QPR play the first home game of the Neil Critchley era in the frankly ludicrous time slot of 6pm on Thursday night, facing old foe Luton Town at Loftus Road.

QPR (10-5-9 LLLLWD 7th) v Luton (8-9-6 DWLDLW 13th)

Lancashire and District Senior League >>> Thursday December 29, 2022 >>> Kick off 18:00 :-/ >>> Weather — Windy, grey >>> Loftus Road, London, W12

Take it from somebody who has to write 48 match previews and reports a season on the same team, this shit isn’t easy.

I’ve spent two decades trying to win a Michelin star with the thin gruel (available as a starter or main) QPR frequently serve up. After 20 years, having them curl out a concrete block like Boxing Day’s nil nil stalemate at Cardiff and challenge me to craft Michelangelo’s David from it once more becomes quite the task. Even my life and family have only churned out so many ridiculous stories to serve as tangents, and after all this time the well of Office and Simpsons memes is running barren - hence, cat pics. It’s how the regular readers of this site (hello to both) have ended up knowing more about me and my life than any of the 11 or 12 real people that actually exist within it. Long suffering mother has said in the past she only ever knows what I’m really thinking, how I’m really feeling, what my actual state of mind is, by reading LFW — but, then, she hates football, and QPR in particular, and I chuck lines about skull-fucking the exhumed corpse of Margaret Thatcher (sorry, sorry, last time) in there to keep her away. You should have fired into the air, she would have run off.

Therefore, I do sympathise with football managers, however well remunerated they are, for having to slog through the rigmarole of 48 pre-match interviews (an interview about something that hasn’t happened yet), and 48 post-match press conferences (don’t say what you really think or you’ll be fined). At least I can say what I really think and feel. They cannot: for fear of reprisals from the league or FA; for fear of blowing up a dressing room of fragile egos and having the thick-as-pig-shit footballers look up from their phones long enough to down tools on them; for the risk of tipping another club off about a weakness they can exploit in the team, or a contract situation they can rinse in a transfer window. Look how well it went for Dean Smith letting the mask slip and saying he was pleased Norwich were playing away after he was pilloried post 2-0 home loss to Blackburn. The goal of these media interactions isn’t to “keep the fans informed”, because you only have to look at how we’ve been treated since lockdown was lifted (a 6pm kick off on a Thursday night is it? Into the fucking sea with you) to know all that “football without fans is nothing” guff was marketing horseshit. It’s basically to quench the thirst of a 24-hour rolling news media — and I guess I’d rather have a professional footballer or football manager lie to me on Sky Sports News than hear what “Thogden” thinks Jurgen Klopp should do next - and get out while revealing as little as possible.

Some of them are really blatant about this. Paul Lambert, at Aston Villa and Norwich, went out of his way to be as boring as possible. Ask him whether Grant Holt will be fit for this weekend, he’d sit there and deadpan that he didn’t even know who Grant Holt was. Some of them, some of the best of them, weaponize it. Whenever Jose Mourinho, or Alex Ferguson, are teeing off on a referee, or a journalist, it may be easy, and terrific, copy, but the real question is what failing, bust up, injury, mistake or problem are they doing it to cover up? Harry Redknapp used to riff on about the Ryder Cup, and Sky lapped it all up, asking zero difficult questions about why the very expensive QPR team he was in charge of had lost 12 away games in a row.

In the real world they call that "dead cat politics", and we've become very accustomed to being lied to there as well. Back in the day when you had to search for incompetence in government, then-transport secretary Stephen Byers was dragged across the cobbles for weeks because one of his aides got caught on email saying September 11 might be “a good day to bury bad news”. The newspapers front paged that on and off for six months until he, and she, finally had to resign. Now, when we’ve had somebody ascend to the position of prime minister while not being able to say publicly how many children he’s fathered, that wouldn’t even last half a day of media cycle. This Christmas/New Year break has been used to slip out the news that the chemical and sewage pollution of our streams, rivers and coastline will be allowed to continue beyond the EU limit of 2027 until, says here, 2063. How lovely, used tampons on the beach beyond the point most of us will be alive. Everybody knows why that piece of news has been put out at this time of year, and nobody, apparently, cares any more. Donald Trump mastered the ability to concentrate such obvious and flagrant lies into such a tight timespan that people become desensitised to it, and politicians around the world have taken note.

Back at the QPR coal face, we’ve had our equivalent with five months of Mick Beale, who made provocative comments in a Bromley accent so forcibly, repeatedly and believably that even hardened, seasoned journalists were pulling the pants down and writing “I love his honesty” across their arse cheeks. Of course, they were all lies, because everything in football is — but they’re entertaining lies, and in the end isn’t that the real truth? The answer, is no. They have these media commitments; they come and sit in front of you sometimes six times a week; and they go out of their way not to tell you the truth. Neil Warnock, rightly beloved at QPR for his achievements here, cannot lie straight in bed. All those Adel Taarabt stories we love hearing again on podcasts are mostly all bollocks. He says what he needs to say to get to the next stage, as he proved conclusively with his sharp about-face on El Hadji Diouf when he thought he could help him get results at Leeds, and he’s been very successful with that. Ian Holloway was exactly the same. His famous “bird in the taxi” rubbish was actually to cover up the fact Clarke Carlisle had tumbled off the wagon again and vanished from their radar for a few days. That’s PR, and football, and football PR in particular.

We’re used to it. But still, after Beale so shamelessly turned our football club into a house of lies, those of us left behind are even more suspicious and cynical than we were before. Prior to the Burnley home game we were treated to a whole load of platitudes about how well everybody had responded to Paul Hall, and then we curled a steamer three goals wide into the S-bend live on Sky. "The players have trained well all week." “What does the bullshit meter say?” “3.6 roentgen.” “3.6, not great, not terrible”. No. No more. Go and get the good bullshit meter, the one from the safe.

Neil Critchley will do well to watch out for this. We are the jilted partner, we’ll think he’s lying to us even when he’s not, we’ll be checking his phone while he’s in the bog for a long while yet. He would be well advised not to lay the standard football manager tropes on us too thick. So, I’m a little reticent to read, and write, too much into the idea that he “kept the players in” for a period of time after Cardiff on Boxing Day, because that’s absolute genre vintage stuff. Still, like I say, these previews don’t write themselves, and I did quite like hearing it. That is why all this bullshit is allowed to manifest with obsessives like us — you want to believe the football manager/politician/Twitter account that’s saying what you want to hear. There are easy games in the Championship, and Cardiff wasn’t the first one of those we’ve royally fucked up this season. You can talk clean sheets, progress, league position, context, early date in the season, but none of it masks that was a poor performance, against a crap side, in an eminently winnable game.

What he has done to this point is tighten the defence up. Jimmy Dunne has played well in the last two games, and benefitted from what looks to me like a bit of pragmatism back there — ideals are fine, but if we’re in the shit let’s get rid of it and play in their half for a bit, talk about the nuance later. Never mind the quality, feel the width. I think any manager inheriting a squad with a goalkeeper, full backs and centre backs as good as we’ve got, but with only seven clean sheets in the best part of 50 games, would have quickly done the same by way of stemming the bleeding and buying time until the ambulance arrives.

The real surgery is to be done on the attack, which has now scored just two goals in eight games, and one of those from a centre back off a set piece. Everybody remotely connected with QPR has a theory, a bugbear, an irritation, a hated player within our attacking midfielders and strikers at the moment. Some think we don’t service Dykes correctly, others think doing so would be like pouring money into a black hole. Willock is either unfit or low on confidence or angling for a move or trying to stay fit for January transfer window. Tyler Roberts is either our best hope who we need to get fit and have playing, or doesn’t care and is a Bertie Big Potatoes who needs to be shipped back to Leeds pronto. There are QPR fans who think Ilias Chair is one of the best players in the league drinking in the same pub as those who think we’re a better team without him in it. What is for sure is we’re not scoring goals, there is no money to do anything about that in January, and we have to start finding a way to correct that soon or watch another play-off dream fade away through the spring.

When the truth offends, we lie and lie until we can no longer remember it is even there, but it is still there. Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth. Sooner or later, that debt is paid.

No lie can cover a football team that cannot put the ball in the back of the net.

Links >>> Parker breaks his duck — History >>> Edwards up and running — Interview >>> Ward in charge — Referee >>> Luton Town official website >>> Hatters News — Blog >>> Luton Outlaws — Message Board >>> Supporters Trust >>> Oak Road Hatter —Blog

Road closures and diversions in place pre- and post-match.

Below the fold

Team News: Ilias Chair, Tyler Roberts and Luke Amos all made comebacks from the bench at Cardiff for their first appearances since November 12, October 28 and November 5 respectively. Given QPR’s struggles in front of goal one would think they’ll be looking at some more involvement in this game. Neil Critchley kept his team in for some time after the 0-0 at Cardiff and made hints in the delayed post match interview that players yet to have much involvement in his two games to date might be seeing some action in the two remaining festive home games. Whether that includes mystery man Taylor Richards, who has followed up his impressive cameo against Huddersfield and man of the match showing in the Livingston friendly by disappearing completely, we’ll see. Stefan Johansen and Leon Balogun remain sidelined.

As God gave to Luton with one hand on Boxing Day, he took away with the other. Cauley Woodrow’s powerful last minute winner was his first goal for the club in ten outings, as he made a comeback from a groin injury picked up in September that has stalled his impact from a summer arrival from Barnsley. Unfortunately, Elijay Adebayo, who absolutely monstered QPR in the first meeting this season, limped out of that game. Similarly, Amari Bell, sent off by the same referee we have for this game at Middlesbrough a fortnight back, returns from his ban but Gabriel Osho’s second red card iin five games (the first booking of which was a total nonsense) means he sits out for two matches starting with this one.

Luton were caught by surprise in the summer when Kal Naismith up and left for Bristol City on a free transfer. Naismith tends to play like a complete tart against QPR — he was crap in both meetings last season, and repeated that at Ashton Gate in September — and his arrival at Bristol City has done nothing to boost their prospects while once more weighting their wage bill in favour of unsellable 30-somethings. The Hatters, however, really liked him, and they’ve been short on numbers in defence ever since. Glen Rea and Reece Burke remain sidelined along with Osho’s latest ban. Always a clever club in the recruitment department, I’m intrigued to see if there is budget available to improve that area of the team for Rob Edwards this January, and who they go for if so. I’m often jealous of the signings made for the money they pay in this part of the world, mind you there are plenty that haven’t worked out brilliantly — The Admiral Muskwe was highly rated but is now on loan at Fleetwood along with former Morecambe star Carlos Mendes Gomes, while Wycombe starlet Fred Onyedimna is on an intimidating injury list that also includes Henri Lansbury, goalkeeper James Shea, and accident-waiting-to-happen Sonny Bradley.

Elsewhere: The two obviously outstanding teams in the Lancashire and District Senior League continue to streak away at the top. Burnley beat Birmingham in their Boxing Day game to breach 50 points after 24 games, and there is already an 11 point gap from them to third place ahead of their trip to Stoke — that’s a bigger gap than the ten that separates Watford in fourth from Hull in 21st. Sheffield Red Stripe are three behind them on 47, eight points clear of third, with a very winnable trip to Blackpool in store.

They feel somewhat out of sight, even at this early stage, and two teams sucking up so many of the points through the first half of the season has seen the rest of this festering mess bunch up like few seasons before. Norwich in fifth on 35 are parted from Swanselona in 16th by just three points. The Canaries’ under performance for the resources and strikers they have has turned toxic in Norfolk, with Dean Smith’s tendency to blame everybody except himself for anything that doesn’t go right for his team finally catching up with him in the form of an outright revolt by the travelling fans at Luton on Boxing Day. They start without him at home to Reading on Friday night.

To create a logjam like this you need several teams from low down the table in good form, and several early pace-setters hitting a wall. Unfortunately, we’re in the latter camp, but we’re not alone.

Blackburn remain third despite four fairly terrible defeats in their last five games, mainly courtesy of their remarkable feat of getting through 24 fixtures without a single draw — their total of 11 defeats is the same as Blackpool, Hull and Cardiff in 22nd, 21st and 20th. They’ve got all on with Middlesbrough at home tomorrow, one of the teams that’s making the most of a bunched league to fly up the table after a lousy start — five wins and a draw from seven since Michael Carrick took over, eight goals in eight games for Chuba Akpom, and potentially into the play-off spots for the first time with a win in this round.

Watford, two wins in six, no goals in four of those, were beaten by one of the form sides Millwall on Boxing Day but remain third ahead of the Marxist Hunters in sixth. Wawll will fancy their chances against tanking Bristol City in this round, while Watford’s trip to South Wales brings them face-to-face with a Swanselona side without a win in eight games, and back to conceding ridiculous goals in the name of Russell Martin’s ideals at Reading in the last game.

West Brom are still reaping the benefits of binning Steve Bruce (who would have thought it?) with four wins from five, and they face Preston Knob End at home who’ve rather blown their pre-Christmas form by losing consecutive home games to us and lowly Huddersfield. Not all good news for the Baggies though, with their deteriorating ownership and financial situation now including a loan from the same MSD Holdings off-the-shelf company that Derby went to the wall owing £20m. The Terriers are going to have to go some to survive from here, but the Cowley’s got them out of the shit after taking just one point from their first eight games a couple of seasons back and you’d fancy them for a home win against another of the sides on an ominous slide Rotherham — a 2-2 Boxing Day draw with Stoke secured with a goal from Conor Washington no less.

Coventry v Cardiff is an exciting fixture between two games beginning with C, Birmingham are hosting endangered Hull and Wigan’s new manager bounce (P3 L3) flops into a home tie with Sunderland to round up the list.

Referee: The good news just keeps coming in this regard, with Gavin Ward back at Loftus Road all too soon after the debacle against Huddersfield. Details.

I wonder if we’re suffering for our geography here, as one of relatively few southern teams in a predominantly northern league. Ward, from Surrey, did three of our home games last season and was at Loftus Road as recently as November 28. Luton, meanwhile, have been refereed by this official 28 times, at least five more than any other club in the EFL. QPR are in a similar position with Hampshire-based Keith Stroud: no club in the country has had him as many as our 34 times, we’ve already had him twice this season (and he dropped out of a third at Coventry) to go with five appointments over the last two seasons. Over the period of time we’ve sat through those 12 appointments with Ward and Stroud we’ve had County Durham-based Geoff Eltringham, who I class as one of the few safe pairs of hands left at this level, just once in two and a half years. Blackpool-based Leigh Doughty, one of the new intake who I thought was very good in two games with us last season, hasn’t had a QPR game since Huddersfield away last Easter. When we got to Preston last week we found Olly Langford, West Midlands based, doing his fourth Deepdale match of the season already, just 22 games into the season.

I guess referees and assistants, not all of whom will be full time professionals at this level, don’t want to be travelling in a country with collapsing infrastructure and no functioning rail network to speak of any more than we do, and you want to make it as easy as possible for them because we’re trying to encourage more people into that profession. Still, we have to do it, just look at the state of our February and March away games, and with only QPR, Millwall, Watford, Luton and I guess Bristol City and the Welsh sides representing ‘the South’ in this season’s Championship, you can’t just run the Southern based referees on a loop with us like this, even if they were any good which sadly for us Ward and Stroud are not. Only six of Ward’s 19 appointments so far this season have been ‘up north’, in a league where half of the teams are M62 corridor or further past that still. Stroud’s stats are even starker — out of 20 appointments this season he’s done one at Sheff Utd, one at Sunderland and one at Burnley, and that’s it, everything else Birmingham or below. Although he pulled out of our Coventry game two of his last four appointments have been with QPR, and three of his last eight and two of his last four have been at Coventry. Meanwhile, he hasn’t refereed Huddersfield at all yet this season, and his last game with them was now just short of a year ago. QPR have had Ward for two of their last three home games, Luton have had him two away games in a row, and his last five fixtures have involved three of the same clubs three times.

It’s just a fairness thing. There are always going to be good referees and bad referees just as there are good footballers and bad footballers, and if you’re consistently getting the same half a dozen faces for four or five games a season, while others you only see once every two years, it runs the risk of a team suffering more games than it really should with one of the poor ones. QPR and Luton have drawn particularly short straws in this regard.

Form

QPR: Now just one win in eight for Rangers, and only two goals scored in that time — Jimmy Dunne at Preston and Lyndon Dykes at home to Huddersfield. The R’s have failed to score in ten of their 24 Championship fixtures this season. Despite that the R’s remain seventh, and can climb as high as fourth with a victory here, but there’s been substantial bunching up behind us while results have been on the slide and there’s now just three points between Swansea in sixteenth and Norwich in fifth. Mick Beale’s team were six unbeaten at home through the autumn and won three games in a row against Reading, Cardiff and Wigan prior to the recent downturn. They have now lost three straight here against West Brom, Huddersfield and Burnley with one goal scored and six conceded. On a more positive note, Neil Critchley has started with two clean sheets in his first two matches in charge after just seven in the previous 42 games and four in the prior 26 away games. The draw at Cardiff continued the Hoops record of Boxing Day failure — they haven’t won away from home the day after Christmas since 1967, 21 games featuring seven draws and 14 defeats. It’s a rare treat for QPR to be somebody’s bogey team, and having passed up the chance of another win in Cardiff where we tend to do well let’s hope we make good on our modern day hex over Luton. The 3-1 defeat at Kenilworth Road in October was the Hatters’ first victory against Rangers in nine matches in all comps and ten in the league. Luton have won only three of the last 27 meetings going back to the 1980s, and at Loftus Road they’re winless in 18 visits going back to 1984 at which point they’d actually won three in a row on the new plastic pitch. Rangers have completed the double over Town for the last two seasons.

Luton: The Hatters were impressive in victory against Norwich on Boxing Day, Cauley Woodrow marking his comeback from an injury that had sidelined him since September 17 with a winning goal in injury time after they’d been reduced to ten men. It was Woodrow’s first goal in nine appearances since rejoining the club from Barnsley in the summer, and his first 16 appearances going back to last December with the Tykes — one of the four he managed for the relegated Yorkshire side last season was in a 2-2 draw at Loftus Road in August. The game bore strong resemblance to Luton’s 3-2 win against another promotion favourite in receipt of parachute payments, Bournemouth, also achieved with a winning goal in injury time last January. That was game 23, and both results moved Luton from 16th to 13th in the table — they, of course, went on to finish sixth and make the play-offs. The departure of the winning goalscorer that day Kal Naismith to Bristol City has left a substantial hole in the Luton backline, but it also hasn’t done muchfor the Robins who are eighteenth - only Bristol City, Rotherham and Wigan (17 each) have lost more points from winning positions than Luton’s 16 in the first 24 games. They are 5-2-4 away from home, with the wins coming at Blackpool, Norwich, Hull, Cardiff and Swansea — four of those to nil.

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. Congrats to Aston who was ‘top at Christmas’, his prize is winging its way to him. Meanwhile, last year’s champion Cheesy tells us…

“I knew being positive for the Cardiff game was going to be a mistake, especially after seeing Clive also go for the win. Ask me three weeks ago if I would have taken a draw at Cardiff and I would have taken it, but that was painful to watch. Was surprised to see Chair come on and Willock to be taken off at the same time. As Nix pointed out on the forum, five points is the difference between 5th and 17th so the point at Cardiff could be useful depending on whether you are looking up or down the league. Going to stay positive for the Luton game. God, I hope we beat them.”

Cheesy’s Prediction: QPR 2-1 Luton. Scorer — Chris Willock

LFW’s Prediction: QPR 1-1 Luton. Scorer — Tyler Roberts

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qprxtc added 21:25 - Dec 28 I love your previews / reports / writing Clive. It’s passionate and truthful. Queens Park Rangers, a club who have been bang average since the day tge were formed and probably always will be. We hope we will rise above it, dread we will sink below it. It’s why every win means we’re going to win the league, every defeat means we the club is crumbling. Every small detail is magnified. We care. Way way more than we should. No one else gives a flying one about QPR. Even the worst teams in a league will win games. Probably against us. We will win games we are guaranteed to lose. We will lose games we are guaranteed to lose. I’ve lust my thread of thought. Basically we’re QPR. How you write about this into coherent, beautifully written pieces so often is beyond me. But thank you Cliff. I’m going back to the Sherry, English Settlement and Pat Wynn.

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Burnleyhoop added 21:29 - Dec 28 Can someone please have a word with Critchley about our historical effectiveness when playing Chair and Willock at the same time? Pitch forks out if both are not on the pitch tomorrow night 🤨
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Andybrat added 22:48 - Dec 28 Clive your brain must be knackered with so many reports over so few days. No idea how big the crowd will be tomorrow but looking forward to a bit of a Critchley bounce in the Stan stand ( thank god there is no standing in the Stan stand) There is a common theme on the forums with the big question mark over Taylor Richards, injured or just not chosen? He looks good every time I have seen him on the pitch. Unsure why but I suspect some interesting selections tomorrow. Any chance of 5 at the back ( not his style). Sort of feels like a big game that could influence the rest of the season, especially with the traffic jam in the league, which feels appropriate with rail strikes. COYR’s

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Gleni1977 added 23:07 - Dec 28 Is your step-dad Larry Grayson?
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thehat added 09:20 - Dec 29 Great stuff again Clive. I think we need to put Chair and Willock on the bench and revert to 3 at the back Dieng Dickie Dunne Salter Laird Field Tim Dozell Paal Dykes Armstrong
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enfieldargh added 11:22 - Dec 29 Your writing as always superb. Luton's injury woes and suspensions sound promising. Gavin Ward hopefully will be a trip hazard to both teams and not just us, am expecting plenty of entertainment from Row D. Am bringing a Leeds fan with me who told me when we signed Tyler Roberts everything we have come to learn,(Leeds nickname for him was spaghetti legs) would love to see him score but think there is more chance of free pre-match beers in the Princess Victoria.

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gobbles added 12:03 - Dec 29 Great Chernobyl reference
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TacticalR added 14:36 - Dec 29 Thanks for your preview. It can only be a matter of time before Jacob Rees-Mogg assures us sewage is a benefit rather than a problem because it's British sewage. After Beale we could with less honeyed words. I get the impression Critchley is not a master communicator, and probably just wants to get on with the job, but then he's left with the problem of filling out those pre and post match interviews. In the Cardiff game we didn't just look short of goals, we looked short of ideas. We can't blame just Dykes for the lack of goals - if we are going to score the whole team needs to be on song, and if we are going to play well we need to adapt to the loss of Johansen. On the distribution of referees...how can you have a national league with localised refs?

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