| News Comment | West Brom wallop seven through hapless QPR - Report at 12:08:39
After the frustrations of the Olly rollercoaster ride, with promising displays by youngsters rewarded with being dropped, the perpetual changes in formation and mystifying mix of genius and bizarre rambling I had hoped we’d have a bland but stable period to rebuild in. How do we rebuild when our promising young players go out on loan or don’t play and are surrounded by old heads that sadly don’t compare favourably with Hill, Derry, Helguson and Dunn. We’re now a very long way from Warnock’s reign and since then we’ve made mistake upon mistake. We should follow the Burnley, Brentford and Huddersfield route but we’ve shown precious little sign of exercising the patience, wisdom or know-how despite the many bitter lessons we’ve had since 2012. Bhatia’s influence on the board seemed to be important before and hopefully it will be again but the top team need a shared strategy for the long term and a good plan for now. They also need to communicate with each other. It looks like they don’t have any of it. Knee Jerks indeed or maybe just jerks. I worry about the message the club gives to players like Smyth, Manning, Chair et al about out ambitions and their value in helping us achieve them. It’s very poor management if we send them out to improve when they’ve already shown they can do it alongside senior players. |
| News Comment | Huddersfield happy to pile pressure on QPR — Report at 01:01:41
Like many recent performances this was played with little belief and it's hard to see how the team can build confidence when one or two players cannot be relied upon to hold up their end. I agree very much with the general principle that fans should get behind the team and I deplore the booing and calls for sacking from the seemingly drunken louts that spend more time in the bar than watching the game. However, frustration with repeated mistakes and a reliannce on players with obviously limited ability cannot be supported. Henry is the weakest link, holding a key position in modfield to no great effect. A player of no great talent he seems incapable of anticipating the play or even knowing how the ball will land until it's at his feet, often wasting precious seconds while his under sized or under used brain grinds into action. At best he's he a last resort and most certainly not a first pick. I don't think we're far off being good but we can't afford passengers and Henry too often leaves the team exposed. Sadly, Onuoha has also become a liability. He's a player with a great heart and no little ability but the defence is shaky and too often he loses his man. Who is marshalling the back four and the team? I feel for Chery and Luongo but most particularly for Washington who has a talent we seem intent on wasting. We not only lack belief but we lack the ability to learn, without the intelligence and the wisdom to admit we've got it wrong and change things around. Huddersfield, Newcastle and Blackburn were all better organised than us, not better teams. |
| News Comment | Masked man robs Rangers of point — report at 08:37:20
Whatever happens in the remaining games the way that Chris Ramsey has galvanised the team since 'Arry left is the reason that we now look better organised, quite a bit fitter, and as a result, a better team. We do look like a team, which makes Redknapp's jibes about infighting all the more ironic, since they come from an arch manipulator and divider of people, who's only strategy was to keep spending other people's money in the hope he might strike lucky. Anyone would have struggled with the squad he left behind him - unfit, disorganised and dispirited. Ramsey has done a brilliant job and we are close to playing good football after two years of being almost unbearable to watch. There are still weaknesses and Rob Green is one. His problems stem from a lack of character, of self belief, so that whilst he can make unbelievable saves (because he never has the time to think about it) he is always prone to huge gaffs, ultimately, because he is weak minded and afraid. His judgement is suspect on claiming crosses or any ball that comes into the box, leaving his defenders uncertain about what to do, and his distribution is painfully variable. The mistake he made against Chelsea was elementary, attempting to kick a ball too close to him because he'd got too close to the edge of the penalty area. He often does it - somewhere between thinking about it and executing it his concentration goes. I wonder if he can read the play or is actually mentally connected to the defenders and the team since he often clears the ball in a dangerous or unproductive way. I've been saying he is a liability for several seasons, so this is not a knee-jerk reaction to the point he cost us on Sunday. My question is whether others could have made most of the (great) saves he's made, and there have been many, and might not suffer from his weaknesses. Our defence can look confused, old and slow despite the youth of Caulker, Isla and Yun and that might actually be uncertainty rather than cluelessness. It's not down to one man (with the exception of the truly disastrous, self serving Redknapp) but the devil does lie in the detail and right now we need to give the team greater edge by recognising where we can make key improvements. I think Green may be one of them, sadly. |
| News Comment | QPR fall to ten men on Redknapp’s Bournemouth return — report at 06:50:59
A lack of imagination says Harry is what our team suffers from, this from the man who sent them out to play 5-3-2 at home to Blackpool. An explicable formation and not for the first time this season; and not for the first time have we seen a strange team selection, with players out of position or out of form and fitness chosen over better options. And why is our promising young talent sent out on loan? The logic of losing Harriman and drafting in Hughes escapes me, and yes, I know Harriman is on a season long loan. Imagination, foresight, planning, vision are things we should expect of the manager. Could he have foreseen the injury list? Probably not the one we've had but he could have planned better for one, particularly in a way that would have strengthened our striking options. We've been comprehensively out done by teams with fewer resources but better organisation, better fitness and better, arguably simpler, tactics. We've barely played well all season and struggled to look like we train together or frequently play together. Long, slow, sideways and backwards passing looks less like patient build up and more like a lack of confidence, hunger and commitment. Those things should come from the top. Do we want to get promoted or just look like we've made a good fist of it? Since co-incidence is difficult to believe in for sustained period of time, I'm beginning to wonder if promotion would be too convenient from a financial perspective for the Rs management this year. |
| News Comment | Purposeful Burnley brush QPR aside — report at 20:43:59
In the absence of people taking responsibility for things it is always tempting to blame, not necessarily constructively. In a right world Karl Henry would be looking at himself when calling for a response and so should Harry, who more than anyone is to blame for this defeat. It's been coming for weeks and has been clearly indicated by tactics that leave a hardworking, skilful and committed player like Austin isolated while we pass sideways and stand still. Replacing Henry with Jenas instead of Faurlin was crass and that was Harry's choice. Your choice of the word purposeful to describe Burnley is telling - we lacked purpose on Saturday, and focus, and determination, and personal responsibility for making something happen. We've got away with it until now and it's bolstered our apparent belief that we are too good to work hard. Burnley are organised, hard working and full of desire but they're not that good and we could have, should have beaten them. |
| News Comment | From hero to villain, Cisse’s mad moment costs QPR — full match report at 07:41:45
Depressing though that the first twenty minutes of the second was, Hughes is right to say that there was plenty overall to feel encouraged by. We might actually manage well enough without Cisse to pick up points in the next two but I worry about the continued use of Derry - his passing is more dangerous than Barton's. I also worry about the incessant abuse of our players by so called supporters in F Block, which starts even when we're winning. And then they follow it up by racially abusing Wolves' Irish players and offering to fight fellow supporters who ask them to stop the abuse of all the players. It's not just the players who behave stupidly. |
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