Match Day Thread QPR v Aston Villa

Robinson and Baptiste together in a back four looked really good and gave us better balance in midfield. I don’t think it’s a coincidence we’ve had two poor performances with Lynch back in the team.

 

Watched the game and a deserved win for Villa who currently look like the favourites to return to the top tier

Controlled and measured

We are a work in progress as usual and on course imo

 

No problem Stan......not sure I got there till about 1.30I was on a fairly fruitless hunt for a food bank which didn't appear until much later. Terry and Ian were later due to bus problems on the A11 I think.
Due to misinformation we looked for you in LU (where I met another QPR supporter from my own fairly small village now there's a coincidence) and we waited in the "Col memorial discussion corner " too....so we tried.

Possibly glad we didn't meet as it was all a bit depressing....

 

Food bank. Hmm. After being directed by three different stewards to four different locations where the food bank was not, eventually gave up and took tins in with me past the security who nodded at the words' food bank'. Did reflect that rather futile to take the lid off a coke bottle while allowing tins weighing possibly 750g in to the ground. As Snodgrass taking corner, I did wonder what impact a missile of tinned fruit or rice pudding might have on him but then remembered that I actually enjoy attending football matches.
Intended to find the food bank after the game but in the misery just forgot them under my seat.
Bit odd to have closed down the collection well before the game started.
I hoped it did not mean that there was so little given that they were embarrassed and shut it down early??

 

Just think Wzsolek leaves us vulnerable down that right side, Baptiste is pulled out to cover leaving Lynch a sitting duck. Any coach with half a brain will target that and any quality winger such as Adomah will have a field-day. All said Villa were the far better side and doubtless Derby and Brentford will have noticed the way to score against us...

 

Against Sheff U they were excellent just as a two. Furlong came on, our one actual right-back, and plugged the gap really well. At least until Hall and Onuoha are available I’d rather go with Robinson and Baptiste with Bidwell and Furlong at full-back.

 

Agreed, you have to have the right players to play three at the back and Wzsolek and Lynch f*ck the system up...

 

Pavel wasn’t playing yesterday, it was Cousins, who started ok but faded badly and wasn’t doing the ‘back’ bit of ‘wing back’ for Villa’s winner.

I didn’t find it depressing Beth. We were beaten by a team which has better players than ours, and given that they spent £83m on it according to Roller, that is only to be expected. Our lads never gave up, competed hard but were simply not good enough.

We are going to have to get used to teams with a lot of PL cash and much bigger parachute payments than ours competing with us in the championship. In the first year after relegation we might have a morale and confidence advantage over them cf Sunderland, but if they had sane owners and decent managers that should soon pass. Then add championship big spenders like Wolves and promoted teams on a roll like Sheffield United into the mix. Strip these out and the teams that are doing better than us are the likes of Cardiff (boo!) and Bristol City, and the fact that they are doing well should give us some hope for the future.

 

Exactly - we're 17 games in and have matched almost everybody - including all the big spenders, until Forest last week and yesterday.

 

It seems that, yet again, there is disagreement as to whether we played 3 at the back or a back 4.

Someone care to give a definitive answer?

Either way, as it's so hard to see what shape we're supposed to be playing, is it any surprise that we're really not that good?

 

The arsehole speaketh...

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DO7_qGoWsAAofu6.jpg:large

 

No claim for this to be definitive, but as I saw it we played the first half with 3 at the back, with Bidwell and Cousins as wing backs. Bidwell did get at least one cross in, and he also had Snodgrass to deal with - a very good player who didn’t do much yesterday - but I’m not sure Cousins is right for the role, especially defensively. Baptiste started very well, but the back three had a lot of work to do against a big, fast couple of strikers.

With substitutions in second half (not sure if it was Sylla or Washington) we went 4-3-3, although at one stage it was 4-2-4 as Freeman played very forward for a bit. Felt sorry for him, not much came off for him yesterday, but he is a decent player.

We never a period of real control in this game, but I think that’s because they had slightly better players (though they are not World beaters). I would have preferred to see Furlong on the right, and I think playing Mackie and Smith up front was a defensive move - Mackie to wear them out by running around a bit and Smith to defend corners with Samba. Washington can do the Mackie role better and a much faster striker than Smith (do we have one?) would have given their defence more to think about. Or at least a striker who can hold the ball up with confidence, I.e. control it.

 

I doubt you’ll find a QPR fan who thinks Cousins is our best bet at RWB. It’s just bizarre.

Eze back soon will be another option up front.

 

Isn’t Eze a midfielder?

 

I was sure we played 4-4-2. To make it clear, we lined up that way for kick off and at various dead ball situations. The only confusion might have come from Bidwell pushing forward and then sometimes jogging back to take up his defensive duties at left back. I thought that was just laziness rather than a sign of the system we were playing. I was under the obvious misapprehension that we had been reasonably successful playing 3-5-2 at home, albeit without the ideal personnel to staff it, but the tactical genius that is Ian Holloway obviously thought we needed to do something different against Villa. Perhaps this was prompted by Villa's pace which was as impressive as it was dangerous. In contrast, we had Matt Smith. Make no mistake, despite having a good first half, we could easily have lost this by 4-1 or 5-1, such was the lack of clinical finishing demonstrated by Villa.

Baptiste was a conventional right back and demonstrated, yet again, that he's not very good at it. There were acres of space down that flank and their second goal came from lack of personnel in that area. Why was Furlong not used? Lynch showed the full range of his passing ability, which is at its best when the yardage is in single figures, and even Robinson was less impressive than usual. As if he needed to prove it all over again, Cousins looked like an unfit and average central midfielder playing out of position on the flank.

The key change was losing Luongo at half time. His tackling, covering and creativity were sorely missed and Manning looked ordinary in comparison. If you asked me who was our best player, I might go for a sub par Freeman but it tells you something about how well we played when I would also consider Mackie for that accolade. Does anyone else think Washington looks overweight? Does anyone else remember when he could sprint and beat a player, albeit without ever scoring?

Villa couldn't have complained if we had gone in 1-0 up at half time but they were well worth their win and, overall, I found the afternoon rather depressing.

 

More of a ‘number 10’ but he’s no waif.

 

Nothing is definitive, but it seemed to me we started wth 3-5-2 and went 4-3-3 in the second half.

 

Given the uncertainty on here over our formation I do wonder how clear our players were on their individual roles and the team shape

Yesterday was hugely frustrating - we had a number of good breaks but contrived to either slow the game down (largely due to poor support for the strikers) or make the wrong pass

Too many long balls lumped up too, easily dealt with by their defensive MF

Yesterday confirmed to me that this season we just aren't a force to be reckoned with in this division - yet. However it will be a struggle to hang on to our better players come May

Talking of which, will Grant Hall ever play for us again

 

Thanks Strolls, that gives me confidence in my powers of observation.

What was up with Smithies distribution yesterday?

 

That's a good call about Smith being a defensive selection. He defended corners well and won more than his share all afternoon against Samba, who was awful. I also thought Bidwell coped well against Snodgrass, who didn't like our man's physicality and drifted out of the game before being subbed. If we had a man of the match at all, I would give it to Bidwell.