With one win in 15 QPR's build up to a London derby with Millwall has been dominated by manager and execs stating their cases in interviews, and the signing of 34-year-old Chris Martin to bolster a toothless attack.
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For 20 years now, a match report for every QPR match, a game preview for every QPR game, an opposition write up for every opponent, a season preview for every season and a signing piece for every permanent signing. Greatest hits include 6-0’s against Fulham, Man City, Newcastle, a 6-1 at Chelsea, FA Cup exits against almost all the lower half of the Football League structure and beyond, and oh so many 3-0 half time deficits at Craven Cottage. When Steve McClaren's R's drew 0-0 at home to Stoke, we topped 3,000 words - an achievement so mighty, I posted it on my LinkedIn. Steven Caulker and Jordon Mutch were hailed, Shaun Derry and Clint Hill slated. Conor Washington was "exactly the sort of thing we should be doing”. Through it all I have wondered, and frequently been asked, at what point is enough enough? This week, we found out. It’s QPR signing Chris Martin.
Here's how this one plays out…
QPR make a daft signing, spending money they don’t have on something they don’t need or something that runs entirely contrary to what they’re supposed to be doing or something they’ve once again caved into the manager of the day on. Let’s call this hypothetical signing, Leeroy Falogun. I then do a piece saying this is a daft signing, spending money we don’t have on something we don’t need or something that runs entirely contrary to what we’re supposed to be doing or something we’ve once again caved into the manager of the day on. "What manager wants manager gets does not work at QPR… this is exactly what the director of football model is supposed to prevent” says I, all high and mighty, with my vast experience of running football clubs and coaching football teams.
Leeroy Falogun then plays well. In fact, he plays really well. Remember that time we had a squad with a wage bill of £80m, with Andy Johnson, Bobby Zamora, Charlie Austin and Javier Chevanton on our books, and when Charlie’s shoulder popped out for a bit in January they let ‘Arry sign Yossi Benayoun, Will Keane, Kevin Doyle and Ravel Morrison to cover for it? With increasing despair I wondered what on earth we thought we were doing — the financial effects of that spell continue to infect every pore of the club today — up to the loan of Modibo Maiga from West Ham. Somebody I described as, quite apart from anything else, not even as good a footballer as I am. What happened next? Well, Maiga scored didn’t he? A very handy late equaliser in a televised 3-3 at home to Burnley.
We then enter the phase of all this I like to call Clive Looks A Prat, when everybody in F Block who has to put up with me yawping on every week, everybody on social media who hates me for reasons I’ve never quite been able to fathom, everybody who dislikes me so intensely they feel the need to register an account on my message board so they can tell me this very directly, all turn around and point as one and tell me what a complete fucking idiot I look/am. And this does my brain no good at all, because fundamentally people want to be liked, and occasions where everybody who dislikes me gather together for all the pointing and laughing take me all the way back to my secondary schooling which was, as I have mentioned a time or two before, a season of evil.
What often (honestly, more often than not, I promise) happens next, over a period of some weeks, is Mobido Maiga, or Leeroy Falogun, or whoever it is, turns out to be a daft signing after all. Money we don’t have spent on something we don’t need or something that runs entirely contrary to what we’re supposed to be doing or something we’ve once again caved into the manager of the day on. So now, I’m right, but as a result QPR are shite again, and therefore I’m still miserable, just for a different reason.
So, a signing piece for Chris Martin? It’s not going to be complimentary, is it? We’ve spent almost the entirety of the last ten years ripping the piss out of the bloke unmercifully, and now here we are picking him up as a 34-year-old who’s just been bombed out with contract to spare by a team below us in the table. What he will do, however, is provide some of that experience and leadership we’ve all said this team sorely lacks. This is exactly what Critchley did when he went one in seven at the start of his Blackpool reign — abandoned the academy niceties and fancy formations, went to a basic 4-4-2 and went much more direct up to Gary Madine. He’ll be a point man for our attack and out ball for our defence, capable of holding the ball up, allowing us to play further up the pitch and more in the opposition half, which, again, we’ve all lamented a lack of while our defenders and goalkeepers have wasted hours of our time pisballing about between themselves on the edge of our own box. Having somebody to play off, Heidar Helguson-style, will be good for Jamal Lowe, and the out-of-form pair of Illy and Willy. He’ll even score a few goals. I think he’ll score tomorrow. And you’d rather have him marking Millwall centre backs at their corners than any of the other strikers we have available, even if it will then take him 20 minutes to move that arse back to the other end of the field. When he does all of that, after I’ve published a piece coating him off, I’m back into that room full of people that hate me again, so what’s the point? There it is, what’s the point? At last, after 20 years, I got there. And it was Chris Martin who did it, as I always suspected it might be.
You'll have figured out by now I'm sure - worst episode of Poirot ever - that you’re basically reading the Chris Martin signing piece now. See what I did there? I’m just being lazy, couldn’t be arsed to think of a new match preview angle so held it over. What a dickhead.
There were questions and opinions I put forward to Les Ferdinand this week that I did not agree with myself. Why a team with a new manager, and one win in 15 games, only signed one player in the January transfer window, for instance. I don’t feel I need to ask that for me, because I’ve read the accounts, and the rules of the league, and I understand where we are, and where we would be if we shit the bed and signed five more players to move us from fourteenth to eighth. But you only have to look across QPR’s internet presence in January to know not everybody understands that under FFP, on our income, it doesn’t matter if we’re owned by a trillionaire or the bloke who stands on the Green shouting "you’re an Arab” at passers by: we’re spending what we can spend. Literally hundreds of people haranguing the club to announce more signings, accusing them of not "backing the manager”, accusing them of "showing no ambition”, begging West London Sport for transfer rumours, demanding the resignation of the board and the owners (roll up, roll up, football club for sale, costs £1.8m a month to run, has a training ground and a historic, world record FFP fine still to pay for, stuck in an antiquated stadium because there’s nowhere else to go — there’d be a queue round the block to take it off Ruben’s hands I’m sure). So, I have to go and ask that question of him on behalf of those people. That’s the job. It was awkward as fuck this week, I hated every minute of it, but Les got it, I get it, and hopefully you all got something out of it.
One of the questions/opinions that was/is mine, however, was not about the Chris Martin signing per se, but what it says about where we are. It is, in my opinion, a fairly damning indictment on Les and the myriad of people that work below him — we have an academy staffed by an international football manager, a former manager of our first team, an academy manager, myriad former players — that eight years into his tenure here we do not have a single person in the building who they believe capable of filling in for one mediocre, injured centre forward for a dozen games in a midtable Championship season. Not one boy, anywhere in our academy, our U23s, our B team, who can stand where Lyndon Dykes stands, hold the ball up, win headers, close down, and miss sitters from three yards out like he does, adequately for a couple of months. That’s unreal, for me.
It’s not the first time either. Nobody would doubt that our goalkeeper situation last season was unprecedented. To lose one keeper is foreseeable, to lose two at the same time unfortunate, to lose three is not something I’ve heard of before, to lose five is ridiculous. Given we were well in promotion contention when Dieng and Archer went down, I can show some empathy towards the short term hire of David Marshall. But when the season is busted, to still be trying to bring Kieren Westwood out of retirement - when you’re supposed to be skint, supposed to be running a tight ship, supposed to be a development club with first team pathways - is poor. At some point, for better or worse, Murphy Mahoney has to be the next cab off the rank there — if not when Marshall was signed then certainly when Westwood was. It’s striking, for me, that we’ve picked Martin up following his release from Bristol City. They’ve just sold one academy graduate to Bournemouth for the thick end of £10m, they’ll get double that for another in Alex Scott, and they’re able to release Martin because when they were short up front this year Tommy Conway and Sam Bell got their turn and both have scored in the Championship this season. Bristol City have zero loans in their team currently, we have four with a fifth injured and now their cast off up front. They will use that money and the headroom it creates to go past us over the next two years, like Brentford and Brighton and so many others before them.
Les was quick to point to the evils of EPPP as a reason for that, and to a certain extent he is right. EPPP was forced on the EFL clubs by the Premier League, entirely to their detriment and for the benefit of the biggest clubs, under threat of having their already pitiful "solidarity” payments from upstairs removed altogether. They put out arm up our back basically. It means the category one academies, by which QPR are surrounded, are basically able to talk to, approach and sign any boy they like from the lower category academies at any point for a set fee pre-decided by a formula that basically adds age to time spent in the academy and comes up with a tiny figure irrespective of his ability. Our excellent columnist Simon Dorset estimates that had EPPP been around when Raheem Sterling was in our set up, we’d have received little more than £100k for him, instead of the £1m Liverpool paid and the near £10m we later got in a sell-on clause. Rayan Kolli, whose performances in the FA Youth Cup have excited so many this season and who recently penned a two-year professional deal with the club, played two games on trial at West Ham last season — because they’re category one, and we’re not, so they can offer him that and have a look, and he can say yes, and there’s nothing we can do about it. It has essentially removed the prime way clubs like us can fight back against FFP, and made it pointless for 72 of the 92 clubs to run a youth set up at all.
Ferdinand said 13 players have been pinched out of our academy by category one clubs for total fees received of just £750,000 - £57k per player. Obviously the club cannot give that list out but Alfie Gilchrist at Chelsea is one, Bradley Ibrahim at Arsenal another, Luca Gunter who played against us in the FA Youth Cup for Spurs a third, and I suspect Liverpool’s Harvey Elliott who was initially lifted from us by Fulham might also be counted in this number and may also be the one Les referred to as now being worth "a lot of money”.
It’s not bad reasoning for why there’s nobody capable of stepping into Lyndon’s shoes for a few weeks, but it does rather beg another question and one I should have asked more directly when I had the chance this week. The new training ground that is often heralded as something of a cure-all for the ills of the club, while undoubtedly a brilliant thing, long overdue and the best thing this ownership have spent their money on so far, still does not provide us with a category one academy because of the extra expense, quantity and quality of staff, accommodation and more that’s now required to reach that level. Ferdinand said in a different part of the interview that we have owners that would spend money if they could, but he was referring to spending £5m, £10m on footballers, which will play well on Twitter but is how we got into this mess in the first place. They can, and are allowed, to spend money on facilities. Would it not be better to spend the money it would take to become a category one academy because - and this may have been the phrase I used but it was certainly the picture Les painted — running a category two academy while surrounded by category ones is like ‘pushing piss uphill’?
If we spend all this money on a training ground, bring the academy together with the firsts, integrate the club, and all of this stuff we’ve been talking about for years, but this talent drain keeps happening, and any half decent 15-year-old we create there can basically be approached in the car park by any of the dozen other clubs we’re surrounded by then… well, for the second time this week I’m wondering what the point is.
Links >>> Wilson settles cliffhanger — History >>> Whitestone in charge — Referee >>> Millwall in touch — Interview >>> Millwall official website >>> South London Press — Local Paper >>> News at Den — Blog >>> North Stand Banter — Forum >>> News Shopper — Local Paper
Team News: So Chris Martin is set for a QPR debut after signing on a free transfer and short term deal from Bristol City, don’t know if you’ve heard. He has one goal in five starts and 14 sub appearances this season, last scoring on August 6, 2022, in a 3-2 loss to Sunderland. Lyndon Dykes, obviously, out for a while and we wish him well in his recovery. Martin will therefore likely be joined in attack by Jamal Lowe, who has scored two in three starts for the R’s so far and should have had double that, although Tyler Roberts’ latest mortal wound at Hull was so serious it only kept him out for one long distance northern away trip and he’s apparently back in contention. Sunderland on Tuesday could be a busy night for the physio — who fancies Middlesbrough away next Saturday? Leon Balogun could be piloting the first manned mission to Mars for all we know and we’re offering VIP passes, all-you-can-eat ribs and guitar lessons at Ale Faurlin’s next barbecue spectacular for anybody recording a sighting of Taylor Richards.
Shaun Hutchinson is a big miss for Millwall given the way they attack set pieces with him in the team, and we defend them, but Charlie Cresswell and Jake Cooper will give us all we want in that regard. Mason Bennett is a long termer while Callum Styles, Tyler Burey and Aidomo Emakhu all missing too. January signing Duncan Watmore joins top scorers Tom Bradshaw (seven) and Zian Flemming (ten) in attack.
Elsewhere: As we know, Friday night is West Brom night in the Championship, so kick back and enjoy their trip to Birmingham with your fish supper. Leeds United’s rumoured interest in inspirational Bielsa-bud Carlos Corberan quickly squashed this week by the signing of a new contract at The Hawthorns.
Apart from that, our Sky overlords aren’t bothered about the Championship this weekend apparently so a big thick dollop of 11 fixtures tomorrow afternoon at 15.00. Champions Burnley host Preston Knob End in a Lancashire derby, runners up Sheffield Red Stripe take their turn watching Swanselona try to complete 400 passes in their own penalty box as part of "the process”. The division’s form team, Michael Carrick’s Middlesbrough, will be watching the other Welsh side, Cardiff, attempt to find their own arse with both hands — prospects for success not strong.
Lutown’s trip to Coventry gives me the opportunity of a gratuitous mention for my old home town team Grimsby’s magnificent 3-0 FA Cup upset over the Hatters midweek — ignored entirely by a media too busy treating Wrexham’s "fairytale” story of nearly getting promoted from the Conference with a striker on £5k a week like some sort of cumdump.
Six pointers all over the place below us in the table. Huddersfield Giants, now on a third manager of the season after the midweek sacking of Mark Fotheringham, host Wigan Warriors who have also chewed their way through two bosses already. That’s a battle between 22nd and 24th, meanwhile second bottom Blackpool — whose injury time equaliser with ten men proved to be the final straw for Fotheringham in West Yorkshire on Tuesday — are travelling to 20th-placed Rotherham this time. Firmly in the ‘looking over their shoulder’ camp at everything going on there, Stoke host Hull. Bristol City, at home to Norwich, and Reading, up at Sunderland, are the next two places up on the ladder.
That just leaves Watford v Blackburn — eight points from eight games as the annual Rovers slide back to the pack now well in swing.
Referee: Dean Whitestone. Godspeed fella. Details.
QPR: Now one win in 15 games for QPR in all competitions, one win in 14 in the Championship, and one in nine under Neil Critchley thought he has drawn five of those fixtures. Rangers haven’t won at Loftus Road in six tries, dating back to a 2-1 against Wigan on October 22 — 112 days ago. They have failed to score in eight of their last 15 games, 12 of their 30 league games this season, and three of their last six home games. They’ve scored one goal or fewer in all but one of their last 15, and haven’t scored more than two goals in a game since beating Cardiff 3-0 here in mid October 17 matches ago. In that period Millwall’s Tom Bradshaw (Rotherham H) and Zian Flemming (Preston A) have both scored three in a game by themselves. Rangers have scored three goals at the Loft End all season — 14 home games. Two of those were penalties and all three of them were scored by the now sadly sidelined Lyndon Dykes. The last time a QPR player scored at the Loft End who wasn’t Dykes it was Luke Amos v Derby at the end of the 1-0 win over the Rams here on Easter Monday — 16 matches and just shy of ten months ago. Even that was with a Dykes’ assist so the last time we scored at the home end without his involvement it was Jimmy Dunne’s headed opener from Stefan Johansen’s corner at home to Blackpool on February 22, just shy of a year ago.
Millwall: I always have the Lions down as a dark horse for the play-offs in the pre-season preview and they never quite manage to make good on that promise. With 18 games left for them to play, they’re currently two places and one point shy of West Brom in the final spot with a game in hand on the Baggies. They come into this fixture with one defeat in their last seven league games, four wins and three draws from the last nine. Two players, Tom Bradshaw (seven) and Zian Flemming (ten), have more goals this season than QPR’s joint top scorers Lyndon Dykes and Chris Willock (both with six). Those totals are both boosted by the aforementioned hat tricks against Rotherham and Preston — two hat tricks in six games over Christmas, QPR’s last was 154 games and three years ago by Nahki Wells in a 6-1 rout of Cardiff. Despite that, and the presence of Bradshaw and Flemming in the league’s top 20 goalscorers, the Lions are almost as shot-shy as we are — they’ve scored 34 goals which is only two more than QPR. Given their lofty league position it’s no surprise, therefore, to find a tight defence — 28 conceded is the best total outside the top two Burnley and Sheff Utd. Away from home they’ve only scored 13 times in 14 games, two fewer goals than we have on our travels, and their four away wins (Bristol City, Watford, Preston, Cardiff) is the lowest total of any team in the top half and one fewer than we’ve managed. Three of those away success have come in their last five road trips, however. In the Championship only Coventry’s Mark Robins (March 2017) has been in his job longer than Gary Rowett at The Den (October 2019) — he is the seventh longest serving boss in the EFL.
Prediction: We’re once again indebted to The Art of Football for agreeing to sponsor our Prediction League and provide prizes. You can get involved by lodging your prediction here or sample the merch from our sponsor’s QPR collection here. Last year’s champion Cheesy was spot on with score and scorer at Huddersfield and this week tells us…
"This morning I relistened to the Andy Belk interview on LFW’s Patreon. I remember listening to it in October 2021 when it first dropped and feeling reassured when Andy talked about always looking at least three transfer windows in advance and cover for each position. Listening again today, I am not sure what has happened. The club talk the talk but they do not walk the walk. I can understand why people are not happy with the signing of Chris Martin. His age is not the issue with me, the issue I have is that we should not be in the position to have to sign players like this. We have learnt nothing. Stick to a plan and stick to a manager that is onboard with the plan. Millwall will be noisy and well up for adding to our worries.”
Cheesy’s Prediction: QPR 1-2 Millwall. Scorer — Ilias Chair
LFW’s Prediction: QPR 1-1 Millwall. Scorer — Chris Martin
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