QPR’s 1-0 win at home to Ipswich on Saturday came at a cost, with Junior Hoilett injuring his hamstring. Off the field a move to a new stadium appears to have moved a step closer.
Charles Sale in The Daily Mail reported this morning that QPR are eyeing a site north of Loftus Road at Old Oak Common.
The area has been earmarked for substantial retail and residential development around a new railway station on the Crossrail and High Speed lines. A 40,000 capacity sports complex is included in the brief for the plot and that would seemingly be ideal for QPR owner Tony Fernandes and CEO Phil Beard who have made a move to a new multi-purpose stadium a top priority since arriving at QPR two years ago.
The club took the unusual step of responding to newspaper speculation with an official statement which read: "We are looking at a number of potential options for a new stadium and believe that Old Oak could provide one possible solution. We have met with representatives of the GLA and the supporting local authorities to discuss whether a football stadium could be incorporated into any plan that comes forward for this site.”
For now, and the considerable future, Rangers remain at Loftus Road and it was certainly a happy place at 5pm on Saturday with a last minute goal from young substitute Tom Hitchcock, on his debut, sealing a 1-0 win against Ipswich in the Championship.
A rather bewildered Hitchcock told the club’s official website afterwards: "I can’t really remember a lot, it is all a bit of a blur but it was a great feeling. It’s the best moment of my life so far. I didn’t really know what to do when it went in. I saw dad on the pitch celebrating, he looked really happy but Frankie Sutherland told me to run to the R Block if I scored so I had to run over there for him. But it’s very surreal right now, it is a great feeling and I am buzzing that we got the three points which is the most important thing.”
After the game manager Harry Redknapp dedicated the result to QPR fan Neil Pike, the 38-year-old professional at Ferndown Golf Club who sadly passed away before the match leaving his one year old son Oscar and wife Victoria. Everybody at LFW extends their sympathies and thoughts to the family as well.
The victory came at some cost, with Junior Hoilett’s bright start to the campaign unfortunately derailed by yet another hamstring injury. The Canadian winger struggled throughout last season with a succession of hamstring problems and pulled up midway through the second half sprinting for a loose ball by the corner flag.
In the post match press conference assistant manager Kevin Bond said: "He’s got a hamstring. He was in full flight and he pulled up. I wouldn’t expect him to see him training on Monday morning. I can him being out for a little while. It will be days or weeks, but hopefully not too long.”
Before the game all the talk had been about Hoilett leaving the club. Few players lost form quite as spectacularly as Hoilett last season but an excellent start to the current campaign had sparked talk of Mark Hughes trying to link up with him for a third time in their careers by taking him to Stoke. West London Sport revealed at the end of last week that Hoilett has a £7m release clause in his contract and Redknapp seemed to be suggesting they’d have to meet that to get the player out of QPR when he spoke to the media on Friday.
Redknapp said: "If Mark wants him he’ll have to make the offer that would take him there. We don’t want to lose him. He’s started the season really well and if someone wants him they are going to have to make a big offer.”
One player who is seemingly destined to leave Loftus Road this summer is Hogan Ephraim. The 25-year-old is currently training with League One side Wolves and awaiting a decision from their boss Kenny Jackett on whether to take him on or not.
Wolves’ head of football development Kevin Thelwell told the local Express and Star: "Hogan has been training with us for a few days now. We will spend another couple of days having a look at him and then take a decision as to whether to sign him or not. He’s a wide player or attacking midfielder we have known about for a while and we wanted to have a close look at him. As for a fee, we haven’t got to a stage where we have discussed that yet.”
Sky Sports meanwhile are linking midfielder Stephane Mbia with a move to La Liga outfit Sevilla.
It’s looking increasingly likely that Leicester City full back Paul Konchesky may well be coming the other way into QPR. The 32-year-old was left out of Leicester’s squad for their weekend win at Derby with manager Nigel Pearson admitting the full back was close to leaving the club. QPR meanwhile were forced to play Clint Hill at left back against Ipswich with Armand Traore out of favour and injured.
Pearson told the BBC: "I thought it was in the best interests of the player and ourselves that he was omitted from the squad. There has been speculation about potential moves away, but I can say he is still our player and I will speak to Paul again on Monday."
Hill meanwhile said it was strange to be back on the left side of the defence for his 100th QPR appearance. The 34-year-old told the club’s official website: "It is amazing to play 100 games for this club. I never thought I would achieve that when I stepped through the door. When I started here I think I was left-back and I was back there again on Saturday which was different.”
"In this league nothing is easy and sometimes you have to hang in there and hope something will drop. Luckily young Hitchy came on with a debut goal and set the place alight. You never get bored of a last minute goal. We are all delighted for Tom,” revealed Clint who has over 500 career appearances to his name. He has scored a few goals in the EDS and he has done himself no harm now. The fans love to see young kids coming through and he has a chance now and it is up to him to take it. When I was very young - a long time ago now - I use to see lads going into the system and think ‘yeah I want to taste that’. Now it is lads here seeing him play and scoring the winner and thinking they want a bit of that and it will help them raise their games.”
While Knochesky’s arrival looks likely, the long-running quest to sign Andros Townsend permanently seems as far away as ever. With Spurs demanding silly money for the winger, who enjoyed a successful loan spell in W12 last season, Harry Redknapp seems ready to admit defeat.
Redknapp told West London Sport: "Andros did great last year but Tottenham don’t really want to sell him. He’s not for sale as far as I know. It’s difficult. I couldn’t see us being able to buy him. I think he’d be too expensive for us. But I do like Andros — he’d be brilliant. I’d love to sign him on loan but whether we could do that, I wouldn’t bet on it.”
And Rangers can scratch a permanent line through Scott Parker’s name as well after he chose Premier League football over the chance to move to Loftus Road nd signed for Fulham instead. Approaching his 33rd birthday and awarded a three year deal at Craven Cottage — who can blame him?
So the R’s continue to rely heavily on revitalised Joey Barton for their midfield presence. The trouble-loving Scouser was LFW’s man of the match for the second week running on Saturday and having been forced to allow Esteban Granero to leave for financial reasons Redknapp is keen to keep hold of Barton to help the promotion push.
Redknapp told the Kilburn Times: "Joey’s playing ever so well, he’s in the team on merit, he’s been excellent. Not only has he been good as a player, he’s not been a minute’s problem as a person. I only knew Joey very slightly before but since I’ve been here he’s trained hard, worked hard, played well, not done anything silly and got on with his football. I think Joey would have gone to Marseille, but I’m not sure what the deal is with them. He’s enjoying playing, showing great enthusiasm.
"I didn’t want Esteban to go but where they’re big earners you have to balance the books, and that’s what we’re doing.”
Gary O’Neil ran Barton close for the man of the match award on Saturday after an impressive second half performance as a substitute. The former West Ham man looks set to be a key player for Rangers and after the game he told the Fulham Chronicle:"I think we deserved to win it — but I thought we might have to settle for a point. Some of the boys were saying we might have lost that in previous years trying to push up — but the back four were switched on. Teams come here and see it as a big scalp and set their stalls out — and we had it at West Ham when we struggled at home and were much better away with teams coming at us. We’re under no illusions that most of it is a grind. But we’re two out of two at home and we do have good attacking options."
Turning to the youth teams and commiserations to Mike Petrasso and Dylan Carreiro who made it to the semi finals of the COTIF International Tournament with Canada but were beaten 3-0 by hosts Spain. Petrasso captained the side, which now faces a third place play off with Mexico.
Back at home the Under 18s started their title defence with a 2-1 win against Brentford in the Professional Development League. The Bees took the lead through Kojo Awotwi but Rangers hit back, forcing an own goal from the Brentford keeper and then winning the game with a goal from Nathan Corkery.
QPR: Smith, Furlong, Butler, Comley, Wise, Kpekawa, Young, Mitchell, Mitford, Corkery (Williams 67), Shodipo.
Subs not used: Kakay, Herdman, Page, Beckles.
This could be the longest section of the LFW Diary this season the way things are going. Deep breath, eyes down, look in…
Adel Taarabt turned in a mixed personal performance on his competitive debut for Fulham on Saturday, but couldn’t really have asked for a better result with the notoriously travel-sick Cottagers triumphing 1-0 against Sunderland at the Stadium of Light.
Afterwards Taarabt told the http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/fulham/10250922/Fulham-recruit-A "Fulham is a very different club to QPR. There are so many players here who have been here a long time – four or five years – and it’s more of a family club. Everyone is friends with each other. You sense it as soon as you walk in. Last year, QPR signed 12 players and there were many strangers. It was difficult.
"It was the perfect debut for me. It was a fantastic result and a great start to the season. I certainly put in a lot of work. People who say I’m a lazy player won’t be saying that now. I did everything asked of me and didn’t complain. People criticise me and give me a bad image. I don’t know why. I’m not this guy they paint a bad picture of. They call me lazy and I only play when I feel like it, but that’s not true. Saying I don’t want to play in the Championship does not make me a bad person.”
No winning start for Michael Doughty at Stevenage sadly, they lost 1-0 to early League One pace setters Leyton Orient, but manager Graham Westley was impressed with his new signing from QPR.
He told the local Comet newspaper: "QPR have been very good to us with Doughty. They want to get their player games, I thought he gave us a real touch of class in the middle of the park today. Marc Bircham made me aware at the pre-season game to keep an eye on him because he was likely to be coming out. I though his qualities that day were just the ones we needed and I think he will be a very, very good player for us. I’m delighted to have him in.
"It’s his quality on the ball that shines through, he’s always willing to take responsibility for the football, he’s creative, he’s got that little burst, he sees a forward pass, takes responsibility to take the game forward, you feel like you own the ball with him in there.”
Elsewhere in League One Michael Harriman got his first point as a Gillingham player as they drew 1-1 with Brentford on Saturday. It should have been more, but the Bees equalised in the fifth minute of stoppage time. Equally bad luck for Shaun Derry in the division above with Milllwall losing and failing to score for the third game running with a 1-0 defeat at home to Huddersfield. The Lions are firmly bottom of the league.
Champions League action on Tuesday for Ji-Sung Park who played 68 minutes for PSV as they drew 1-1 with AC Milan, and Esteban Granero who played the last 25 minutes of Real Sociedad’s 2-0 win against Lyon. Both matches were first leg qualifiers.
No Newcastle action for Loic Remy as yet — his calf strain kept him out of Monday night’s 4-0 shellacking at Manchester City.
Couple of brief notes…
Ian Holloway has been reunited with winger Jason Puncheon after brining the player into Crystal Palace on a season long loan. Puncheon spent half a season on loan at QPR in the Premier League in 2011/12 without impressing but played well for Southampton last season and Olly, who worked with the player at Blackpool, has moved quickly to add him to his Eagles line up.
Brentford meanwhile have signed goalkeeper Liam O’Brien on a short term deal. The former QPR youth prospect, released by Barnet in the summer following their relegation from the league, has arrived as cover for Jack Bonham and David Button with Richard Lee sidelined with a shoulder injury.
- Leeds have signed defender Scott Wootton from Manchester United for an undisclosed fee. The former England youth international, 21, made four first-team appearances at Old Trafford and has agreed a three-year contract at Elland Road. He also spent time on loan at Tranmere, Peterborough and Nottingham Forest.
- Doncaster defender Bongani Khumalo says Rovers can challenge for promotion this season after they drew 2-2 at newly relegated Wigan on Tuesday night. Rovers led 2-0 at one stage and the South African on loan from Spurs said: "I think we can go all the way, we're as good as anybody else and we'd like to surprise some people this season.”
- Blackburn have signed former Watford defender Aaron Tumwa on a one-year contract. The 19-year-old has joined on a free transfer following his release by the Hornets this summer.
- Defender Greg Halford says he is happy to continue playing up front for early pace setters Nottingham Forest after starring in a 3-0 weekend win against Bolton. Halford said: "I have confidence in my ability wherever I play. Starting as a centre forward was a shock and surprise, but one I enjoyed."
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