QPR, fresh from the sale of Charlie Austin and a first win under Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, welcome Wolves to Loftus Road on Saturday.
Championship >>> Saturday January 23, 2016 >>> Kick Off 12.30 >>> Weather — Overcast, reasonably warm, rain in evening >>> Loftus Road, London, W12 >>> Live on Sky Sports 1
The last time these sides met on this ground it was a Premier League fixture. QPR, handicapped by the first of several Djibril Cisse brain farts, lost 2-1 to Mick McCarthy’s side but by the end of the season it was Wolves taking the drop while Rangers stayed up by a gnat’s cock hair.
Both clubs have designs on being back in the ‘big time’ as soon as possible, but both find themselves in somewhat odd situations trying to achieve that. QPR slightly lower in the table than they probably should be, weighed down by a typically dreadful Christmas; Wolves perhaps slightly higher than they might be, buoyed by four straight wins over the festive period. In truth, midtable mediocrity doesn’t come much more midtable or mediocre than this. The Sky Sports subscribers must be salivating at the prospect.
A public declaration from Wolves owner Steve Morgan that he wants to sell the club after shy of a decade of ownership has stalled two years of solid progress under manager Kenny Jackett. A League One title, achieved while shifting the last expensive vestiges of a failed Premier League squad from the books, was followed up with a play-off push in their first season back in the second tier last time out. In fact, the 78 points they accumulated last year would have secured them a spot in the six comfortably every year since the play-offs began but not in 2014/15.
There have been problems other than the chairman trying to beat a hasty retreat. Jed Wallace (Portsmouth) and Nathan Byrne (Swindon) both looked like typical Jackett, typical Wolves, success stories when signed in the summer but neither have settled particularly well. A feared strike force of Bennick Afobe and Nouha Dicko was supplemented in the summer by the arrival of Adam Le Fondre but Dicko picked up a season-ending injury early and Afobe seemed to have his head turned by summer interest from Norwich and rather went through the motions until he was finally bought by Bournemouth last week.
But while the for sale sign is up, there’s a feeling it’s a club in a holding pattern. Morgan will leave it debt free, with an updated stadium, decent youth set up and training ground infrastructure. But rich foreign fools are harder to attract to the Black Country than they are to West London and this could drag on for a while. Growing suggestions that Kenny Jackett has "taken the club as far as he can”* are to be resisted — this is the sort of situation with good players leaving and the chairman only looking short term re replacements that can quickly develop into a slide or freefall under less adept, calming charge.
(* - Copyright Charlton Athletic 2004-2006)
QPR have had a typically schizophrenic season to this point, but seem to be back on the meds now.
Charlie Austin’s contract situation, Sandro’s passport and Visa looking like the lost works from the Mister Men series, Leroy Fer’s dodgy knee, Robert Green’s demands of West Ham and a lack of serious offers for Matt Phillips meant they kept hold of the big names they’d perhaps hoped to shift when billing the season as one of consolidation and rebuild.
With them all still in situ, encouraging summer signings were cast aside, and entirely of their own volition the club heaped pressure upon the players and managers by publicly declaring the goal posts had moved. Now it’s turned out that this team finished bottom of the Premier League, and attracted little interest in anybody other than Charlie Austin, for a reason, reality and reason seems to be washing over the place once more.
That said, one win at Rotherham — where the first half was totally dominated by the hosts — is all that’s separating us from a complete online meltdown. Had Rangers been 2-0 down in New New York last week, as they should have been (at least), and not comeback then the increasingly vile world of QPR on Twitter, and the message boards, would have looked like demilitarised zones this week.
If, as it seems, the likes of Phillips and Green are now moving on, with Fer and Sandro likely to join them if only anybody still buying the "Dutch international” promo or somebody in a country that doesn’t check the documentation thoroughly can be found, common sense is returning and a long game is being played again then this rabid response to results good and bad has to stop.
Conor Washington will likely play some part on Saturday having signed from Peterborough. He, like Grant Hall, like Massimo Luongo, like Wycombe’s Matt Ingram who will arrive next week in all likelihood, is exactly the sort of payer we should be brining here. Buy low, give players a chance to prove themselves, benefit in the short and medium term by having a load of motivated players busting a gut to better themselves, and then sell high before repeating. But some of them will fail, some of them will not make it, some of them will take longer than others to be a success, and some of them will be Grant Hall.
All of them need space to breathe and develop. The club took that from them in the first half of the season by insisting we had to push for promotion. It was a mind-blowingly stupid thing to do and they’ve hopefully learnt from it. Supporters, Tweeters and websites like this one now need to stop treating every defeat as a sign of a coming apocalypse, every win as the end of the rainbow, and start settling in for a long haul.
Hopefully. Who knows? We may go out and spaff loads of money on loads more players next week and set a course for the Premier League once more with a big hole in the hull. You never can tell with QPR can you? It’s part of the charm.
Links >>> Easter Monday thriller — History >>> Wolves' state of flux — Interview >>> From Austin to Washington — Podcast >>> Woolmer back for Wolves clash — Referee
Team News: The Lord and Saviour Conor Washington goes straight into the squad, in Charlie Austin's shirt, charged with scoring lots of goals absolutely immediately under pain of abuse and ridicule. The lesser spotted Alex Smithies will start in goal, with Joe Lumley on the bench, ahead of the expected arrival of Wycombe stopper Matt Ingram next week. Rob Green is out in the car park, engine on, awaiting somebody daft enough — hopefully Pards has a big night in Crystals tonight and signs off on it without realising. Jamie Mackie will spontaneously combust if not handed a start soon.
Good news for QPR — Wolves' new Polish striker Michal Zyro is out after scoring three goals in his last two matches.
Bad news — Emi Martinez, the goalkeeper who kindly moved out of the way in the second half of our comeback win at Molineux back in August, has been taken hostage by the Wolves fans preventing him from playing against us again.
Jordan Graham (knee explosion) is out for the season but Adam Le Fondre and Bjorn Sigurdarson return to the squad after last week's match with Cardiff clashed with Kevin Phillips' Golf Day.
Elsewhere: Championship action, coming atchya, like Cleopatra. Big Spending Burnley and Joseph Christ's "sky high" personal standards (red cards for caressing the flaccid genitals of other professionals during crucial relegation six pointers not withstanding) host the Derby Sheep in the game of the weekend on Monday evening. I can scarcely recall wanting Derby to cut loose and run the rounds of the kitchen through somebody more.
There's a big volley of second tier mediocrity flying straight into your gob at 15.00 on Saturday before that. "If Ipswich are the benchmark for sixth, we'll take that benchmark," Steve Evans slurred to Steve Evans after the Champions of Europe surrendered their fourth, fifth and sixth points of the season to the Tractor Boys last time out. Well Sir Sweatsalot, as 'Big' Mick McCarthy pointed out, they are sixth (well, joint sixth in any case) and they're heading to Brum this weekend while the Champions of Europe (seventeenth) welcome the Wurzels.
To be fair, Evans also says he doesn't eat too much, just at the wrong time, so I wouldn't get too worked up about whatever slop he's belched out this week.
What else do we have? The natives are restless south of the river as Belgium's Finest welcome the Mad Chicken Farmers and protests are planned at The Valley before and after the match. The Charlton CEO says it's "weird" the supporters feel they have a stake in the club, in a way people who go to the cinema never would with UGC. Silly moo. Anyway, the protests better be up to scratch with Blackburn in town — they of course gave us a live chicken in a Rovers home strip previously, which really takes some beating.
Barings Bank at home to the Franchise will be like a footballing version of a visit to the STI Clinic, with a smaller crowd.
Brighton's unbeaten 19 game start to the season has collapsed into one win from nine and they'll have all on with revitalised Huddersfield at home. Likewise Waitrose as Sheffield Owls, free-scoring and now with Gary Hooper on a permanent deal, come to the distribution centre.
Preston v Abacus, and The Red Dragons against Rotherham make up the list with Boro hosting the Trees.
Tarquin and Rupert face a tough sell on their organic artichokes this weekend with the good people of Hull travelling south with the Tigers Tigers Rah Rah Rah.
Referee: Veteran Football League referee Andy Woolmer is the man in the middle for this match — his first return to Loftus Road since he made rather a pig's ear of QPR's 3-0 home win against Bournemouth in the 2013/14 promotion season. Full details of that, and a collection of other poor performances in Rangers games, as well as his recent stats are available here.
QPR: Rangers' 3-0 win at Rotherham last week continued their run of not conceding in the first half of matches to 16 outings, but halted an unwelcome run of eight games without a win. That was starting to weigh heavily against new manager Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, but he has only lost three of his nine games in charge so far and one of those was in the FA Cup with a scratchy team. In the league QPR have lost only three of their last 13. The Rotherham win was the R's first clean sheet in eight attempts. It's currently four without a win at Loftus Road, three of which have been drawn. QPR have lost 19 points from winning positions this season — the most in the division. Seb Polter has scored three goals in his last four appearances, and in fact has scored three goals from just four shots on target in his league outings this season.
Wolves: A fairly dire run of just two wins from a dozen games leading into Christmas was blown away by four straight victories over the festive period from Kenny Jackett's men. They were, however, beaten 3-1 by Cardiff at Molineux last time out. It's their form at home, in front of a notoriously demanding crowd, that has been holding them back this season — just four wins from 14 played on their own patch which doesn't bode well for QPR this weekend as they sit tenth and it's the away form that has got them there. Their six wins on the road (Blackburn, Fulham, Birmingham, Rotherham, Charlton, Brighton) is better than second-placed Hull and three of the four teams in the play-off positions. League leaders Middlesbrough have won seven away, third placed Derby six. They've won three of the last four on the road in the league, but did lose 4-1 at Sheff Wed in the other game in that sequence. Wolves have only lost one, and won seven, of their last 11 matches on this ground.
Prediction: Reigning Prediction League champion isawqpratwhitecity tells us…
"Not poring over the entrails too much for this one. Wolves have mixed form, but in only three of their last nine league games has either side kept a clean sheet. Last week was brilliant for us, so it's tails up and take it up to 'em, boys! I'd love to tip Washington for first goal on his debut, but he may not start, in which case..."
Jim's Prediction: QPR 3-1 Wolves. Scorer: Seb Polter
LFW's Prediction: QPR 1-1 Wolves. Scorer: Junior Hoilett
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