QPR, second bottom without an away win all season, face their former manager Mark Hughes at Stoke on Saturday before what’s certain to be another frantic Transfer Deadline Day on Monday.
Queens Park Rangers fans, in the online space at least, currently largely divide very firmly into two increasingly extreme camps.
First of all there are those for whom Harry Redknapp is the devil incarnate, and with each passing defeat the criticism becomes more vociferous. We’re now at the stage where any football, sporting or global news event can quickly be switched back to a damning indictment of the way Rangers and their experienced manager are going about their work.
For example, any youth teamer rising from the bench to score a late goal for another team is immediately held against Redknapp who, in more than two years as boss at Loftus Road, has given graduates of the club’s youth academy two starts and three substitute appearances. Redknapp said, despite the length of time that he’s been at the club, that he was still "reliant on other peoples’ opinions” of Josh Laurent — hence the player ended up at Brentford.
There was another — perfectly legitimate — opportunity for the exasperated masses to leap on the beleaguered boss this week when League One Sheffield United roared back into a League Cup semi-final with Premier League Tottenham thanks to two late goals scored by a young player scouted from non-league coming on from the bench. Sheffield United annihilated Rangers in the Third Round of the FA Cup at the start of the month and Redknapp blamed the result on tiredness and fatigue after a hectic Christmas period, despite the fact that seven of players he picked for that game had no or little involvement in the festive fixtures. Sheffield United have already played 38 times this season (QPR will only play 40 games in total) and yet they’re rocketing through cup competitions, and maintaining a play-off push. Why aren’t they tired and fatigued?
Picking contradictions, inconsistencies and outright lies in what Redknapp says is like shooting a hammerhead shark in a mop bucket with a cross bow. You can’t miss. Allow message board regular PommyHoop to demonstrate…
Here’s Redknapp before the Man Utd home game:
"I go home Saturday night from Burnley and I can’t talk to my wife. I can’t talk to anybody. I get so low. It’s scary. It’s not right really, but that’s how it gets you. When I stop feeling like that is probably the time I should retire. When I go home and think, 'Oh, it doesn’t matter — what’s for dinner, darling?’ Have some fish and a nice glass of wine. I go home now and just sit up watching television, watching football until about 05.00 on Sunday morning in a room on my own. It’s wrong. It’s a silly way to live your life, but if you care, you care. You can’t change the way you are.''
And here’s Redknapp after the Man Utd home game:
''Do I look like I feel under pressure? When I get home I'll take my wife for a nice meal somewhere, have a nice bottle of wine, then in the morning wake up and take my dogs for a walk. My life's very good.”
Secondly, there are those who — possibly through irritation with reading so much negativity about the club we’re all supposed to support — have positioned themselves as mini, unofficial press officers, providing a positive spin on everything the club and the manager and the chairman say or do.
As the factions divide and their statements become more extreme, so each of them looks even more ludicrous, one group like hysterical Daily Mail journalists seeking offence and problems and outrage at every turn, the other like Chemical Ali at the gates of flaming Baghdad declaring a 2-1 defeat at Burnley following a defensive shambles is actually some kind of weird positive.
This week’s sale of Jordon Mutch to Crystal Palace less than six months after he was bought for £6m from Cardiff City has been a perfect opportunity to rush to the respective turrets and start firing arrows at one another again.
There is no question that Mutch has been poor for QPR this season. In fact, he’s made only nine appearances across six months and not a single one of them was noteworthy for anything positive whatsoever. You’d struggle to find a Rangers fan anywhere who wanted him in the team. When I suggested that his turn and saved shot that led to Bobby Zamora’s goal at Everton at least meant that, despite a dire performance, he’d done more for the cause than the people’s champion Joey Barton, who directly cost his team the first two goals that night, the idea was shouted down. Now a lot of those same people are criticising the club for offloading the player.
From the point of view of Redknapp, and his supporters, this is an excellent move. An under-performing player has been shipped out for money which can now be spent on another player who may not under-perform, thereby increasing the team’s chances of staying in the league. Rudy Gestede, a formidable target man playing well at Blackburn, has been linked and would improve QPR’s attack no end. If Rangers stay up, the move will be hailed as a shrewd piece of business — although any Sky Sports reporter told to "fuck off” for having the temerity to call Redknapp a "wheeler and dealer” in the future should punch him straight between the eyes with yet another solid example of how much unmitigated bullshit he speaks.
For the naysayers, and those who just worry about the obviously shambolic way the club being run, this is more kerosene for a raging blaze. Jordon Mutch’s signing in the summer was seen as an important shift in QPR’s mentality — Leroy Fer, Mutch, Steven Caulker were all promising younger players bought at decent prices in stark contrast to the ageing, high-earning, low output dogs the club had saddled itself with previously in the pursuit of quick fixes and cheap publicity for the Tune Group. I was delighted with the Caulker and Mutch arrivals in particular — exactly the sort of players I wanted to see QPR spending their money on.
I don’t even know where to begin with the decision to sell him on so quickly, for less money, to a direct relegation rival. I can’t fathom it on a football level, nor on a business level. It’s difficult to imagine how Harry Redknapp retains the steadfast support of the moneymen at the club when he’s doing things like this. If you sent me to Waitrose with a tenner to buy a ready-meal for your dinner but before you could eat it I flogged it on to somebody else for £7 and spent that on a Pot Noodle you’d wonder what kind of mental remedial you were friends with.
When Mutch signed in the summer the QPR manager described him as: "A fine young player, with a big, big future. He's already shown what he can do at this level with Cardiff last season, with a decent goals return, and this move will provide him with a great platform to take his game onto the next level." Now Tony Fernandes is Tweeting, just six months later, that there’s no point in keeping a player who isn’t in the manager’s plans. Doesn’t this just show how few plans the manager actually has?
Mutch was injured early on, and rushed back from that injury on more than one occasion making the situation worse. Redknapp regularly cited the inability to get Mutch on the field as one of his ever-growing list of excuses why the team wasn’t performing. When he was eventually fit for selection, he played nine times in the league — never more than twice consecutively, and never twice consecutively in the same position. He’s one of a clutch of ‘number ten’ type players — along with Fer, Eduardo Vargas, Niko Kranjcar and Mauro Zarate — that Redknapp has accumulated at great expense for a team that does not play with a ‘number ten’ in it. What kind of "plan” is that?
Having spent all summer long talking about playing with a back three, Redknapp abandoned it after two matches leaving the club with a surplus of these creative, advanced midfielders and a dearth of wingers and full backs. Fer and Vargas play out of position on the wing, Niko Kranjcar doesn’t play at all and Mutch has been shipped out. Fewer than two games it took for that idea around which the entire summer transfer spending was structured to be abandoned, fewer than a dozen appearances for the "fine young player with the big, big future” to be sold.
In the summer I spoke about how the arrivals of Caulker, Mutch, Fer and others looked shrewd in the sense that were relegation to happen, another fire sale would not be required. They looked much more like the sort of yo-yo signings clubs like West Brom made long term investments in, knowing they would stick around for a season in the division below, and be able to step back up following a promotion — the likes of Chris Brunt, Jonas Olson and James Morrison have been the backbone of the Baggies for years in this division and the one below and it’s a model QPR finally looked like they’d taken heed of. Or not.
Whatever division QPR are in next season Mutch’s departure leaves the club with one (one) central midfield player who is under contract, under 30 and fit to play: Leroy Fer. Joseph Christ and Karl Henry are over 30 and out of contract; Niko Kranjcar is over 30 and only on loan; Samba Diakite is in a secure institution and Sandro is in negotiations to replace the late Thora Hird as the face of Stannah Stairlifts. Whether QPR stay up or go down, they will need to - yet again, yet again - go out into the market and spend money on an entirely new central midfield.
Somebody somewhere deep within the dark recesses of Loftus Road must surely be saying "hang on a fucking minute here”.
And even if you’re of a mind to think that Mutch just didn’t fit here, didn’t play well, rarely looked any good, rarely looked very bothered, won’t be greatly missed and may well finance a signing that changes the season for the better, you’re therefore forced by your own reasoning to ask why yet another player of a good age with a good fitness record who has performed well elsewhere at clubs of similar size to QPR has come to Loftus Road and crashed.
Fer and Vargas, along with Matt Phillips and Junior Hoilett, two others Redknapp is desperate to be rid of, all played well for their previous clubs but cannot find their own arses with both hands here. On Saturday the R’s go to Stoke, travelling very nicely in the top half of the Premier League and the fifth round of the FA Cup under a manager who couldn’t win an away game in 11 months, or a game at all in 13 attempts at the start of the 2012/13 season at Loftus Road. What is it about QPR that means Jordon Mutch can look great for Cardiff, and awful in Hoops? That question needs answering bloody quickly, or the club would be better off taking the £5m received from Palace for the player away from Redknapp before he lumbers us with another one.
What Redknapp, and QPR, and the divided fan-base needs more than anything is a win to calm everybody down — an away win in particular. As we’re no doubt about to be told over and over and over and over and over and over again for the next 48 hours, Stoke City is a hard place to go and get a result. Not so hard that Aston Villa, Leicester and Burnley haven’t won there this season, and not so hard that they’ve not already been beaten four times on their own patch this season, but hard all the same. The Potters also have a reputation for handing our charitable victories and goals to clubs on runs like Rangers’ abject, pathetic 11 defeats from 11 road games this season.
Twelfth time lucky? Expect a server-melting row if it’s not.
Links >>> Bojan blow fails to mask Stoke progress — opposition focus >>> Praise for Hughes — interview >>> Bircham’s PR campaign — history >>> Dean takes Stoke trip — referee
Marc Bircham is led away from angry Stoke City players during a meeting on this ground back in 2004. The Canadian-international midfielder was accused of dropping to the ground too readily in an incident which led to the sending off of Gerry Taggert. To compound matters, Kevin Gallen scored the only goal of the game during the second half to set up a nervy trip back to the station for the travelling faithful.
Stoke lost striker Bojan to a season-ending cruciate knee ligament injury in the FA Cup at Rochdale on Monday, and while his absence is good news for QPR this weekend we’ve had enough of those horrible injuries to our star names at Loftus Road over the years to wish the player all the best and sympathise with the situation. Just as he was starting to really hit his straps in the Premier League after a summer arrival as well, such a genuine shame. Senegal are out of the African Cup of Nations so Mame Diouf is available to start up front once more.
Elsewhere: What QPR need is for three teams to show themselves to be even more incompetent than them during the next four months. Two prime candidates meet in the early Saturday game with Tigers Tigers Rah Rah Rah hosting Newcastle. Steve Bruce’s summer transfer business, seen as astute at the time, has failed to yield a single hit, and the decision to let Shane Long depart just six months after joining looks foolhardy. While Hull are in it up to their tits, Newcastle have an eight point cushion, but with John Carver handed the job until the end of the season despite taking one draw and three defeats from four games in caretaker charge don’t rule out a plummet from the Geordies in the coming months — February, March and April takes them to Palace, Man City, Everton, Sunderland and Liverpool while Man Utd, Arsenal, Spurs and Swansea visit the North East.
Pards Pardew will be glad he left, and he’s won four from four as Palace boss so far just to rub salt in the wounds. Against Everton at home this weekend, there’s every chance of the Eagles making it five from five. The other team that twisted over Christmas — West Brom — host Spurs at home in what looks a certain draw for your coupon.
Sunderland at home to Burnley is a key meeting at the bottom and the Shepherd’s Bush regulars will, for once, be cheering on Louis Van Gaal against Leicester at home.
The Men of Liverpool Together Collectively as One play Big Fat Sam’s Big Fat Brand of Entertaining Football at Anfield — both teams locked in that weird game where you push for the Champions League spaces, but leave yourself enough wiggle room so that if the dreaded Europa League is a likely possibility a run of defeats can be strung together to end the season and avoid it.
On Sunday non-scoring, non-shooting Villa go to Arsenal while Swansea go to Southampton in a hipster derby.
Sky’s "game that matters” this weekend is Chelsea hosting Man City, which will certainly decide the destination of the title despite bigger gaps being clawed back and there being a lot of football left to play. Expect it to be called "The Decider” or "Judgement Day” or some such titillating nonsense.
Referee: Mike Dean, not a man noted for his generosity to QPR in recent years, is the man in the middle for this one. It’s his second Rangers appointment of the season following the Man City home game where Rangers had two goals disallowed in quick succession, and a succession of players yellow carded for offences similar to ones City were let away without further punishment for. Not ideal. Here’s his full QPR case file.
QPR: Well we know this script well enough by now. The loss at Burnley at the beginning of the month was the tenth straight league away defeat for Rangers, a eleventh in all competitions - a new Premier League record. Charlie Austin’s penalty was just the fifth goal scored by Redknapp’s side on the road this season (only Villa have managed fewer) and Austin has four of those himself and two of them were penalties. The two conceded takes the against column to 24, by far the most in the division. Rangers haven’t won in six, losing four.
Betting: Our resident professional odds compiler Owen Goulding is back after a mid-winter break to offer us…
"QPR embark on another awayday that probably fills most of the incredibly loyal away following with fear of another fruitless day out. Stoke’s Britannia Stadium probably isn't the first choice of venue for most supporters looking for a first away win of the season, but in truth, it’s not the fortress the media would have you believe. Add to this the loss of the excellent Bojan, and it will be back to the long ball up to Crouch tactics that have been well exercised in Staffordshire over the last few years.
"The concern for the Rangers faithful is the ability to deal with this threat and it worries me that it won't be coped with, but there are definitely goals to be had for QPR here as Stoke do like to give teams an opportunity or two, especially when the onus is on them to take the game to the opposition at home. Match prices of 4/6 stoke, and 5/1 QPR seem about right and I'm not confident QPR will get a result here but I am reasonably confident of Rangers getting on the score sheet and so looking at the scorers market, a very generous 11/4 offering from Ladbrokes for Mr Austin to notch at any time during the game is too good to pass up.
Recommended Bet: Stoke v QPR - Charlie Austin to score anytime @11/4 Ladbrokes
Elsewhere from a betting point of view, keep your eyes on Ebbsfleet United - in FA Trophy action this week - who have signed some very good players for their level and will hope to embark on a winning streak, and a few players who are likely to find the net in the coming weeks at big prices - Jeroen Veldmaat for Heracles in Holland and Alfie Mawson for Wycombe Wanderers.
Prediction: Reigning Prediction League champion WestonSuperR tells us…
"Wouldn’t it be fantastic to inflict a defeat on Mark Hughes on home soil? We have quite a decent record at The Britannia and I have very fond memories of my last visit which was the 3-2 win that propelled us into the top half of the Premier League table under Neil Warnock. Sadly since that day our away record (bored of talking about it now) has varied from bad to downright awful and we seem to have reached a real nadir at the moment.
"Can we finally get a point on our travels this season? Well I haven’t really seen anything recently to suggest we can. Our best bet could be to try and replicate the formation at Everton which produced an almost acceptable performance although still not good enough in my eyes and still a loss by two clear goals. In reality it’s hard to show any sort of genuine positivity about our chances against a Stoke side that will be strong, physical and have a good Home record over the past few seasons so I predict more pain on the road.”
John’s Prediction: Stoke 2-0 QPR. No Scorer.
LFW Prediction: Stoke 1-0 QPR. No Scorer.
The Twitter @loftforwords
Pictures — Action Images