Two games in little more than 48 hours for QPR this Easter weekend, and neither really means a great deal. LFW looks ahead...
Old First Division, Old Old Second Division >>> Saturday April 18, 2014 >>> Kick Off 12.15 >>> King Power Stadium, Leicester >>> Live on Sky Sports 1
Old First Division, Old Old Second Division >>> Monday April 20, 2014 >>> Kick Off 15.00 >>> Loftus Road, London, W12
The common or garden British football fan finds him or herself living in uncomfortable times, where nothing quite makes sense any more.
We’ve been told, pretty much since Arsene Wenger first touched down at Heathrow, that English football has to change its ways. It’s about possession, and 4-2-3-1, and nutrition and diet. No more kick and rush, 4-4-fucking-2 and light ales on a Thursday after training. A new breed of manager has swept onto the scene and changed the face of the game, often with no meaningful top level playing career of their own — Brendan Rodgers, Jose Mourinho, Wenger, Roberto Martinez. We can play like the Spanish too.
And that’s all been fine. At least we know where we stand. Put that bacon sandwich down and have this granola bar and vitamin supplement instead, and for heaven’s sake start passing to a team mate instead of always looking to "hit the channel” and "turn that full back around.”
But now, alongside all this new age hippy nonsense, we have Tony Pulis and Steve Bruce tearing the place apart.
How we laughed and poured scorn on the idea of Hull City, who lost 15 Championship matches last season and scored less goals at home than relegated Bristol City, going into the Premier League and taking on the best teams in the country with Alex Bruce playing as a holding midfield player. This was supposed to be Derby County circa 2007 all over again. Would the league agree to let Hull start games with 13 men on the pitch just to try and make a game of it.
Hull are thirteenth, six points clear of the relegation whirlpool, and looking forward to a first FA Cup final in their history. It’s little short of a disgrace that Bruce is as long as 66/1 for the manager of the year award, especially when Manuel Pellegrini is as short as 22/1 for winning a League Cup and nothing else having spent £96m on a team that had already cost £1bn before he got there.
Pulis has had more recognition. Never relegated before in 20 years as a manager he looked like he’d put his personal record in jeopardy when he arrived at Selhurst Park in November to take charge of a team that had lost nine, won one and drawn one of its first 11 games. A remarkable win at Champions League-chasing Everton on Wednesday, their fourth straight Premier League victory, means they have survived in the top flight for the first time since it was revamped in 1992/93 at the fifth time of asking. Palace have won 12 of Pulis’ 25 games in charge and drawn another three.
This is ridiculous isn’t it? Tony Pulis? Tony Pulis who thought Jon Walters was the best thing since breasts were invented? Tony Pulis who deviated from a lamentable style of play at Stoke only to go from "hit Kenwynne” to "hit Crouchy”? Tony Pulis whose supporters used to sing "Swing low sweet chariot” at home games? Tony Pulis who kept unfashionable Stoke City in the Premier League for five years but still drove the club’s long suffering support to distraction with football so dull and hideous to look at you’d rather whirl your finger around in your eye socket and turn your eyeballs into a mushy pulp than look at it for a single second longer? That Tony Pulis?
Now some sort of football demi-God, producing form worthy of European qualification from a team whose best player is Jason Puncheon and defence is made up of Damien Delaney, Adrian Mariappa, Scott Dann and other such luminaries. The job he has done at Selhurst Park is utterly remarkable and, if Liverpool don’t succeed in winning that first title in 20 years, then he’s the manager of the year by a street. Palace are actually reasonable to watch as well — Stoke had no pace in their team so went long, Palace do have legs so rely on swift, thrilling counter attacks. Pulis isn’t a long ball merchant after all, it seems, he’s just very adept at selecting a horse for a course.
What one or two QPR fans have picked up on this week is that Pulis took over at Palace November 23 2013, and Harry Redknapp took over at Loftus Road on November 22 2012. Palace had four points and were bottom, QPR had four points and were bottom. Had Tony Fernandes said at the time that he was making an approach to Stoke to speak to Tony Pulis the natives, and no doubt this website, would have been up in arms at the idea. QPR under Harry Redknapp won just four of their remaining games and were relegated while Palace, with a far worse team on paper, now sit eleventh.
We heard from Jamie Mackie on the always excellent Open All R’s podcast this week that the situation Redknapp inherited from Mark Hughes — who is now happily creaming off the credit for leading the team and set up that Pulis built from scratch into midtable as if he’s had anything to do with it — was toxic, and probably far different from the situation he found at Selhurst Park.
Mackie said: "At the time I loved the football club and it meant a lot to me, but the years we went up, stayed up, I had an unbelievable dressing room there and it was great fun going into work, going into training. The last six months really, really changed - it wasn't a good place to be at all and that was such a shame for me. I felt it was a time then for me to move on, I wasn't playing and it was an opportunity for me to not be part of that changing room. I didn't want to be part of that changing room because it was one of the worst places I've been in terms of attitude and desire to win football matches. It was disgusting. I didn't want to be part of that when
I'd been part of something amazing at a great football club.”
So whether even Tony ‘The Saviour’ Pulis would have been able to do anything with QPR last year is highly doubtful, but it’s another niggly little stat that Harry Redknapp could do without as his critics continue to arm themselves and mass at the border, almost waiting and willing him to fail this season so they can say they were right.
If QPR are promoted this season then the manager will have done his job. At the moment there look to be far more likely play-off winners than QPR — Derby and Wigan are in form and playing well while Rangers have been involved in little more than ticking off fixtures for a few weeks now, even allowing for last weekend’s thumping win over Nottingham Forest. The R’s have four largely meaningless games to go and this team hasn’t shown much inclination towards putting itself out when it doesn’t have to. Momentum is important in the end of season knock out and will be difficult to build in these circumstances.
But, ominously for the rest, Redknapp is getting a lot of his better players back to full fitness — Joey Barton returns today at Leicester and Charlie Austin is being eased back in. With any luck (though Leicester boss Nigel Pearson would refute the suggestion that luck has anything to do with it) the R’s will only be missing Matt Phillips and Ale Faurlin come the big moment and that makes them an awkward opponent to draw.
It does seem rather destined for Redknapp to be dumped out of the play-offs by the man he gave a coaching opportunity to last summer, Steve McClaren, but then nobody in football has a crystal ball. Apart from Pulis of course — he can tell you the Cardiff City team for their last game of the season already if you’re interested.
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Marc Nygaard celebrates his miraculous second goal at Leicester as relegation threatened QPR secured a vital 3-1 away win in 2006/07.
Team News: Although QPR look, feel and play like the team everybody is going to want to draw in the play-offs — certainly when compared to the form being shown by Wigan and Derby — the R’s are starting to get a number of their key men back to fitness at just the right time. Although Charlie Austin looked off the pace against Forest he’ll benefit from another hour of action and it will be interesting to see how he is used in the two quick-fire games this weekend.
Clint Hill, Aaron Hughes, Andy Johnson and even Kevin Doyle are all approaching some kind of fitness as well but Matt Phillips and Ale Faurlin remain sidelined long term and Jermaine Jenas left the Forest game early with a hamstring injury. Junior Hoilett was, as usual, struggling by the end of that match as well so we’ll have to see how much action he gets with two games in just over 48 hours.
Jamie Vardy returned to action last week after a groin injury but Matty James is out with a knee problem for Leicester who still need points to guarantee the title ahead of Burnley.
Watford will welcome back Italian defender Marco Cassetti on Monday as he serves the second match of a two game ban for yellow card accumulation against Ipswich on Saturday. Cristian Battocchio (knee) and Lloyd Doyley (ankle) have been ruled out of the Saturday match but are close to returning and may yet feature on Monday — Doyley, infamously, scored one of only two goals in more than 400 career appearances against QPR four seasons ago.
Elsewhere: Games scattered liberally across four days, everybody required to play 180 minutes, injuries sustained, managers moaning, players physically spent, leant against walls, breathing heavily, begging for mercy. Easter.
Some started yesterday… Plucky Bournemouth are now back to simply being
Bournemouth again after a 4-2 home defeat by Sheffield Wednesday brought to an end a run of five wins and a draw and leaves them three points shy of the play-off places with three to play — the first of those is against Ipswich on Monday who still harbour realistic top six ambitions of their own. The Tractor Boys go to Udinese today sitting a point behind sixth place Brighton who could only draw at Huddersfield yesterday and host Blackpool on Monday. Reading, who sit between the two, were hammered 3-0 at the Globetrotters on Good Friday have Middlesbrough at home on Tuesday — keeping up?
The Globetrotters look safe in the play-off spots now, which is just as well given they’re at second placed Burnley on Monday — the Clarets are all but promoted now after a bad-tempered win at Blackpool yesterday although Derby’s 2-0 win at Doncaster keeps them waiting a while longer. Derby, also now secure in the knock-out, host Barnsley who need points for a different reason on Monday.
So what of that relegation scrap? Well Barnsley can heap pressure on free-falling Blackpool with a win against terminally out of form Leeds at Oakwell today and Millwall could move out of the bottom three altogether if they win at Middlesbrough. Two decent results for Ian Holloway’s resurgent (two wins and a draw counts as a resurgence ok) Wall this weekend — they’re at home to lowly Doncaster on Monday — sets up a friendly cockney knees up at Loftus Road next weekend when everybody will be friendly and singing together as one in the name of our fair city. Or razing the place to the ground. Haven’t really decided yet.
Four teams can still be sucked in: aforementioned Freefalling Blackpool, who are at the Globetrotters on Monday; Standard Liege who drew 0-0 with Champions Elect Bolton yesterday in what’s already being referred to as the Game of the Century and go to Sheffield Wednesday on Monday; Donny Rovers, who lost to Derby last week ahead of that Millwall six pointer; and Birmingham City, who have been losing consistently for weeks without ever seeming to go anywhere in the league but are now just three points in the black with games against Forest away today and Blackburn at home on Monday to come.
Huddersfield are just about safe, and Yeovil all but down, which makes it a nice time for them to meet in the countryside on Easter Monday.
Is that everything? Frankly I lost interest five paragraphs ago.
Referee: The Leicester game, a clash between the first and fourth placed teams in the league, has been given to rookie referee Scott Duncan in only his third full season on the list. It’s his first career appointment with QPR and represents a decent vote of confidence from the authorities in his ability. His stats are available by clicking here.
Monday’s clash with Watford is being referee by James Linington from the Isle of Wight — an official who incurred the wrath of Birmingham boss Lee Clark last month for allegedly mocking his players over the score in a home match with Burnley. His QPR case history and recent stats are available here.
QPR: Rangers killed off their hopes of automatic promotion with a three match winless run that included defeats at Bournemouth and Blackburn but broke out of that slump with a 5-2 win at home to Nottingham Forest last weekend. That result maintains a record of just two defeats at Loftus Road this season — to Reading and Leicester — with 14 wins and five draws from the other 19 matches. Away from home they’ve won seven, the fewest of any team in the top six, and have lost four of the last five on the road including the last two. Only Reading and Ipswich outside the play-off places can catch QPR as it stands, and both would need the R’s to lose all their remaining games to do it. Only Brighton have kept more than QPR’s 17 clean sheets this season.
Leicester: The Foxes are 12 points clear at the top of the table, four away from second placed Burnley, with four matches left to play. It’s a promotion built on an impressive unbeaten run of 21 unbeaten matches sandwiched between away and home defeats to Brighton. That run included 15 wins, and a 1-0 success at Loftus Road back in December. Sealing promotion with a 2-1 win against Sheffield Wednesday they’ve since stalled slightly with a 4-1 defeat at home to Brighton and a draw at Reading on Monday night. It means they’ve won just two of the last eight, drawing four, going into this match. At home this season they’ve won 15 and drawn four of 21 with only Brighton and Nottingham Forest winning on this ground in the league so far. Leicester have scored 78 goals in the league this season, more than any other team.
Udinese: The Hornets’ recent 4-1 win at Sheffield Wednesday snapped a run of 14 away matches without a win stretching back to a 2-1 success at Huddersfield at the start of October — to be fair nine of those 14 games were drawn, including a 2-2 at title chasing Leicester where they led 2-0 at one point. They’ve won four, drawn ten and lost six of their away matches this season with the wins coming at Hillsborough, Huddersfield, Barnsley and Birmingham back on day one. Watford have lost one of the last seven, and none of the last five, coming into this game.
Betting: Professional odds compiler Owen Goulding says…
"QPR travel to promoted Leicester on Saturday looking to cement their already highly likely play-off place. From a betting point of view, this kind of game has 'AVOID AVOID AVOID' all over it. Motivational issues are rife on both sides QPR have a number of players back from injury and it will be interesting to see which team Redknapp starts with. If I was pushed to have a bet, I would be looking at the under 2.5 goals market as this could easily be played out as a training game. This is currently available at a best priced Even money on Betfair.
"Elsewhere there are a mountain of meaningful fixtures throughout the country over the weekend but most eyes will be on Carrow Road on Sunday. Unbelievably, 888Sport and Unibet seem to have not noticed the amount of penalties Liverpool have been scoring recently and you can back Liverpool to score a penalty in this game at 4/1. Considering they have scored nine penalties in their last sixteen games, and although Norwich are not a team who concede many penalties, in this instance it is well worth an interest against a Canaries side who will be defending for their lives.”
Bet of Weekend: Norwich v Liverpool - Liverpool to score a penalty - 4/1 (888Sport/Unibet)
Prediction: Reigning Prediction League Mase tells us…
"How refreshing it was to hear Nigel Pearson this week laugh off suggestions of signing has been's and never-were's in favour of actually scouting properly and coming up with a shopping list that most of us haven’t heard of or know what to make of. Proper planning and equipping for the tilt to the Premier League has been the key to City's success and is in marked contrast to the buy in haste, repent at leisure approach so favoured at QPR.
"With the sizeable if streaky win against Forest last week we became virtual certainties for the playoffs and these next four matches could either be used to really hone our team and tactics or be treated as a mini break from actually putting in effort. So far so predictable, and the early kick-off in front of the cameras, picked at a time this looked like a potential title decider, now has all the appeal of sloppy seconds with SuBo.
"Both clubs to field peculiar line ups, play in a haphazard way, but the Foxes take the points.”
Mase’s Prediction: Leicester 2-0 QPR. No scorer.
LFW’s Prediction: Leicester 1-0 QPR. No scorer.
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Pictures — Action Images