behind and drag defenders around. Intelligent in his movement, he can often break into gaps by arching his runs into these channels – although he doesn’t always time them well. Kone’s duality of being the focal point to play into or the last line runner makes him incredibly desirable and leads me to believe his skillset could translate to the Championship well.

Out of Possession

Kone offers effort and energy to close down defenders and will chase balls back to the goalkeeper. He doesn’t have electric pace but is capable of applying pressure and rushing decision-making when pressing. He can get caught in isolation if the team don’t press together, leaving him helpless as opposition teams pass it round him with ease. A player that puts in the hard yards and empties the tank, Kone thrives off the crowd’s support – let’s give him that supportive energy to drive him (and the whole team) on.

Personal Thoughts

Richard Kone is a player that has garnered significant media attention due to his astronomical rise from Athletic Newham to one of League One’s top goal scorers and most feared strikers. Much like Poku, and I’m conscious that I’ll piling the pressure on a new signing, Richard Kone is a player that can & will sell for £15m+ in the future if QPR can platform him correctly. Surprised that my club have been able to beat off the competition for his signature, and simultaneously desperate to get to W12 to watch him in action.

Reaction

“I've always been really hungry to achieve being a professional footballer. I made my mind when the opportunity comes, I'll be ready. I'll be ready to take it. By God's grace, it took the time that it took, four years, and when the time was right, I did take my chances and here I am. I am really dynamic, like to work hard, run a lot, hold up play. I try my best to be better every day. I think they can expect goals from me – goals, working hard off the ball and linking up with my team-mates. I'll back myself and say I will score goals. I've always believed in myself, no matter the level. You still have to improve, keep on learning and add to what you have already. I can't wait to meet the fans, can't wait to meet them, they have been all over my socials. I'm really excited. I've had a good pre-season, I'm feeling fit, sharp, so I’m ready, ready to go.” -Richard Kone

“We are delighted to welcome Richard to the football club. Fans can expect a complete centre-forward who works hard off the ball, has the physicality to hold the ball-up effectively, bring others into play and the explosiveness to get into dangerous goal-scoring positions.” - Christian Nourry

Context

After more than 30 years of support, 20 years of LoftForWords, ten seasons in the Championship and oh so many games with Preston North End you can probably tell it takes quite a bit to get me excited about QPR these days. Can I interest you in some jaded cynicism or a sarcastic comment instead? But, I must confess, I’m excited about this one.

QPR have long standing issues at centre forward, and those certainly didn’t look like going away any time soon watching Zan Celar on Saturday. Strikers are the most expensive position to buy, and therefore on our challenged budget the most difficult to recruit. The 20-goal-a-season striker is largely mythical, or certainly the idea that everybody in the Championship has one or needs one – nobody got 20 in this league last year, only Szmodics and Adam Armstrong did the year before. There were two 20-goal strikers in the whole EFL last season – just our luck that one of them was contracted to us, Charlie Kelman, and for a variety of reasons we’ve now sold him straight onto Charlton.

QPR have found it nigh on impossible to recruit strikers over the last decade. Infamously, the closest they’ve come to replacing Charlie Austin was re-signing the actual Charlie Austin for a second time. People like Matt Smith and Seb Polter have been able to do a steady enough job at points, there have been flashes from Idrissa Sylla types, but the numbers speak for themselves – the last time a QPR players scored 20+ goals in a regular league season was Andy Thomson in 2001/02, we haven’t had anybody score more than 15 since Charlie in 2014/15, we haven’t even had a striker get into double figures in the last three years with the top scorers being Frey on eight, Dykes on seven and Dykes on eight.

We’ve spent some reasonably good money on some absolute crap down the recent years – Macauley Bonne Offside, Lyndon Dykes, Zan Celar I’m afraid to say looks like being on this list at the moment. Teams with similar budgetary issues like Coventry, Blackburn and Plymouth have been able to recruit some terrific forwards (plural) in the same period of time.

Kone looks, to me, like our best swing at this problem since we spent money and took a risk on a medical with Austin first time around. Luton bid up as high as £7m for this guy in January, Leicester and Toulouse have been in for him this summer, the analytics accounts universally adore him. Physical, athletic, scores goals with both feet (well out performing his xG with 14 non-penalty goals last year), more penalty box touches than any other League One striker... This is a striker who is involved, and who makes things happen. There have been Ivan Toney comparisons.

The move for Wycombe’s top scorer continues a few positive themes of this summer’s recruitment that suggest learnings from a year ago. With Poku, Mbengue, Burrell and now Kone we’re prioritising physicality a lot more, having been too small, too weak and too nice for much of last season. We’re looking at players capable of surviving and thriving through an EFL winter – 52 appearances last year – although of course Poku pulls his hamstring on day one just because. We’re aggressively pushing the average age of our squad down – 23.1 on Saturday the division’s youngest having started off with the second oldest behind Rotherham just two seasons ago. Kone does perhaps lack a bit of pace versus the other recruits mind.

For all these reasons, and of course budget, we seem to be taking a ‘best of League One’ approach on our budget now rather than trying to outfox other clubs shopping in European backwaters. I think that’s much more suitable to the Championship, our situation within it, and QPR as a club. We’ve traditionally been at our best when our recruitment has looked like this. Of course if you want to be cynical you could say that if you keep buying League One players then that’s where you’ll end up, but I don’t see our additions this summer in that light and in the case of Poku (Birmingham, Rangers), Mbengue (Watford) and now Kone (Swansea, Toulouse, Leicester) there was a reassuring amount of interest elsewhere.

That speaks to another theme – we’re either paying very well, or doing a bloody good persuasion job selling the club as the place to be at the moment. That won’t continue if we become known as the place you come to blow your hamstring out, and we really have to get that sorted, but to get Poku, Mbengue and now Kone ahead of those clubs with much bigger budgets than ours is a significant achievement for which Christian Nourry and the club deserve a lot of credit.

Look, it’s QPR, my first reaction is still… what’s wrong with him? Kone has, kindly put, a unique back story. Football wise he has come an enormous distance in no time at all – he only made his Wycombe debut in January 2024. We’ll have to treat him right, show patience, not heap a load of pressure on him as some sort of messiah. A hugely exciting signing all the same.

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Pictures - Reuters Connect