It's a Premier League team, under the lights, at Loftus Road on Tuesday as QPR attempt to make rare progression into round four of the League Cup against Crystal Palace and our former charge Ebere Eze.
Rumbelows Cup Third Round >>> Tuesday August 17, 2024 >>> Kick Off 19.45 >>> Weather – Sunny, breezy >>> Loftus Road, London, W12
As if sitting up long into the night, through the generic, cliché-riddled analysis of the game you’d already seen and knew the result of, wasn’t soul-sapping enough, then (eventually) came the third round draw.
Let’s recap… FA Cup replays – bad. Two-legged League Cup ties – bad. Domestic cup competitions in general – bad. Having to play at 12.30 on Saturday when you’d have a game on Wednesday – bad. Man Utd v Liverpool in Beijing a week before the season starts – good. Money-spinning July tours of America with games on artificial surfaces and temporary pitches played in 106 degrees – very good. Expanded Champions League format with ever more meaningless games over an ever-broader stretch of the calendar – excellent. Remember?
To accommodate the latter, this year’s third round is spaced over two weeks and the precious little darlings in European competitions were deliberately forced apart by a ham-fisted seeding which has resulted in such tedious non-events as Man Utd at home to Barnsley and Man City at home to Watford. Next time this lot offer to piss off and play in a European Super League by themselves it might be best to just let them go.
Guess what? Premier League still not happy. The ever-loveable Thomas Frank used his press conference ahead of a tie at home to Orient to go on some cloth-eared ramble about getting rid of two legged League Cup semi-finals in January. This seems to have been driven by Yoane Wissa’s nasty ankle injury picked up at Man City at the weekend, exacerbating the Bees’ already troubling injury list. But the season’s only a month old, that Man City game was in the league, it was the first game for two weeks, and Brentford have been in one two-legged League Cup semi-final in 150 years.
Ultimately, those in the top division like to moan almost as much as they hate playing actual football games. And they don't even have to be there five minutes before they completely forget they were ever down here with us, and may well soon be again. You can keep trying to appease and placate them, you can take away FA Cup replays, you can let them come in late to the League Cup, you can seed the third round, you can let their puppy farms play in the EFL Trophy and completely destroy that competition, you can do whatever you/they like… and they’ll still want more. Take, take, take. Because, ultimately, they don’t want to play games against my team or yours. There’s no money in that. They want to play in Dubai, and Yokohama. You, and your League Cup ties, are just fundamentally in the way.
The League Cup is a competition not long for this world. It’ll inevitably bite the dust sooner or later, no doubt in return for some pathetic annual hand-me-down to EFL clubs from upstairs that, once divided up, amounts to a round of drinks in the Crown.
Against that backdrop, QPR v Crystal Palace positively borders on the romantic. I mean, it’s not Anna Kendrick turning up with that bottle of wine, but it’s a home tie, against a Premier League side, an all-London affair, under the lights, at Loftus Road. It’s better than a kick in the nuts, certainly given our dire record of both results and calibre of draw in both cups over recent decades, and that’s before we even start talking about the potential first competitive return to W12 of our former king Ebere Eze.
Few players have mesmerised the crowd here in recent years like Eze did and, although you can come at me in the comments if you like, to my mind no player has ever really left QPR on such good, positive terms. Peter Crouch maybe, still well loved in Shepherd’s Bush? Eze’s growing status in the game, prowess in the top division, and England honours are celebrated by QPR fans almost as heartily as if he still played in blue and white hoops. Every goal met by a flurry of Tweets, message board threads and WhatsApp messages – particularly when it’s against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. Be it his golden personality, the way he did right by the club with his contract extension enabling us to finally get a good fee for a player, or just his outright brilliance on the pitch, there’s a warmth and love towards Eze from Rangers fans that you just don’t usually get towards players that leave you for another.
Whether Eze starts the game tonight will be one of the talking points of the team selections – he did in their second round whitewash of Norwich, for which Oliver Glasner picked an intimidatingly strong line up and subsequently won 4-0 (eek). Plenty of intrigue around QPR’s team as well. There’s a couple of obvious ones like Joe Walsh’s likely return in goal after impressive performances in the first two cup games, and you’d expect Zan Celar to come in for Michy Frey up front, but everywhere else is cast into some doubt. Liam Morrison’s injury is unfortunately timed, particularly with Jake Clarke-Salter now out as well.
As ever it’s about workload versus desire to progress in the competition but, relative to last season at least, Marti Cifuentes has better depth to play with. Being able to bring on players like Saito, Celar, Smyth and Varane from the bench, along with the unexpected emergence of Alfie Lloyd as a bit of a chap, is a very welcome development and a big positive from the summer transfer window. This time last year a QPR manager looking for impact from the bench was confronted with Albert Adomah, Charlie Kelman, Stephen Duke-McKenna, Aaron Drewe et al.
I want to win, though. All this talk of squad rotation and what we’re prioritising, the fawning over Eze… I want to win. I appreciate the lovely little ‘hi QPR fans’ pre-match video isn’t for me, it’s for a younger demographic who lap that stuff up, it’s to try and drive disappointingly sluggish ticket sales (pricing?), it’s harmless etc. But Palace, like Brighton, like Brentford, are one of those clubs routinely miles and miles below us through the 1990s and 2000s who have not only gone past us but pulled off into a different, seemingly unreachable stratosphere. They’ve done it through their own smart decision making and shrewd ownership, but we’ve allowed it through our incompetence. Selhurst Park has a lot of the same challenges Loftus Road has, and it hasn’t held them back in the defeatist way we seem to think our little ground does. This stuff annoys me. The general attitude to the League Cup, across the board, annoys me. I don’t want their star player saying hi to me, whoever it is. It’s Crystal Palace we’re playing lads, in a competitive cup tie, it’s not Real Madrid coming to town for a showpiece friendly. I don’t want us sacking it off with a second string team, clapping along if/when Ebs scores. I want to win.
Fortunately, I think we’ve got a manager here now who does as well. Let's see what he does with this latest test.
Links >>> Eze takes centre stage – Oppo Profile >>> Rangers hit six – History >>> Gill gets first QPR game – Referee >>> Palace Official Website >>> Five Year Plan – Contributor’s Podcast >>> The Holmesdale – Palace Forum >>> CPFC BBS – Forum >>> Back of the Nest – Podcast
Team News: Sam Field was booked in the first half at Hillsborough on Saturday and then removed at half time – something Cifuentes often does with players carded in the first half, particularly the midfielders. This time it seems Field had been suffering with the bug that’s going round at the moment but he is said to be fit to return tonight. No such luck for Ilias Chair and Morgan Fox who have both missed the whole season to date and are still a way off a return. Jake Clarke-Salter’s calf issue is back, unhelpfully coinciding with the departure of head of performance Ben Williams whose arrival in the first instance seemed to be the catalyst for4 that issue finally clearing up.
Elsewhere: I don’t want to labour the point about how we write Stoke City up first in the season preview every summer because they’re the most predictable team on the coupon, but having allowed Stephen Schumacher the summer transfer window and season budget to mould the team in his image just as they did with Michael O’Neill, Alex Neil and others they’ve now binned him off in the second week of September after a league defeat at Oxford. Their latest brave new era starts tonight at home to Fleetwood.
There’s not a real looker among the Tuesday night fixtures. Tarquin and Rupert face our much beloved long old slog up to Preston Knob End. There’s a Steve Bruce derby between Blackpool and Sheff Wed. Man Utd Reserves go off at 20.00 against League One Barnsley – a game they’ve seen it appropriate to charge the away fans £47 each to attend. Sub-human scum. Southampton Reserves know all they have to do is let Everton Reserves go 2-0 up and then they’ve got them. Brentford Reserves, meanwhile, play Orient.
Tomorrow there’s the thrilling prospect of an all Premier League tie between Brighton Reserves and Wolves Reserves, but Tottenham Reserves heading to Coventry could be quite interesting.
You’ll remember this was the draw butchered and seeded to accommodate the vitally important expanded Champions League format this year – those extra games are fine, apparently – so we’ve got a whole other chunk of third round games next week with several European sides effectively given byes – Man City Reserves at home to Watford, Villa Reserves at Wycombe and Arsenal Reserves at home to Bolton. Liverpool Reserves did at least pull something moderately troubling in West Ham Reserves, albeit at home.
Leicester Reserves at Walsall and Newcastle Reserves at Wimbledon are parked either side of Chelsea Reserves v Barrow which really is a tie that was drawn the wrong way round.
Referee: Sunny Singh Gill, the first British Asian referee in the Premier League, gets his first QPR game this evening. He made his Premier League debut last march at Crystal Palace and their 1-1 home draw with Luton, a game he found himself in some degree of hot water for afterwards when the cameras caught him signing autographs at half time. Details.
QPR: Rangers won 2-1 at Cambridge in round one and then overcame Luton on penalties in round two after a 1-1 draw at Loftus Road. Rangers have only made round three once in the last five years and if they win tonight it will equal their best performance in this competition in 35 years. Rangers beat Orient on penalties after a 1-1 draw in 2021/22 and subsequently beat Oxford 2-0 at home and Premier League Everton on pens after a 2-2 draw at Loftus Road to reach round four. It was their best performance in the competition since 2008/09 when a shock win against Aston Villa at Villa Park took us into a fourth round 1-0 defeat at Old Trafford. Of course, but for the latest Keith Stroud-supervised catastrophe, Charlie Austin’s legitimate late goal would have stood and QPR would have had a quarter final at Arsenal — the R’s haven’t been that deep into the competition since 1988/89 when they lost 5-2 at Nottingham Forest. Rangers have still only been to one cup quarter final, in either competition, since 1990 — the 1994/95 FA Cup quarter final away to Man Utd.
Rangers went out at this stage of the competition last year when Norwich City scored with the final kick of the first round at Loftus Road. With Premier League Bournemouth coming from two down to win 3-2 in W12 in the FA Cup it halted a concerning run of cup exists against League One sides. The defeat on penalties to Charlton at this stage of the 2022/23 competition, and loss at Fleetwood in the FA Cup, meant QPR had been eliminated from cup competitions by League One opposition at least once for six seasons running: Charlton 2022/23, Fleetwood (FA Cup) 2022/23, Sunderland 2021/22, Plymouth 2020/21, Pompey 2019/20, Blackpool 2018/19, MK Dons 17/18 (FA Cup).
It’s exactly ten seasons since QPR and Palace last met in the league – the games 2014/15 Premier League games finished 0-0 at Loftus Road and 3-1 to Palace at Selhurst Park on the day of Matt Phillips’ wonder strike. Prior to that the last meetings were in QPR’s 2010/11 Championship promotion season when Heidar Helguson won it in the last minute in South London, and then scored twice in a crucial 2-1 win at Loftus Road in the return. QPR are unbeaten in four meetings on this ground, but three of those have been draws.
Palace: The Eagles finished last year’s Premier League season in red hot form, winning six of their final seven games. However, after a summer in which they had four players in the England Euros squad and star striker Mateta then went to the Olympics with France, it’s been a sluggish start to the new campaign with the 4-0 second round League Cup win against Norwich the only win so far.
They lost 2-1 at Brentford on day one when Ebere Eze had a goal incorrectly disallowed, and were then beaten 2-0 at home by West Ham. After dumping Norwich out of the cup they’ve drawn 1-1 at Chelsea and 2-2 at home to Leicester in the league. They are yet to lead at any stage of their four Premier League games so far. Last season they finished tenth with 49 points. Away from home their record was 5-6-8 with the wins coming at Sheff Utd, Man Utd, Burnley, Liverpool and Wolves. Ebere Eze has now played more games for Palace (129) than he has for QPR (112). He scored 20 goals for Rangers and has 27 for the Eagles.
Palace’s cup record is nearly as shocking as ours. They’ve never won a major trophy, but were FA Cup finalists in 1990 and 2016. Their best League Cup performance is four separate semi-final appearances – 1993, 1995, 2001 and 2012. That most recent run saw them beaten over two legs by Cardiff who went on to play Liverpool at Wembley. In the 12 years since they best they’ve managed is round four (2016, 2018, 2019) and the last five years have seen three exits in round two and two in round three. Last year they were beaten at this stage 3-0 at Man Utd having beaten Championship side Plymouth 4-2 in the second round. Rangers have played Palace seven times in the FA Cup (including replays), once in the League Cup and have never lost. The South Londoner’s only cup success over the R’s was in the Zenith Data Systems Trophy in 1991. The last cup tie was QPR’s 1-0 FA Cup quarter final win here in March 1982 on their way to the final against Spurs.
Prediction: As ever, no Prediction League for cup ties. Looking at the strength of the team Palace put out against Norwich, I’m fearful they might just have a bit much for us tonight. Nevertheless, we travel in hope.
LFW’s Prediction: QPR 1-3 Palace. Scorer – Jimmy Dunne.
If you enjoy LoftforWords, please consider supporting the site through a subscription to our Patreon or tip us via our PayPal account loftforwords@yahoo.co.uk.
The Twitter @loftforwords