QPR won a third game in a row, against all odds at leaders Leicester City, to give their Championship survival hopes an enormous shot in the arm on Saturday afternoon.
A little after two in the Saturday afternoon, in the lounge bar at Ye Olde Walkabout Arms Leicester, a local gentleman who was not party to our conversation, and had not been invited to join, told us he felt the team Enzo Maresca had selected for the day’s festivities was probably good enough to beat Queens Park Rangers "four, or five, nil”. Of course, I don’t live here, I live in Alicante… Great mate, good to know.
Now, as both regular readers know, what I’d usually do with little nugget like that from a day on the road is turn it into a microcosm of a wider point that I want to make really only because when you come to LoftforWords you come because you’re expecting 4,000 words on whatever it is we’re talking about and, frankly, this shit doesn’t write itself.
Perhaps a long drop intro on arrogance and hubris, making mention of the 63 separate years Leicester City have spent in a division that’s now apparently so completely beneath them, concluding with a lament about exactly what point in time it was everybody in this country decided to just start being a complete twat to one another.
Or maybe, instead, a vintage Kermodian rant on the evils of the Premier League, where money, and unslakable greed for more money, is accelerating the growth of a chasm of inequality between the haves and have nots, turning the Championship into a farce as it does so. For getting relegated, as Leicester were last season despite having a squad of players that should have been nowhere close to that fate, the top flight in this country rewards you with £100m+ in prize/TV money, a parachute payment to take with you, and then a whole load of laughably astronomical transfer fees for the players who have all just failed so abjectly but don’t much fancy the consequences of their own actions in the form of a 46-game Championship season and oh-so-many Tuesday nights in the Preston branch of Lenny Henry’s. Leicester brought in £90m in sales last summer, Southampton £150m, before we even get to the parachute payments, but yes do tell me again what a wonderful job Enzo Maresca and Russell Martin are doing. (Come on Ipswich, for fuck’s sake, keep going lads, just a few more weeks).
We could talk about the power of expectation, and its effect on the mental side of sport. Exploring why QPR look so relaxed and comfortable in their own skin against Hull, Bristol City and Blackburn, but then crumple under the weight of context against Huddersfield, Stoke or Rotherham. Discussing how winning 25 and losing only six of your 34 games, and topping the table by a stretch, can bring a complacent malaise to a place rather than any real joy. Each win shrugged off because of course you’ve won, each defeat drawing enormous flouncing criticism. Saturday afternoons spent interrupting conversations at adjacent pub tables to let them know you think you’re probably going to win "four, or five, nil” followed by 90 minutes of sitting in stony, moany silence waiting for the footballers to get on and entertain you to what you consider an adequate level, rather than offering them any vocal support or encouragement to do so. Dance monkey, dance. Is it fine enough? Is it fine enough for me?
But, no. To tell you the truth, the only reason I’ve brought it up is dick swinging. Pure, unadulterated, unashamed, unapologetic, schadenfreudian dick swinging. For today is a dick swinging day, and for once we’ve got plenty of dick to swing. Less LFW match report, more The Kriss Akabusi Sex Stories. Awooga, indeed.
Let’s set the mood and do the first goal. That’s right, there’s more than one. Chris Willock’s recent noticeable uptick continued with a slick touch and cute turn through two opponents over by the dugouts, his decision to risk a forward move rather than playing safe with a backwards pass catching complacent markers cold, his pass early and accurate. Lyndon Dykes’ run bent just enough, in the linesman’s opinion, to be onside. From there it was about calmness and composure from the Scottish striker, and he got enough power on his low cross to elude Mads Hermansen in the home goal, but not so much that it carried it beyond Ilias Chair at the back post. The Moroccan tapped into an open goal from a couple of yards out. Hook it to my veins and start the pump. I’ll be a while.
In the away end, something approaching delirium. One of ours was launched half a dozen rows down the stand, and returned sometime later with the crotch ripped out of his jeans. On t’internet, very much righteous indignation about Chair’s kayaking weekend and present ongoing free man status. Ninety replies to the home team’s Tweet: "he should be in prison, ffs”, "what a prison sentence for him”, "how come he’s allowed to play?”, "meant to be in prison isn’t he?”, "I don’t get it, should he not be in prison?” This is the ongoing problem of having The Sun as part of your society, and people believing what’s in it. Leicester, meanwhile, made Hamza Choudhury their captain, two days after he’d been fined £20,000 in court for driving his big footballer car on the wrong side of the road while pissed up, heading back to a restaurant to collect a mobile phone he’d drunkenly left there earlier in the evening. Such is this sport, and the mental gymnastics its followers go through depending whether the sinner is their player or somebody else’s.
With 26% possession to Leicester’s 74%, three shots on goal to the Foxes’ 18, two on target to their five, zero corners in a game when Rangers faced nine (one of those, presumably, not headed away by Jimmy Dunne, but I can’t remember it if so) the time has come to talk a bit about whether QPR "deserved” this. Not because I give a shit, which I absolutely do not. There’s a big chunk of me wishes we’d had even less of everything and won in the last minute with a goal that should have been disallowed, because there just isn’t enough good, original British comedy around these days. More to assess how Rangers played with the rest of the season in mind. The answer, despite those numbers, is really rather well. We looked a well-coached team.
Leicester do what Leicester do. It doesn’t really matter if there’s ten minutes gone or ten minutes left, if they’re home or away, if they’re leading or losing, if it’s August or May. Enzo Maresca, Marge Simpson's art teacher, knows one way, and one way is exactly what they played. Pass after pass after pass, side to side, rainbowing around the opposition penalty box waiting for a gap to appear, like an ice hockey power play. Pass after pass after pass. Methodical, metronomic, modern football. Talk among yourselves for a bit. QPR set up accordingly, with a very narrow back four defending the width of its penalty box and ceding the wide channels. At one point a ball broke to Mavididi in big space at the back post and, rather than closest man Steve Cook charge out there with a block, right back Dunne was quickly sent scurrying round from further away to close the situation down, such was the importance placed on defensive shape and QPR’s disciplined attitude to sticking with it. Sam Field was back for the suspended Jack Colback in the middle of midfield and proved the perfect man to stand next to the near faultless Isaac Hayden, holding position, reading the play, intercepting passes, and then keeping the ball when the chance arose. You need your full backs to be good in this, as they’ll frequently get overloaded out wide. Leicester love, love, love, with all their hearts, that straight ball, between centre back and full back, to get a winger in behind to the byline. QPR had seen film, practised, and Dunne and Kenneth Paal performed superbly. The amount of shrewd reads and interceptions from Rangers’ left back, in particular, was exceptional.
For all of the possession, all of the times Mavididi and Fatawu got good ball in wide areas to face up the full back and run them, the amount of real, true, big chances created by the home side was fairly negligible. The shots stats paint an unfair picture of an afternoon fielding grounders and routine saves from soft headers. Begovic saved a bobbling shot from Patson Daka after five minutes when, for me, most referees would have already whistled for a high boot on Jimmy Dunne; Steve Cook got a big meaty block in on Akgun’s 25th minute effort; Harry Winks curled wide of the far post from the sort of range he’d scored from in the first meeting at Loftus Road; Paal’s perfect cover job expertly denied Leicestershire’s premier wedding venue Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall a tap in at the back post. Immovable Cook, immaculate Jake Clarke-Salter, impressive Sam Field, each with a headed clearance in turn when required in quick succession around 32 minutes.
They’re going to have a lot of ball, they’re going to have a lot of shots, doesn’t necessarily mean they’re going to be particularly impressive with it, nor have a lot of high quality chances to score, if you prepare well, set up correctly and execute. QPR prepared well, set up correctly, and executed.
This was no repeat of another unexpected 2-1 win over the league leaders, achieved at Burnley a year ago by standing the whole team on the goalline for 90 minutes, egregiously wasting time at every opportunity, and accidentally scoring from two set pieces. When QPR had the chance to play, they played. That highly effective Field and Hayden combination in midfield was complimented beautifully by Dane Lucas Andersen’s second start for the club. Now here’s a footballer you don’t mind paying to watch. Every touch on point, every pass precise, nary a ball wasted. Imagine the Instagramable Sunday morning trips to Chiswick coffee shops with Jimmy Dunne: Andersen talking about how much he learned about his own outlook and approach to life from a clan of isolated Tibetan monks he met on a six week solo trek of self-discovery; Jimmy telling him about the time they lost a security deposit on a Vegas Air BnB because Joe Lumley tried to trap him in a Dutch oven and accidentally followed through onto the bed linen.
One nil half time. Three thousand and one in the corner, emotional tribute to Stan Bowles already banked, dared to dream.
There was a lot about the start of the second half which was to be expected. QPR sank a deep, a little too deep in truth, and struggled to get forward from there. Lyndon Dykes was booked for kicking the ball away by referee Andy Davies, which I wouldn’t mind had Ilias Chair not been prevented from taking a quick throw on a counter attack in the first half by Ben Nelson doing exactly the same thing without recourse. The 50/50 decisions going almost exclusively in favour of the home began to mount notably. Only Reading have been refereed by Andy Davies more than QPR, but this was only his second ever Leicester game, first since 2013, and he seemed to treat the whole thing like the sort of cowed, awed day out at a big club officials like Mike Reilly and Mike Reed used to slop out for "Sir Alex” at Old Trafford in the 90s. Rangers were forced to defend a late free kick from wide for a foul by Jimmy Dunne when it seemed certain that he’d been the one sinned against. Nelson, who should already have been on a yellow, tried to interrupt a late counter attack by putting in a horrifying challenge on Field that was arguably a red card on its own merits – booking. When Coudhury was finally pulled up and carded for a foul the away end celebrated it like a goal. Am I assessing this from a biased position? Of course. At times it was difficult not to feel Davies was doing the same.
It's time to talk about the second goal. Do not adjust your sets.
To combat the deepness and the Leicester press, to take advantages of the opportunities on the break and the space in behind, Marti Cifuentes added the pace and purpose of Sinclair Armstrong and Paul Smyth to the mixture – a few household chemicals in the proper proportions. Things Sinclair Likes No.1 in The Series – running in straight lines. Off towards the penalty area Armstrong set with purpose as Chair took a free kick from wide, delivered over everybody to the ever-dominant Dunne at the back post for a nod down and Sam Field’s click and collect set on the penalty spot. And there he was, just charging on from the bench, into the penalty area, through the back of the ball with all his laces, and off towards the away end in one fluid movement. Didn't have to break stride or deviate course at all. Perfect. Things Sinclair Likes No.2 In The Series – finishes he doesn’t have to think very much about. Wallop. Eat that and tell me you’re still hungry. And you thought we celebrated the first goal. Cats and dogs living together once more. Things Sinclair Likes No.3 In The Series – long, convoluted, drawn out celebrations. Five minutes of stoppage time added to the end of this game, and six of them were because of his Oscar's acceptance speech down by the corner flag. All glory be to God.
Early in the Cifuentes reign we said one of the many, many challenges he would have to overcome was a complete lack of any quality depth to the squad and therefore a total absence of game-changing options from the bench. Now, thanks to some creative January recruitment, and a manager playing to people’s strengths and making the most of what he’s got, this exists. Sinclair’s goal here follows Smyth’s as a sub against Rotherham, Andersen and Frey’s match equalling contribution form the bench against Norwich, and Joe Hodge’s debut goal at Blackburn.
Two nil to Rangers, and to the half dozen ruddy-faced, a bit-too-old-for-this-by-now-surely, limp-dicked wonders who didn’t have the stones for The White Horse back in October and instead deliberately positioned themselves along the bar in the Crown & Sceptre, stamping about the place singing "straight back up, straight back up Leicester City” and trying to start punch ups with a pub of old men, women and kids, I ask you now… do you, like apples?
There was, sadly, to be one negative on an afternoon of almost universal positive and celebration. At two nil, with Leicester’s fans long since checked out and their players apparently not far behind, this was a game for the seeing. We were in danger of having a nice time. And, as we know, we can’t be having that.
A free kick awarded on the edge of the box against Smyth would have been absolutely fair enough, had Chair not recently had an identical claim waved away at the other end. It shouldn’t really have mattered either way when Mavididi teed up Dewsbury-Hall for a routine shot clipped up and over the wall that any goalkeeper worth his salt should surely, at worst, be parrying away wide of the goal. Asmir Begovic is one of those weird divisive characters at QPR, like Lyndon Dykes, where those who like him and those who don’t entrench their positions more and more with each passing day spent online until both are stubbornly making obviously ridiculous points because they can’t be seen to cede ground. Whatever you think of the veteran Bosnian international, and I’m clearly much more on the ‘bit of a liability’ side, we can surely all agree that whatever it was he did here was, at best, incredibly strange. Launching himself into the air, he dived well past the flight of the ball, and instead of catching it or parrying it away from danger, attempted a bizarre two-fisted punch which sent the shot straight back away from him into the heavy traffic of the crowded penalty area. I don’t know if he was going for a big camera save and got it wrong, but it basically broke every rule in every goalkeeping manual, and Barnes Wallis was subsequently able to bounce his bomb into the unguarded far corner of the net. Oooh it moved in the air, oooh it took a deflection, oooh he did well to get to it at all… bollocks. It’s abysmal goalkeeping. Watch Steve Cook’s reaction – he’s exactly right.
Whole thing now in the balance, we were back to tick following tock following tick following tock, when really there was no need. And the rain teemed down.
Leicester’s bench was absolutely ridiculous, and sure enough here came Jamie Vardy, and hairy Love Islander Tom Cannon who was one of the best ten players we faced in the Championship last season for Preston and has therefore obviously been hoovered up by a relegated side for a quick £8m and allowed to start all of three games. Akgun came on, and then went off again. Thanks for saving us the time, Sue. Cifuentes responded by introducing Morgan Fox for his first action since January 28 in place of Chris Willock, but any fear we were repeating the mistake of Sheff Wed away by surrendering midfield to try and pack the defence was allayed by an assured performance from the newcomer in the now lesser-spotted back three.
For the most part the pattern simply returned to what it had been before. Leicester powerplay around the box, lots of ball for Fatawu and Mavididi, little penetration, no serious shots on the goal. Paal’s reading of the game was exceptional – on this evidence no surprise to hear he’s the one most diligent at checking in with the video analysts about his own performances and points to work on, and a huge improvement on a rare off day against Rotherham. Dunne - my word, what a redemption story - won every header at every corner, provided an out ball for Begovic and the defence when the short game was under pressure, coped admirably with Mavididi - who Arsenal once included a contract clause requiring an extra payment should he win the Balon D’Or when selling him – and just looked so at home out there. Wonderful to see one of the squad’s good guys coming out the other side of a prolonged personal poor spell. Cook and Clarke-Salter were both terrific in the middle of the defence and, when a chance finally did drop Leicester’s way in minute five of five added to the end of the game, it was Jake and Sam Field, charging into danger like a pair of deranged firefighters, heaving their bodies in front of the ball for a game-sealing block. You couldn’t pick a bad player in red and black hoops really, but Hayden looked so good to me against a central midfield of Winks and Dewsbury-Hall that really has no business playing in this division.
Rangers, in truth, should have added a third. Play on waved through that Nelson attempt on Sam Field’s life, Chair and Armstrong were effectively clean through on goal together with only one defender remaining, but botched the chance. A third would have had me cursing my decision to spend that Marc Nygaard story in the preview. It’s not the first time relegation-haunted Rangers have come here and won against the odds just when they needed to, and if there’d been a third goal added on top I’m not sure we’d be back in London yet. The relentless backing for the team from the corner thousands rang out long after the final whistle. Even the bizarre news that, once again, everybody else at the bottom had won as well couldn’t dampen this mood.
Nobody expected that John Gregory team to survive, nobody expected to go to Leicester that day and win the game, and Marc Nygaard will never score a goal like that again as long as he’s got a hole in his arse. But following clubs like ours is about enduring long periods of punishment for small moments of indescribable, ecstatic relief, which often come when you least expect them. To be there to see a win - against all odds, logic and likelihood – away to an obviously superior Leicester side, with all the unexpected boost that tiny possibility would provide to QPR’s survival chances, and all the mental trauma this almost-certainly-fictional outcome would inflict on the teams around us… you do first of all have to go to Leicester away.
Implausibly, three in a row for both these teams now, though not the way round you’d expect.
Big story, big day, big hitters… who fancies a drink?
Links >>> Ratings and Reports >>> Message Board Match Thread
Leicester: Hermansen 5; Choudhury 5, Nelson 5, Faes 5, Justin 5; Winks 6, Dewsbury-Hall 5; Fatawu 6, Praet – (Akgun 16, 5 (Cannon 78, 5)), Mavididi 6; Daka 4 (Vardy 61, 5)
Subs not used: Coady, Doyle, Albrighton, Souttar, Madividua, Stolarczyk
Goals: Nelson 60 (unassisted)
Yellow Cards: Choudhury 84 (DUI), Nelson 90+1 (foul)
QPR: Begovic 5; Dunne 8, Cook 8, Clarke-Salter 8, Paal 8; Hayden 8, Field 7, Andersen 7 (Smyth 56, 6); Chair 7, Willock 7 (Fox 73, 7), Dykes 6 (Armstrong 56, 6)
Subs not used: Frey, Hodge, Dixon-Bonner, Cannon, Larkeche, Walsh
Goals: Chair 38 (assisted Dykes), Armstrong 57 (assisted Field)
Bookings: Andersen 43 (delaying restart), Dykes 54 (delaying restart), Cook 90+4 (time wasting)
QPR Star Man – Jimmy Dunne 8 Could have been really any one of most of the team. Even the players I’ve got on seven… you look at Chair’s goal and ceaseless work on the close down and press, Willock’s vast improvements in recent weeks, Field’s authority and assist (just failed to play forwards a couple of times for me when it was on, hence a mark off), Andersen’s classy contributions… I think you’ve got to give it to one of the defenders given the discipline and execution of the plan and to be honest I was more minded towards Steve Cook, who I think makes such a colossal difference to us, and Kenneth Paal, arguably his best performance for us. Nevertheless, out of position at right back, against a player as good as Mavididi, I thought Dunne’s performance without the ball was exceptional, before we even get into the outlet he gives us aerially when we’re in possession, and his Richard Dunne-like obsession with winning every header from every Leicester corner – something we’ve long struggled with. A huge return from a prolonged trough in form, a surprise hit, well done James.
Referee – Andy Davies (Hampshire) 4 Hmmmmmm. As basically Championship Bot 8.6, employed at this level for the last dozen years and obviously destined never to go any further, refereeing at stadiums like this, for players like Leicester’s, in front of this size of crowd, is not something that happens to Andy Davies very often – this his second Leicester game, first since 2013, versus 19 with QPR. He looked completely in thrall to them. The sort of performance where you were just waiting for the obligatory award of an Old Trafford penalty for some spurious bullshit and when Mavididi stumbled under limited contact from Smyth with the final action of stoppage time my heart travelled up into the back of my throat almost as fast as my stomach dropped out of my arse.
Now, of course, if an opponent has 70% of the ball and spends most of the match attacking your goal then the majority of the free kicks and decisions are, naturally, going to go against you. And, I admit, I’m coming at this from a QPR point of view, with blue and white glasses obscuring vision already blurred by an afternoon of medicinal Peroni, making judgements from hundreds of yards away at the back of a stand while also tapping out match report notes and trying to pick that bloke from the pub out among the silent home crowd. Lyndon Dykes may also be offside for the first goal, in which case all bets are off. But, look, let’s take two fairly minor incidents specifically…
In the first half, on a counter attack, Ilias Chair won a throw, and wanted to pick the ball up quickly and return it to play immediately to catch Leicester defenders out of position and potentially get Lyndon Dykes in on goal. Nelson deliberately kicked the ball away from Chair and across the perimeter track, delaying the restart and preventing him doing so. That has been a yellow card every day of the week for a long time, even before this season’s long-forgotten clampdown on exactly things like that. In the second half Leicester wanted to get the ball down and take a quick free kick, Lyndon Dykes nudged the ball away in exactly the same fashion to prevent them doing so and was booked. That’s not right. That’s not right at all. It’s neither, or both, not one, but not the other. I think it said a lot about how this game was refereed, and the fact Nelson then stayed on the pitch after his horrific late tackle on Field when a) he should have been on a booking already and b) that’s a red by itself, only exacerbated the situation.
Short of kicking it for them I’m not sure how much more he could have done for them. One can only think Jamie Vardy’s prolonged haranguing of him after the full time whistle was just because that gobshite hadn’t fucking moaned at anybody else for three or four minutes and was getting withdrawal symptoms.
Attendance 31,439 (3,001 QPR) Three thousand QPR fans here, and they were all still in the ground long after the final whistle had blown and the last of the 28,000 home lot had exited. The best away support for many a long year, entirely positive, supportive, loud and proud throughout. A real privilege and pleasure to be part of. It’s a day, a game and a result, that we’ll be talking about in ten years. By which point the hangover may just about have subsided.
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