Having arrested decline and passed the first half of the season with flying colours, QPR are now starting to be asked tougher questions by the Championship and need to start finding better answers at Watford on Sunday.
Old First Division, Old Old Second Division >>> Sunday December 29, 2013 >>> Kick Off 15.00 >>> Vicarage Road, Watford
QPR have played this gratuitous extra game between Christmas and New Year at Watford once before in recent times, and Harry Redknapp would give Joe Jordan’s false teeth for a similar result this time around.
Back in 2007/08 Aidy Boothroyd’s Watford were newly relegated from the Premier League and had started their attempt to make an immediate return to the big time in formidable style. When Rangers held them to a 1-1 draw at Loftus Road in September — Stefan Moore with the goal miraculously — it was only the second time a team had taken points from a powerful Hornets side that included a young Adam Johnson among their number on loan and old QPR favourite Danny Shittu at the heart of the defence. They won 11 of their first 15 games, drawing two of the others, and had been waved off into the distance by other promotion hopefuls, resigned to playing for second place and the play offs.
QPR, by contrast, had started the season abysmally, with no victories from their first nine matches. Given the starting eleven John Gregory had at his disposal — Camp, Rehman, Stewart, Mancienne, Curtis, Rowlands, Bolder, Bailey, Moore, Nardiello, Blackstock — that was no great surprise. A takeover by Flavio Briatore and Bernie Ecclestone right at the very end of the summer transfer window offered hope where there seemed to be none but it would be January before their choice as manager to replace Gregory — Luigi De Canio — could start to lavish some of the new found wealth on a team in need of major surgery.
It was testament to De Canio’s ability as a coach that he actually got a back four of Bob Malcolm, Damion Stewart, Zesh Rehman and Chris Barker functioning in a rudimentary manner and several loan signings — Hogan Ephraim, Rowan Vine — were added but QPR were still kicking around the relegation zone when Christmas arrived and a New Year’s Day clash with fellow strugglers Leicester loomed large.
The Watford game looked like a free hit. QPR weren’t expected to get anything and were firmly focused on the Foxes two days later. De Canio made a plethora of changes to his team and a sizable travelling support settled in for an inevitable defeat on a ground where the modern day QPR have never fared well.
What followed was extraordinary. Rangers were three up by half time thanks to a brace from Martin Rowlands and a trademark Stewart header from a corner. Watford rallied, with Damien Francis scoring soon after half time, but Akos Buzsaky was cool under pressure in scoring a fourth which meant Shittu’s late goal against his former club while playing as an auxiliary striker counted for little. It was one of Rowlands’ finest performances in QPR colours. Just to really crown a fabulous New Year, the R’s beat Leicester at Loftus Road as well.
Watford, it turned out, weren’t that good after all. They’d won just two of nine going into that QPR match and in the second half of the season they won only five of their remaining 21 matches. What seemed like a cakewalk to automatic promotion turned into a play off nightmare as they crashed at the hands of Hull City. They’ve never been back to the Premier League since, and had a few financial scares and dodgy ownership episodes in the meantime.
If you believed the bookmakers every August, you’d think the three teams relegated from the Premier League have a God-given right to return automatically, immediately. As the top flight television money sky-rockets just as the Championship starts imposing strict spending restrictions on its own clubs that may soon be the case, but for now the teams dropping out of the top division are just as likely to continue their struggles at the lower level as calmly win their place back. Last season Wolves went straight through the Championship like a dodgy batch of prune juice and Blackburn Rovers weren’t a million miles away from doing exactly the same thing.
That Watford pattern has been seen before as well. Iain Dowie’s Crystal Palace side, unluckily relegated on the final day in 2004/05 thanks to a late goal from Charlton Athletic in a game they were winning at The Valley, started their bounce-back attempt well — ten wins and three draws from the first 19 games at the lower level — but stumbled in the second half of the season and crashed in the play offs, to Watford coincidentally.
It could be that a newly relegated side from the top division carries a certain intimidation factor in a division that still includes a whole clutch of clubs like Yeovil, Barnsley, Doncaster, Millwall and so on. They look at the budget available, they look at the players that stuck around, they look at their own team, and the write the game off. Certainly in the first half of this season we’ve seen nearly half a dozen teams — Barnsley, Ipswich, Charlton, Brighton and Middlesbrough - come to Loftus Road with absolutely no intention whatsoever of playing to win the game. There they all sat, with everybody behind the ball, and watched the clock in the hope they might manage a couple of hours without conceding a goal. Once QPR scored, as they did on all but one occasion, the game plan was shot and the match was over.
But as time wore on the division realised there was nothing to fear from Aidy Boothroyd’s hoof and hope outfit, nor Dowie’s Palace side, and perhaps it’s finally dawning on the Championship that Harry Redknapp’s 2013/14 QPR aren’t all that either. Press them high up the field, play the game at a high tempo and have a little attacking ambition and you’ve got a really good chance of beating them. On Boxing Day in Nottingham, Forest manager Billy Davies was so short of strikers he pressed Greg Halford into rudimentary service up front, but the tempo of Forest’s play — led by Jamie Mackie, Henri Lansbury and Djamel Abdoun — and refusal to allow QPR to dally in possession in their own half was more than enough to secure a comfortable 2-0 win.
No doubt other Championship sides will have taken notice of just how Forest did it, and how easy it was for them, and will be preparing a similar plan — just as the rest of the division watched De Canio pick the Hornets apart six years ago and followed suit for the next six months.
QPR have arrested their alarming decline with a fine first half of the season, but it’s often been based on having too many good players for teams showing no ambition of their own to cope with. Now, as the Championship bites back, it needs more than that. It needs more speed, more tempo, more width, more ruthlessness and more nastiness. It needs a response. And it needs to start, ironically, back at Vicarage Road on December 29 all over again.
Links >>> Opposition Profile >>> History >>> Referee >>> Travel Guide
Akos Buzsaky celebrates scoring a late fourth for QPR at Vicarage Road in that 2007/08 game. At the top of the article, Martin Rowlands salutes the travelling fans after opening the scoring from the penalty spot. Bloody nice kit that as well.
Team News: Given that Bobby Zamora was patently not fit enough for even the woeful 45 minutes he got at Nottingham Forest on Boxing Day you would hope (and pray, and beg) that he won’t be sent out into battle again on Sunday, leaving QPR to effectively play with ten men. Andy Johnson, a second half sub at the City Ground, must be pushing for a start as Charlie Austin continues to labour with a hamstring injury. Joey Barton is back from a one game ban and is sure to replace Karl Henry in midfield after his own horror show in Nottingham. Nedum Onuoha must be a good bet for a start in defence.
That 4-0 win last time out might tempt Guiseppe Sonnino to stick with the same Watford side despite the games coming thick and fast for his team, and defenders Daniel Pudil and Hector Bellerin returning from hamstring and hip injuries respectively.
Elsewhere: So here’s a little something for you as we embark on round 1,323 of the 2013/14 Championship, just 43 minutes after the conclusion of round 1,322… So far seven teams have changed their managers this season, but only one of those currently resides in the top ten in the league.
Sheffield Wednesday, who finally sent Dave Jones back into the arms of his netball player full time, have yet to find a permanent replacement and sit third bottom ahead of a trip to Charlton who are just four points ahead. Barnsley got rid of David Flitcroft and rolled back the years be re-appointing Danny Wilson but they sit bottom, four points adrift of safety, with in form Derby in town this Sunday.
Now Derby are, of course, the exception to the rule, with Steve McClaren leading them on an extraordinary run of nine wins, three draws and just a single defeat since he took over from Nigel Clough.
Miwwwwlllllwall chopped Steve Lomas after a 4-0 defeat at Udinese at the weekend and they face fellow strugglers Doncaster who are keeping hold of Paul Dickov for now this weekend. And Middlesbrough remain firmly ensconced in the bottom half ahead of their home game with Reading despite going all continental and brining Aitor Karanka from Real Madrid to the land of deep fried chicken and smog to replace Tony Mowbray.
The Globetrotters, now with Uwe Rosler in charge, have Burnley at home this weekend but also currently sit in the bottom half of the league, in thirteenth place.
The top end of the table is largely made up with clubs who’ve kept faith: Nigel Pearson’s Leicester lead the way and host Champions Elect Bolton this weekend while Billy Davies’ Nottingham Forest host Brian McDermott’s Leeds in a battle of fifth v sixth in the game of the day. Mick McCarthy’s Ipswich have quietly come up on the rails, just in time for a visit from Harry Redknapp’s QPR, and they have Eddie Howe’s Bournemouth this weekend who are making a very decent fist of their first season at a new higher level.
Oscar Garcia’s Brighton and Paul Ince’s Blackpool are poised three points shy of the play off picture — a gap that can soon be made up with a sudden flurry of positive results.
There’s a chicken and egg situation here isn’t there? Teams sack their managers because they’re struggling in the league, so it makes sense that more teams at the bottom have changed bosses than those at the top. But it’s clear that such a change is no immediate cure-all. Are teams doing well because they’ve kept hold of managers, and are they failing because they change them; or do they change them because they’re failing, and keep them because they’re doing well?
Like so much of the nonsense that takes place in a 24 team league across 46 rounds and nine months — it’s all almost totally irrelevant at this stage. That’ll be £26 for your match ticket sir.
Referee: What QPR perhaps didn’t need this Sunday is Premier League referee Neil Swarbrick re-appearing on their radar. Swarbrick was one of the better officials the R’s faced during their previous stint in the Championship and he was rewarded for his performances with a promotion to the top flight at the same time as Neil Warnock’s side, but he struggled to adapt to the faster pace of the Premier League and QPR were on the receiving end of his rank incompetence on a couple of occasions. A farcical red card for Joey Barton in a Christmas match at home to Norwich two years ago was a particular low point for him. For his full QPR case history and stats please click here.
Watford: A 4-0 win against Millwall at home on Boxing Day halted an alarming slide in Watford’s form that saw manager Gianfranco Zola sacked and replaced by Giuseppe Sonnino. The Hornets hadn’t won in ten Championship matches dating back to October 5 before that and had lost a club record five consecutive home matches with Sheff Wed, Yeovil, Bolton, Leicester and Derby all winning at Vicarage Road. A win here would be the first time Watford have won back to back matches since the first two fixtures of the season.
QPR: Rangers have only won four of their last 12 matches home and away, a worrying slide in form, and the defeat to Nottingham Forest on Boxing Day followed hot on the heels of a 1-0 home set back against Leicester — the first time the R’s have lost consecutive matches in the Championship this season. The form had been slipping on the road for sometime — the 2-0 win at Blackpool just before Christmas was the only win in seven away games with three draws and three defeats in the other fixtures.
Prediction: Reigning Prediction League champion Mase, refusing the offer of time off over Christmas, tells us…
"Truthfully, we were pitiful against Forest. The usual clichés about being lucky to get nil have never seemed more apposite and the last game and a half we have been proven inadequate in every department. The sole success we can reflect on is that the club managed to keep - uncharacteristically - the loss to injury of its only dependable goal threat hushed before Thursday's chastening.
"Watford remains, in my view, a game we can afford to lose. There have been the usual knee jerk reactions about Harry gaming Tony for a belt loosening come the transfer window by exaggerating the extent to which reinforcements - or "more blood" as Clive would have it - is required. But the fact remains we haven't scored nearly as many goals as any club in the top ten and now opposition strikers are finding profit to be had from our defence it is important we approach the window in a sensible way. Promotion seems to be the preoccupation of our owners and these latest stirrings will have them as anxious as those in the stands.
"Our recent games with Watford have featured goals aplenty and their form this season is almost the dictionary definition of inconsistency. At times they have suffered from their lack of experience and have been on the wrong end of some heavy scorelines. I just fear we have shown a soft centre in the last few weeks and our lack of goals remains the paramount concern. Frankly even if Austin is able to feature we are still by no means guaranteed to trouble the scorers; for various reasons (but not the political ones hinted at above), I doubt he will be risked; and we will lose narrowly again. Pessimism is what won me the competition last year and it is to my familiar friend I now return.”
Mase’s Prediction: Watford 1 QPR 0, no scorer
LFW’s Prediction: Watford 0 QPR 0, no scorer
Tweet @loftforwords
Pictures — Action Images