Fraser Forster To Fight For Place

Saints CEO Martin Semmens has declared Fraser Forster a "full part of our squad" and stated he will be given an opportunity to win his spot back in the Saints side, a statement that suggests that one of the other keepers may be heading out of the door.

Forster has played just once for the club since Boxing Day 2017 — a 3-0 defeat at West Ham in May last year, although not covering himself in glory on that day he was no better or worse than Gunn or McCarthy at the time, but if he thought that might signal a comeback he soon found himself out on loan at Celtic the following season.

His great form in Scotland seemed to suggest he would return to Glasgow for the coming season, but with Celtic unable to afford to either buy him or pay a reasonable part of his wages, he is now back at St Mary's and could be given another chance.

"There's never been any issue with Fraser from a relationship point of view," Semmens told BBC Radio Solent.

"He's always trained brilliantly and is a fantastic guy. Ralph (Hasenhuttl) and him have never really had any issues and they've not had a lot of time together.

"He's obviously always been our player and one that we watched carefully."

He added: "Fraser made an active decision to come back. He didn't want to stay at Celtic anymore, he wanted to come back and play for us so we'll give him that opportunity.

"Fraser has been a full part of the squad since he came back. He couldn't be during the games in July because he wasn't allowed to be part of that squad but now he's a full part of it.

"He's training and he's doing really well, so we'll see how that develops but Fraser is a full part of our squad going forward."

With Forster seemingly back in the squad it seems that unless Saints find a buyer who can afford his wages then he might well be here for the coming season, if that is the case then either Angus Gunn or Alex McCarthy may well be elsewhere either on loan or permanently.

Neither was totally convincing during the season, Mc Carthy played the bulk of the games but seemed always prone to an error, sometimes they cost us goals and sometimes he got away with is such as the offside goal at Bournemouth.

I would think that it would be Gunn that would move on possibly on loan to give him experience.

What to read next:

Season Preview Revisited – Bottom Half
The concluding part of our season preview revisit looks at the teams at the foot of the 23/24 Championship – we got two of the bottom three correct but there were some other big misses here too.

Season Preview Revisited – Top Half
It’s that time of the year again where we look back at the hits and misses from our season preview – this year we either got your team exactly right to the place, or missed by half the division.

A season of three thirds: how Cifuentes and QPR beat the drop – Analysis
Columnist Andrew Scherer returns with an end-of-season deep dive into the facts and figures behind Marti Cifuentes’ rescue job on QPR’s class of 2024.

End of Term 23/24 – Attack
The fourth and final part of our annual review and number crunch of the QPR squad finishes with the club’s amazing non-scoring strikers.

End of Term Report 23/24 – Midfield
The third part of our end of term report focuses on QPR’s midfield – an enormous problem for this team for a number of seasons now, it’s been one of the areas of significant improvement under Marti Cifuentes.

End of Term Report 23/24 – Defenders
Part two of our annual individual player reports for the season focuses on a defence which really came into its own under Marti Cifuentes and contains the two outstanding candidates for the club’s player of the year award.

End of Term Report 23/24 – Goalkeepers
The first of our annual four-part individual assessment of the QPR players’ performances during the previous season always starts with the goalkeepers – and, regrettably, that means we’re puncturing the recent feel-good factor round here by beginning with a negative.

The Coventry Conference – Report
Coventry away, for so long a fixture that loomed almost as large as the spectre of Eoin Jess over Queens Park Rangers, turned into an eighth away win of the campaign and survival party for a manager and support base who both really stepped up when it mattered in 23/24.

Coventry City 1 - 2 Queens Park Rangers - Player Ratings and Reports
If you saw the match, please give us your player ratings and a mini match report.

The season that was - Preview
As QPR, unbelievably, head to Coventry on the final day safe and secure, LFW looks back at a tumultuous two years at the football club, and the lessons it must learn to make the most of the potential it now has to move forwards.