 Friday, 22nd Oct 2010 01:55 by Clive Whittingham Flavio Briatore’s sudden decision to start poking his nose in at QPR again is hardly ideal preparation for our first televised clash of the season at Bristol City on Friday. Bristol City (24th) v QPR (1st)Things are so much simpler when you’re a child. I still recall the televised Monday night match against Liverpool at Loftus Road in October 1995 as one of my all time favourites. Rangers were right on the top of their game that night with Les Ferdinand ripping Phil Babb apart with assistance from Kevin Gallen and supplies from Andy Impey, Trevor Sinclair and Steve Hodge. It was a travesty really that QPR only won 2-1 that night, and only did that thanks to a late Ferdinand goal that looked offside on the replays. I was a mad QPR fan by that stage, but midweek games were frowned upon with school the following day. My mum made a concession that I could have friends, most of them pretending to be Man Utd and Tottenham fans, around to watch the game on Sky and I think that was the first time I could ever recall feeling proud. Proud of my team sticking it to the household names and coming up with the win live on the television for everybody to see. The relentless mickey taking QPR fans used to get on the playground, even at a school in West London, subsided for a day or two at least. Little did I know or realise at the time that the reason the cameras kept panning up to some former player or other in the stand was because much maligned chairman Richard Thompson was engineering the departure of Gerry Francis, who built that fine team, by bringing in Rodney Marsh over his head as a Director of Football. With Francis out of the way the club would have been free to sell Les Ferdinand, Clive Wilson and others – and sure enough that’s exactly what happened six months later. Marsh said recently that he believed the role was merely a meet and greet sort of affair but admits now that he was naïve. Francis’ departure, and the subsequent appointment of Ray Wilkins started a chain of events that it could be argued QPR are yet to recover from 15 years later – certainly it led to our relegation from the top flight and we haven’t been back there since. For that reason most QPR fans look back on that Liverpool game, Gerry’s last in charge, with great sorrow and regret but I cannot help remember that night in my living room very fondly indeed. How typically QPR it would be if the club was to engineer another cataclysmic implosion now, just as we look like finally returning to the top flight for the first time all those years later. After months and months of blissful silence from Messrs Briatore and Ecclestone Rangers fans are suddenly finding the pair of them “showing an interest” in the club again on the eve of another date with Sky TV where, coincidently, the opposition goalkeeper will be the same man who kept goal for Liverpool that night at Loftus Road. The recent quotes in the press from Ecclestone and Briatore talking up their involvement at Rangers may simply be because they want to drive up the price that Vijay Mallya might pay for their shares, or they may have seen the success of the team this season, realised the Premiership is a distinct possibility and decided they might like to stick around after all. If it’s the latter, it’s bad news, particularly in Briatore’s case. QPR are doing well this season because Neil Warnock is the manager, and Neil Warnock is the manager because Amit Bhatia and Lakshmi Mittal got hold of the club at the turn of the year, ushered Briatore aside and promised the new manager whatever he wanted to build the side and then let him get on with it. To hear this week that Warnock is subject to weekly telephone conversations with Briatore is worrying, to hear that Briatore dreams of getting rid of Neil Warnock if we get promoted and replacing him with Marcello Lippi is even more concerning because it suggest that Briatore still believes he yields enough power at QPR to hire and fire managers. Having interfered in the dealings of and subsequently sacked six different bosses at Loftus Road in two and a half seasons surely even a man as arrogant and egotistical as Briatore must know, even though he’d never admit it, that QPR’s success this year is a direct result of his absence. The last thing we need is that self important slug sliming his way back onto the scene and I pray that this latest load of bullshit from him firstly hasn’t impacted on Warnock or the team in any way and secondly is the last we’ll hear from him this season. Five minutes on Bristol CityRecent History: This isn’t the first time QPR have travelled to Ashton Gate on a Friday night for a live Sky fixture. In 1998/99 the broadcaster, for reasons known only to their programmers, chose this fixture for coverage. City were on their way out of the then First Division firmly in bottom place with Benny Lenartsson in charge while QPR were destined to escape by the skin of a mouse’s ball bag – and with Iain Dowie, Steve Morrow, Karl Ready and Tony Scully part of the QPR team that night it’s hard to understand how we managed that. The game finished 0-0 and I remember it being on television because that was around the time that my dad’s throat cancer had really taken hold. We took him a copy of the tape to watch in hospital the day after and half joked at the wake that it might have been 90 minutes laid watching that dirge that finished him off. Here we are some 11 years later and we again find ourselves facing a bottom placed Bristol City side at Ashton Gate live on Sky on a Friday night, although thankfully times are a little happier for ourselves these days. Rangers caught up with City again a few years later following their own relegation. In the meantime the Robins had endured six months of Tony Pulis and then appointed former Sheffield Wednesday manager Danny Wilson to lead them. They were one of the bigger fish in the Second Division pond when we arrived, but had a hilarious knack of messing things up right at the end of the season. They narrowly missed the top six in 2001/02, lost to Cardiff in the semi finals in 2002/03 and then Brighton in the final in 2003/04 when QPR had pipped them to the second automatic spot on the very final day of the season. Wilson was rather harshly sacked after that defeat, and replaced by Brian Tinnion who despite being a popular player with the club turned out to be thoroughly lousy manager. It needed Yeovil boss Gary Johnson to come in and rescue the situation 18 months later after Tinnion turned City from promotion candidates into potential relegation victims. Johnson started with a nine game losing run and was widely criticised by City fans, the chairman of the supporters club publicly branding him a Conference manager out of his depth, but he turned it around and promoted City to this level in his first full season in charge. City almost made it back to back promotions into the Premiership when they reached the play off final in their first season at this level, beating Neil Warnock’s Crystal Palace in the semi final en route, but they lost in the Wembley final to Hull City. That success seemed to rather make a rod for City’s own back because it raised expectations beyond what was really reasonable. I wrote in successive previews for this fixture that I simply could not understand the stick that Johnson got from fans on City’s main message board when the job he had done was taken into consideration. City are a similar club to ourselves in many ways – ground too small and outdated to support Premiership football, recent history based more around bobbing between this league and the one below than playing in the top flight, average attendances towards the lower end of the Championship spectrum. And yet when they merely punched their weight in the middle of this league rather than pushing on for the Premiership Johnson started to receive criticism that his team had stagnated. In my opinion it simply found its level and the decision to part with Johnson, now looking good for a promotion from League One with Peterborough, was a big mistake. It could well be come the end of this season that City and Posh swap places. During the summer it seemed that City had pulled off a major coup in tempting former Reading boss Steve Coppell to come and join them and I had them down as play off certainties following an extraordinary week of transfer activity in which David James, Damion Stewart, Nicky Hunt and Sam Vokes all arrived at Ashton Gate. Coppell though is a complex chap. He walked out of Man City after less than a month in charge in the 1990s citing stress and left City just three games into this season because he said his heart wasn’t in the job. Coppell always cuts a rather sad and dejected figure, even when things are going terribly well for him – gazing off into the distance and mumbling bits and pieces about football whenever interviewed as if he couldn’t possibly care any less about the game and is thinking of several thousand other much more profound subjects. I still believe there was much more to his walk out than will probably ever be told. Whatever the reasons, it’s left City in a real mess and the consequences of it could be felt for years to come at Ashton Gate. Manager: Keith Millen is to City what Frank Sibley was to QPR – an omnipresent nice fella, useful for caretaker management situations when they arose, but perhaps not the best choice for the full time role when it came up. As a player he made the thick end of 500 appearances for Brentford and Watford between 1983 and 1999 before finishing his career with four years at Bristol City where he then went straight into coaching. Millen was made the assistant manager in 2004 when Danny Wilson departed and the club turned to veteran player Brian Tinnion to lead them. Tinnion is famed among the QPR support for an interview given during the 2003/04 promotion season when City were in the midst of a 13 game winning run that closed up a sizeable gap between themselves and Plymouth at the top and had both the Pilgrims and QPR sweating somewhat. For reasons best known to himself Tinnion abandoned the usual political answer approach that most football people take in such circumstances and declared that QPR and Plymouth were “running scared” and that it could be “all over bar the shouting” by the time the three sides met at the end of April. City, who Tinnion openly stated were in the “driving seat” at this point, absolutely collapsed thereafter and lost in the play offs to Brighton while QPR and Plymouth were promoted. An ideal candidate for management he certainly was not, and it was no real surprise to see Millen thrust into a caretaker managerial role just over a year later after Tinnion took a promotion chasing City squad and turned it into one that could potentially be relegated to League Two. Millen played that role again last season when Gary Johnson and the club parted company but expected to be spending this season as the assistant once more when Steve Coppell arrived to replace him. Coppell’s latest meltdown has rather thrust Millen into a difficult job with little experience. The City side that Johnson took to the play off final has aged or moved on now and Coppell was embarking on a rebuilding programme when his latest suspicious brain explosion occurred. Millen has neither the experience nor the wherewithal to do that rebuilding job as it stands and at the moment City are in danger of paying for six months of poor decisions, starting with allowing Johnson to leave and ending with the appointment of Millen on a long term deal, with their Championship status. Three to watch: It’s hard to think now, ten clean sheets in 12 games later, that there was some considerable disquiet among the QPR fans when Damion Stewart was allowed to move to Ashton Gate for a relatively small sum of money during the summer. QPR had been chasing City’s full back Bradley Orr for some time, and the player seemed keen to come to Loftus Road, but while that transfer dragged on City were able to show interest, make an offer, agree terms and sign Stewart the other way in less than two days. It seemed like one step forward and another backwards for the R’s when Orr did eventually sign because we’d lost Stewart seemingly to smooth the deal through. Damion Stewart was about as raw a footballer as I can ever recall seeing at QPR when he first appeared at Loftus Road under Gary Waddock’s management in 2006. We were denied a sight of him on the pre-season tour of Italy that summer because of visa issues and so it wasn’t until the season began that we really got to have a good look at the big Jamaican who was, whatever the club tried to make out to relive the pressure on him at the time, bought as a replacement for Danny Shittu who left for Watford that same summer. Stewart was quick across the ground and powerful in the air but his positional sense and decision making was a constant menace to his team mates and for the most part of his early time with QPR he was a complete liability. Having only played in the bottom division in this country previously with Bradford City that was perhaps understandable and slowly but surely he grew into the role under John Gregory’s more experienced management. Fast forward to 2008/09 and Stewart was at the peak of his game – a towering colossus of a centre back who was able to outpace most strikers in the league which meant he could cover for the odd mistake he did made by chasing back and executing one of his trademark physical challenges. He was the complete centre half and won the Player of the Year award at Rangers for a campaign that was highlighted by his winning goal and man of the match display in the League Cup at Aston Villa. The Player of the Year award has been something of a curse to QPR players in recent years though. Recipients have been injured, lost form or left the club altogether after winning it and last season Stewart started to suffer with a number of problems. Firstly he was clearly overweight. Now under Jim Magilton that certainly wasn’t unusual, half the team seemed to be carrying excess baggage, but Stewart got stupidly big last season. I can still see him being withdrawn early from a home match against Leicester in which Martyn Waghorn absolutely ripped him apart live on Sky, waddling across the field at the sight of the electronic board like one of the Lilt ladies. From what I’ve seen of City on the television this season that weight doesn’t seem to have come off and that in turn has affected his pace badly – which was previously one of the main strengths of his game. In his absence QPR have become an almost impregnable outfit with Matthew Connolly and Kaspars Gorkss, who for so long had to compete with each other for the right to partner Stewart, forming a brilliant partnership at the heart of the defence. Rangers will know all about Stewart’s strengths, coming up for corners for instance, but they’ll also know his limitations which have certainly increased in recent years. As it stands, it looks like another shrewd bit of business by Neil Warnock getting money for a player whose stock was on the slide. Stewart was one of three signings made in two days during the summer by then Bristol City manager Steve Coppell but the arrival of the QPR player and Bolton’s Nicky Hunt was completely dwarfed by the shock signing of England goalkeeper David James. Freshly back from the World Cup where he had been England’s first choice for all but one of the games James left cash strapped Portsmouth and turned down Celtic among others to make the surprise move to Ashton Gate. This signing brought City’s promotion odds tumbling and suddenly there were stories about Michael Owen and all sorts of veteran big names in similar positions making their way to the west country. Ultimately James was the only big name signing of the summer, and Coppell left soon after the start of the season as we know. The former Liverpool man was, by all accounts, in flying form against Reading here on Tuesday but his signing, which cannot have come cheaply, has not been a conspicuous success so far. A big part of City’s problem this season has been the continued absence of star striker Nicky Maynard through injury. That has meant they have had to rely on replacements with less quality, experience or ability. Fitting into the inexperienced category nicely is attacker Albert Adomah who arrived in the Championship during the summer after impressing in League Two with Barnet. Regular LFW readers will recall friend of the site David Howell, Harrow Borough manager, stating that he believed Adomah could go all the way to the Premiership after selling him to Barnet in 2007. Howell was back in touch last week to remind me of that fact and point out that Adomah actually hails from Askew Road in Shepherds Bush and will therefore no doubt be extra keen to impress this Friday night. It’s the first time he will have played competitively against QPR as a professional. An additional note – regular scourge of QPR Jon Stead will lead the City attack on Friday night. He has five goals in his last four appearances against Rangers. Links >>> Bristol City Official Website >>> Bristol City Message Board >>> Travel Guide HistoryRecent Meetings: QPR beat Bristol City the last time the sides met, but that barely begins to tell the story of the game. The match between the sides at Loftus Road on Boxing Day proved to be one of only five with Paul Hart in the QPR managerial hot seat, and the only one he won. Things looked good when goals by Jay Simpson and Mikele Leigertwood gave Rangers a comfortable 2-0 half time lead but things turned very sour after the break. First Nicky Maynard controlled, teed up and smacked home a genuinely world class goal into the roof of the School End net from the edge of the area. Then, faced with half an hour to hang on, Hart incurred the wrath of the Loftus Road crowd by removing the attacking players from an already negative formation and introducing two more full backs and a further holding midfielder to form a formation so negative even Craig Levein would balk at playing it. There followed half an hour of QPR lining up on the edge of their box with a flat back eight and simply launching the ball downfield into an empty half of the field every time they got it. Many left before the end, those that stayed booed the team off despite the result. Hart was gone within a fortnight. QPR: Cerny, Hall, Ramage, Gorkss, Williams, Leigertwood, Routledge, Watson, Buzsaky (Borrowdale, 83 ) , Faurlin (Agyemang, 62 ) , Simpson (Connolly, 83 ) Subs not used: Taarabt, Balanta, Taylor, Pellicori Goals: Simpson 30, Leigertwood 41 Bristol C: Gerken, Orr, Fontaine, McAllister, Carey, Williams ( Clarkson, 70 ) , Skuse, Hartley, Maynard, Haynes ( Sproule, 82 ) , Saborio ( Sno, 70 ) Subs not used: Elliott, Nyatanga, Henderson, Edwards Goals: Maynard (57) Bookings: Haynes , Maynard , Sno Rangers were unfortunate to lose at Ashton Gate in the opening week of last season under Jim Magilton. In a challenging start to the season QPR had to travel to Plymouth, Bristol and Exeter in the first ten days and should have taken at least a point from Ashton Gate where Adel Taarabt, who hit the post from less than a yard out in the second half, was most guilty of missing chances. Nicky Maynard and Danny Haynes both missed good opportunities for City in a first half they enjoyed the best of but Rangers were dominant after the break and even after Maynard had taken advantage of a slip by Fitz Hall to give City a late lead Mikele Leigertwood should have equalised in stoppage time when he was faced with the goalkeeper one on one. Bristol City: Gerken 7, Skuse 6 (Fontaine 37, 7), McCombe 6, Nyatanga 7, Orr 7, Hartley 7, Elliott 6, Clarkson 7, McAllister 5 (Velicka 64, -) (Johnson 75, 7), Haynes 6, Maynard 8 Subs Not Used: Basso, Akinde, Sproule, Brian Wilson Booked: McAllister (foul), Nyatanga (foul), Hartley (time wasting) Goals: Maynard 78 (assisted Clarkson) QPR: Cerny 7, Ramage 6, Hall 7, Stewart 7, Borrowdale 6, Routledge 8, Leigertwood 6, Faurlin 6 (Helguson 84, -), Buzsaky 6, Taarabt 7 (Vine 66, 5), Agyemang 5 (Pellicori 66, 6) Subs Not Used: Heaton, Mahon, Gorkss, Connolly Booked: Faurlin (foul), Buzsaky (foul), Stewart (foul) Head to Head: >>> Bristol City wins 25 >>> Draws 22 >>> QPR wins 31 Previous Results: 2009/10 QPR 2 Bristol City 1 (Simpson, Leigertwood) 2009/10 Bristol City 1 QPR 0 2008/09 QPR 2 Bristol City 1 (Taarabt, Lopez) 2008/09 Bristol City 1 QPR 1 (Blackstock) 2007/08 QPR 3 Bristol City 0 (Agyemang 2, Buzsaky) 2007/08 Bristol City 2 QPR 2 (Blackstock, Stewart) 2003/04 Bristol City 1 QPR 0 2003/04 QPR 1 Bristol City 1 (Padula) 2002/03 QPR 1 Bristol City 0 (Gallen pen) 2002/03 QPR 0 Bristol City 0 (Vans trophy, City won 5-4 on pens) 2002/03 Bristol City 1 QPR 3 (Connolly 2, Gallen) 2001/02 Bristol City 2 QPR 0 2001/02 QPR 0 Bristol City 0 1998/99 Bristol City 0 QPR 0 1998/99 QPR 1 Bristol City 1 (Ready) Played for both clubs: Tommy Doherty Bristol City 1996-2006 >>> QPR 2005-2009 Born and bred in Bristol, the Doc made his debut for the red side of the city in September 1997 in a 3-0 win over Luton Town. Over the next nine seasons he would become an integral part of the City team constantly battling for promotion from League One, captaining the side in his last two seasons at the club. In all, the competitive midfielder played just over 200 games for City in his spell before Ian Holloway come calling in the summer of 2005. Rangers and Holloway had frequently been linked with Doherty, a player that wasn’t unlike Ollie back in his playing days for the club, and the R’s boss finally got his man for an undisclosed fee. Doc’s time at W12 didn’t get off to the best start as he was sent off in a pre-season game and there were constant complaints that he looked unfit. However Tommy started the season with a place in the R’s midfield and would go onto play the first seven games of the season. His sending off against Luton and then niggling injuries meant that the he struggled to get another run in the first-team and doubts were again raised over weight and fitness, apparently due to too many cigarettes and too much alcohol on his days off. When Gary Waddock was placed in charge Doc found himself out of the first-team picture altogether and was farmed out on loan to Yeovil Town for the remainder of the season. Tommy never played another game for the R’s after that joining Wycombe first on loan then permanently and was named their player of the year in 2007. Now playing for Bradford City in League Two which is a criminal waste of a talent which was sadly let down by his temper and appalling lifestyle off the pitch. Links >>> Bristol City 1 QPR 0 Match Report >>> Connections and Memories This FridayTeam News: QPR fans still await the first sighting of Rob Hulse in Rangers’ colours following his deadline day move from Derby and he has travelled with the squad to Bristol. While he certainly won’t be risked from the start there is a chance of a bench spot for the striker and he will definitely be well in contention to face Burnley next week. Other than that long term absentees Lee Cook and Martin Rowlands are unavailable and Akos Buzsaky is out with a twisted knee. Expect Ali Faurlin to start again in midfield and Tommy Smith to be given a prolonged run out if not a start. Fitz Hall was back on the bench at Swansea on Tuesday but seemed to pull a muscle in the half time warm up so his involvement is questionable. Bristol City are likely to stick with the same team that secured their first home win of the season against Reading on Tuesday night. Cole Skuse missed out against the Royals with a heel injury and is not available here either. Sam Vokes continues to be troubled by a hamstring injury – he has appeared only once for City since signing on loan from Wolves in August. Elsewhere: The Championship weekend is stretched out across four days this week with QPR starting things off on Friday and second placed Cardiff playing last at Leeds on Monday night. Both those games are on Sky, while the BBC is showing Doncaster v Sheffield United on Saturday tea time. Of the non-televised fixtures look out for a relegation six pointer between Preston and Palace at Deepdale, an intriguing tie between high flying Swansea and resurgent Leicester in South Wales and the meeting of play off chasers Burnley and Reading at Turf Moor. In fact with three former Premiership fixtures between Hull and Portsmouth, Norwich and Middlesbrough and Forest and Ipswich there is plenty to catch the eye this weekend. God I sound like Manish Bhasin. Referee: Premiership referee Lee Mason is in charge of this game, the first time he has been in charge of the R’s since our 1-0 win at Aston Villa in the League Cup two seasons ago. Other notable results with this referee include the 3-3 draw at Rushden and Diamonds with that famous goal from Gareth Ainsworth in our Second Division days. Click here for a full run down of our history with Mr Mason. FormBristol City: City have made a disastrous start to the season at Ashton gate with four teams leaving here with maximum points so far. The win on Tuesday against Reading, their first on home soil this season, brought tears to the eyes of captain Louis Carey – and no wonder after bad defeats on this ground against Norwich, Millwall, Watford and Coventry. Their only other win came at fellow strugglers Scunthorpe in September and so far they have lost seven and drawn three of their 12 matches and sit bottom of the table with nine points from a possible 36. City have conceded 13 goals at home this season, more than any other team, and scored five which is worse than any other team in the league apart from Hull. Their -11 goal difference is also the league’s worst and is 32 worse than QPR. QPR: The clean sheet at Swansea on Tuesday night was a tenth in 12 league games for Paddy Kenny this season and was secured by his penalty save – the second time in as many games sides have missed penalties against Rangers. QPR have the meanest defence and the best attack in the Championship with just three conceded and 24 scored but three of the last four games have finished 0-0. Rangers are currently two points ahead of second placed Cardiff but will stay top this weekend with a draw unless the Welsh side wins by 12 clear goals on Monday night at Leeds. In six away games so far this season Rangers have won at Sheff Utd, Ipswich, Palace and Leicester and drawn with Derby and Swansea. They equalled the club record of 12 games unbeaten at the start of a season on Tuesday and can break that record, that has stood since 1947, by avoiding defeat here. Manchester United are the only other unbeaten side in the English league system this season. Prediction: It would not be very like QPR to win on the television, and City were greatly improved on Tuesday night by most accounts, but to be honest I expect us to win here and win well. I think our defence is too strong for their attack and we’ll pose them too many problems for their fragile confidence to cope with at the other end. QPR to win 3-0, 20/1 with Blue Square Photo: Action Images Please report offensive, libellous or inappropriate posts by using the links provided.
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