Fate or fortune

Queens Park Rangers 2 Blackburn Rovers 2
Hull City 1 Queens Park Rangers 1
Fulham 4 Queens Park Rangers 0
Queens Park Rangers 4 Bolton Wanderers 3
Birmingham City 2 Queens Park Rangers 1
Queens Park Rangers 0 Sheffield Wednesday 0
Queens Park Rangers 3 MK Dons 0
Brentford 1  Queens Park Rangers 0

Firstly, I must make a massive apology for not writing a post for so long. I always knew that travel plans would mean I'd miss some games...so I listened to many of the earlier ones from abroad. Fulham away was listened to for one very exciting minute (the remaining 44 being very depressing) on the wifi of Turkish Airlines during an 11 hour flight from Hong Kong to Istanbul. Needless to say I had the great excuse of being too tired and jet lagged to really be able to concentrate on the 2nd half so at 3-0 down I switched off and slept.

Looking at the results above just as a plain list without any context it's pretty hard to find any real rhyme, reason or pattern there. I guess except to say that perhaps we've stopped leaking too many goals- thanks probably to the inclusion of Clint Hill in the squad and Warnock in his suspicious 'advisory' role. And I guess for me it's emblematic of how I've been feeling about things lately. Sometimes it's easy to be fatalistic about things, often it's romantic notions that make me lean that way. But sometimes things just happen and there isn't a whole lot of decent explanation why.

It's been a crazy few weeks and I've missed most of the above games both home and away which is rare for me. As I said, initially due to travel but more recently after coming back from the Philippines I was hit, unknowingly at first, with Dengue fever. Having been admitted quickly in to hospital after a visit to the GP I was frightened as hell having not spent any time in hospital since I was 8 years old when I had my adenoids taken out. So I've spent the last 2 weeks ill, being prodded, tested and then diagnosed with Dengue, and the last week thankfully recovering at home. Dengue in general isn't dangerous but it can kill and there is no immunisation as yet. And I never in a million years thought I might get it because I've never really been one to get mosquito bites and I've spent several years travelling back and forth from Asia...and was born there. But Dengue can happen to anyone, not just 'travellers'. As they say 's*** happens'.

Having spent, for the first time in many years,  so many games listening from far away or in a sick bed - and not being able to see much action in the flesh, it's been so hard to get a real sense of what has been going on. And again looking at the list of results it's almost as if the only explanation I can give for the rather random set of numbers, is that s** is seriously happening. Scientific I know (and just the rational report you've been waiting for from me!).

Seriously though, I talk about the defensive improvements that have been made. But having been able to watch the Brentford game on telly last night, and from everything I am seeing on twitter and hearing from friends, it looks as if we've made a bit of an assumption that our issue has been defence. But in our over subscribed mid field I am seeing gaping issues and a lack of creativity. Henry, weirdly for me, is a great defensive midfielder for the Premier League, but in a league where we should have a bit more attacking scope why aren't we seeing a bit more of Faurlin? And last night's subs confused me- Chery off for Austin, and Luongo for Hoilett? I'm no tactician but why are we removing our hope for midfield creativity. Henry and Tozser are just not cutting it for me right now. And what is Gladwin doing back at Swindon? Random random random...

Having been a bonkers year for me which I am not sure I could have predicted on New Year's Eve 2014, I can only say that I am unable to provide any predictions for QPR and what is to come. What I can say for sure though is that the last few weeks have helped me to remember all the important things. Family, friends and QPR have all been very sweet and and whilst it was touch and go on how serious my illness at one point, it's not a jot on some of the things some of my dearest friends have been through this year. So I am very grateful and a little embarrassed by the attention.

Our performances of late (regardless of results), have certainly been disappointing, but I am still extremely proud of supporting a club with players that do take the time out for individual fans. I've always known that was the case, but I have now experienced it first hand.

Thanks you to Charlie, Clint and the club and thanks to my wonderful friends. And good luck to the lads over the next few weeks.  Whilst we are unsure of our fate for now, it looks like we're going to need a bit of good fortune (wink).

Making the best

Queens Park Rangers 1 Carlisle United 2 (Capital One Cup)
Huddersfield 0 Queens Park Rangers 1
Queens Park Rangers 1 Nottingham Forest 2

Yesterday's match was in one word, a disaster! With the game in our control and a moment of weakness it was quickly taken away from us. Oh, think of all the parallels I can draw with life and those moments of panic and loss of control.

I had this blog post all planned out before yesterday's match. It was going to be about Charlie and all the other players that stayed at QPR on transfer deadline day and about how, at that point, all our minds were on making the best of what we thought we were going to have (none of them). Then I was going to talk about how, now with those players (Greeno, Matty, Charlie), our best could be even better than we had first assumed.

It's a funny old world, when events conspire against you, and not for lack of trying. No, I don't think we were great at all yesterday, but I would certainly say we need to give Forest a bit of credit for frustrating our style of play. It was tricky from the start- I could feel the tension and even tweeted that I could see red cards coming our way. Little did I know it was come at such a heavy price. And I am a bloody softy really. I have way too much empathy than I'd like (often to my own detriment), that when I got home and saw Greeno's face on the telly, I actually felt sorry for him. I couldn't really tell what sort of expression he did have - it was somewhere between embarrassment and tearfulness (or maybe it was simply the strong sun in his eyes).

And speaking of expressions, from the moment Charlie got on the pitch I could see this match was going to be an important one for him. After all the press (which is still ongoing and is now about the January transfer window!), and the palaver surrounding a potential departure from Loftus Road, Charlie is a true professional in the sense that he is guided by decent principles that anyone would respect: Those that protect his family, his personal growth and the people that have done good by him in his life. And yesterday he looked pumped up and serious about the game. Perhaps you could say it's because he didn't come through the academy system and that's why he's like that. Or the other well-often scribed view, is that because he was a brickie 6 years ago he knows the value of hard work. But the more I think about it, the more I realise that that is simply who Charlie is and how he was brought up. I think he would have been the same person, academy or not. Having said that, he had a point to prove. After scoring what was, to me, a truly magnificent Charlie special, he ran over to South Africa Road and looked up to our block with a deadly serious face and his finger to his lips. I was in cloud 9, and assumed at first that he was looking at me (remember #slidingmovements) - and then I thought perhaps it was a Sky camera man because maybe he was silencing David Sullivan and anyone else who had doubts about his Premier League ability. Only later I was told some bloke in our block had heckled him about his work rate apparently. He was silencing the critics, but silencing those our very own ground. Who would have thought?

So what of the future now that the dust has almost settled until January at least? I am still seeing a team working hard to play as a team at least on a personal level. With the muted atmosphere yesterday I could hear them talking to each other, encouraging each other, and obviously playing out some formations learned in training. There is plenty to work on tactically and I am not sure everyone is 100% happy or comfortable where they are positioned. But I'm happy with what is being pulled together as it is all being done with the right attitude that we've been begging for for years. Life ain't all roses as we know, and 'clutzy' mistakes will happen. Dear old Smithies now has the mammoth task of winning the hearts and the trust of fans for the next three games. But like us, he's got to make the most of what he's got. It's a challenge which must be seen as a great opportunity - and I wish him all the best.

You RRRs

Connections

Charlton Athletic 2 Queens Park Rangers 0
Yeovil Town 0 Queens Park Rangers 3
Queens Park Rangers 2 Cardiff City 2
Wolves 2 Queens Park Rangers 3
Queens Park Rangers 4  Rotherham Utd 2


For most of my life I have been very conscious of my mixed heritage. My experiences living in the UK, Hong Kong and the Philippines have very much made me who I am affected how I feel about things.  I think there are others who feel the same way.  Back in 2010, a woman who was schooled in Hong Kong released a book called The Eurasian Nation. This book is a collection of thoughts and photographs from people of combined Asian and Western ancestry. Reading through some of the examples, you can see that every experience and every person is unique. It reminds me that we simply can't generalise about human connections, but that in life, connections mean everything.

This is a comfort as I continue to write this blog and share my thoughts on the ups and downs at QPR and all the connections that we make as we support our team. And as I glance at the results so far, it looks like we are, as always, in for a roller-coaster ride. I am not sure that we're going to be challenging for a play off spot (especially with the potential departure of Phillips and Austin), but I don't think many of us expect or want that. Conversely, we're too good to be struggling in the dregs of the bottom of the table (even if they do go). Our roller-coaster this season is going to be something to do with getting to grips with a new ethos and a new team. The kind of team most of us fans have been begging for for 3-4 years! We're in (to use an often used business term), the 'forming' phase of group development (of which there are four). And we're in it when there are pressures and targets that need to be achieved at least once, if not three or four times a week! We haven't even hit the 'storming' or 'norming' phase...we might not get there until the end of the season. Oh, to one day reach the 'performing' stage...

We simply have be realistic and honest about what is to come.

It seems to me, amongst of all of this, that our first problem to solve, is the number of goals we're leaking in. Never one to claim any tactical expertise, I'd be open to hearing what's at the heart of this problem. Is it our overall attacking approach, or it is specific individuals or specific positions? Having not had a single clean sheet in the league is a major concern. I don't remember it being like this at all two seasons ago. It's almost like we've got two different teams within a team, with the defenders totally unconnected to the forwards.

Nonetheless, yesterday was one of those few moments in a season where everything seemed to come together and prove to me that it's still a club worth being involved in. Credit must be given to those at the club who very quickly started to plan Stan Bowles Day after hearing the news about his Alzheimer's diagnosis. And by the looks of it, the club did everything it possibly could that day to drive awareness of the condition, raise money for Alzheimer's Society and for Stan himself. It was great to see him smiling and the atmosphere in the ground was fantastic. Many people there, including myself are simply not old enough or were born early enough to remember Stan Bowles playing. But that was irrelevant on a day which was all about connections: All of the fans with Stan, Stan with the club and with Loftus Road, the younger with the older generation of QPR fans, the players with the history of this club, and all of us together with our friends enjoying the icing on the cake in the form of a 4-2 win.

Please donate to the two causes if you can:

Stan Bowles- personal Go Fund Me  page to help support his care

Alzheimer's Sociery - special Stan Bowles  Fund Raising Page

Clichés

Preview- QPR- Season 2015-2016

I need to start getting it out of my head that my life works in three year cycles: three years of good and three years of bad. Especially on this important first day of the football season. But it's been hard. It's been an extremely tough year. The football fizzled out and I didn't even write a final 'report'. In my personal life I had bad news after bad news.Now I am hoping my quota for bad news this year is full and I can now move on and look forward to better things.

I kept up to date a little with the summer goings-on at QPR, but haven't been immersed in it. Not as much as last year. I've made some big changes in my life that have controlled where I am focused. But I did go to the friendly on my own at the Hive against Dundee. It was a bright summer's evening in London that reminded me of why I love this country so very much. And then I smiled a lot watching a game of football, and that included savouring every moment of Charlie playing...thinking perhaps he would disappear before deservedly moving to a bigger and better club than ours.

Today I have my ticket in-hand for Charlton away and I am looking out of my window to what looks like a beautiful warm day ahead. I am thinking of my football friends who I hope I'll see, and I'm trying to remember that every moment counts and to be in the present. And when I think of that, and think of the great little report on  the LFW site, I realise just how apt such a mantra is in relation to how we support this club.

My brother said the other day something like 'Forget the past it's gone, don't worry about the future, it isn't here yet...live for the present'. Perhaps this post is full of clichés but I suppose there is a reason why they exist. And for QPR, we've got to stop moaning about what has happened before- with existing and old owners, with our overpaid and under-delivering players, with the ground move - or not a ground move, with our issues on the family stand or the freaking PR policy. And while we can worry about the future (which at this very point is really open to the elements), what is it that most of us hardcore fans remember at the very end of the day when it comes to supporting our team? I remember my friends, the days out and experiences up and down the country, the joy of finding a new crazy item for my 'borrowed' dog at the 'Superstore', or singing a ridiculous song when we are playing really badly. Sometimes, if we are lucky, there are pieces of sublime football that can cap a day off superbly.

Our joy in life, and our joy in QPR is simply in our own hands. So I wish everyone a joyful season and a wonderful result today.

Perspective

Manchester City 6 Queens Park Rangers 0

Queens Park Rangers 2 Newcastle 1


Losing 6-0 is painful, but it's not like we haven't seen it before. Making up for it with a slim win over a crap team made things marginally better, but overall it's been a damp squib of an end of a season. So much so that I am planning not to use the three Leicester tickets I bought this Sunday.

QPR events and other things happening in my life have made me more philosophical than usual. I've been having lots of really 'hippy-like' talks with friends in the past couple of months...about fate, the universe and the cosmos. I wonder whether it shows my age that I still think like this sometimes . In some ways it feels like it goes against the grain of the Millennial mindset filled with aggressive ambition. I do believe that sometimes we spend so much time arguing, being negative, making politics out of nothing in supporting our team and in many other walks of life. And my answer right now is simply that maybe it's just time to let go a little.

Why am I saying all of this? It's a short blog post this time around. I've just heard news that a very beloved friend has lost his little girl to a long term illness. I found out via a message from him around 5am this morning, 6000 miles away. In my slightly hungover haze I was once reminded about what is important.

After all, when all said and done, we are left only with our souls, our integrity and the love that we have for each other.

Things to look forward to...

Queens Park Rangers 0 West Ham 0

Liverpool 2 Queens Park Rangers 1

Well it's been a little depressing hasn't it?

And I'm just looking outside at the wind and rain dreaming of warmer spring weather and summer barbecues.

So, while we get used to the thought of life back in the Champ I thought I'd think about all the lovely things we have to look forward to next season .

#1 Saturday games

Honestly, who cares about wall to wall coverage and online streams of all games when one has to contend with games on a Saturday morning or a Sunday evening? (Okay so 12 isn't morning but it sure does feel like it when you have a hangover.) One thing that's great about the Champ is the regular Saturday games at 3pm. This is great because a. you have time to recover from said hangover, and b. you have the next day to recover from the drinking you did the day before whilst dancing at the Springbok disco.

#2 More games

Well, we all know there's one thing harder than staying in the Premier League and that's winning the Championship. It's a tough season with so many games and so many teams. But isn't it just fun to have so many more games- and often two during a week? Call me greedy but I enjoy gobbling them all up.

#3 Yorkshire games

Well, this is of great importance to me personally. My Gran is from Yorkshire and this season has totally SUCKED for her because I've only made one trip to see her when I went to see the Rangers play Hull away. In the Champ she gets to see me 3 or 4 times in a season,  I stay up with her in sunny Doncaster for the weekend and get treated like a champ myself. Fish Bits of Doncaster here I come.

#4 Better beer

I'm a proper beer girl myself (none of that namby pamby lager). And one thing that's great about away games in the lower leagues, especially those 'oop north' is that the beer in many of the grounds is really rather good. AND also very cheap.

#5 No more half n' half scarves

Ahh, these scarves are the bane of any real fan's match experience. We fans of English football love a good moan, so although I'll miss growling about the half n' half scarves, I'll enjoy not seeing them at all next season and look forward to visiting new towns, new grounds and meeting some lovely fans of QPR and of other teams.


And about moaning. It's not good for you. Let's smile a bit more. Studies have shown that smiling lowers heart rate, reduces stress, puts you in a better mood, increases productivity AND encourages trust. Now who wouldn't want that eh?

You RRRss

Soul searching

West Bromwich Albion 1 Queens Park Rangers 4

Aston Villa 3 Queens Park Rangers 3

Queens Park Rangers 0 Chelsea 1

I've been wondering about what separates the great teams from the good teams. And you could argue that today's result showed us the difference. One mistake on a windswept pitch and Chelsea bullied us in to a last minute goal. Up until that point I had spent 87 minutes believing that it's not always class and skill that wins the game, and sometimes, just sometimes it's belief and hard graft. But that's not football is it?  And if it were, perhaps we wouldn't have won that famous day at Wembley last year.

The last couple of weeks since the Everton match have made me feel differently about how we've been playing. I was away on holiday, and almost felt as if my absence was a catalyst for such fantastic results in the Midlands. After a really crazy-busy winter, I really needed to recharge the batteries and do a bit of soul-searching.  It's so easy to feel caged in when you are in a cycle, but time off to think, and the chance to listen to the Rs winning over the internet helped me to clear my thoughts. It was good to be back to my other home and open my eyes again to the wider world.

Like most QPR fans I felt that the results did bode well for today's derby- a match which we all take so seriously and for which 'new Chelsea fans' have not an ounce of understanding. It's all rather amusing how this team from the swamp came from nothing to something when huge swathes of money were pumped in to it by Abramovich. And their fans laugh at how much we consider it a huge rivalry even though it is absolutely the purest definition of a derby being separated by 3 miles. I think there are many millionaires and billionaires that have come in to the football ' business' and thought that throwing money would fashion a great team in the same way that it happened for Chelsea. We've been guilty of it to an extent, and failed massively (as is well documented). Frankly I don't know enough about Chelsea's set up to know what, other than money, has brought them success but I do think that within this world there truly is a higher tier of investment which simply isn't within the reaches of our little old club, or most others for that matter. And the handful of clubs that can afford it, ultimately succeed.

Outside of money, it's easy to think that the path to success in life is strewn with amazing epiphanies, a clear plan of action and positive thinking. When we look at people, companies and teams that do well, we don't always hear about the long hard slog, the zig zagged road that they've taken, the set backs and the angst. And sometimes they don't tell you about the times when they felt like they simply couldn't go on and considered jumping off a building or just giving it all up completely.

Sometimes when you are on that journey too, you see things you never thought you'd see, or you act like this person you never thought you would. If you don't take care of yourself it is easy to turn in on yourself and be blinded by the inevitable negativity. But most of us make it, survive, and redefine for ourselves and in our own way, what success truly means for us. Ultimately, success isn't the same for everyone.

Perhaps that is where QPR is right now? While losing this way is hard to take, it's continues to be part of that process I wrote about last time. I have a great feeling about Chris Ramsay and his attitude. And a great feeling about what Barton often calls the strong 'nucleus' of the team which no longer feels like its been selected via Tombola. I'd like to think that the club is starting to define success for itself on its own terms, but that's just what I'm feeling and hoping- the evidence will ultimately play out over the coming months. To be honest, if I take a step back from the results, the fight for survival, or the potential to go back down, I'm really okay with the team just taking a few deep breaths and doing a little soul-searching if it means I can continue to feel proud of our team the way I am today.