Lofty Heights... 'Ohhh Bobby Zamooooora!!!'

A look at Queens Park Rangers F.C. through the eyes of the fans - follow us on twitter @loftyheights70, @LoftyQPR and @qprleeroy








Sunday, November 14, 2010

The streak continues for both teams.


It was streak versus streak as Rangers' took their unbeaten start to the season to Nottingham Forest as the hosts were putting their 27 home match unbeaten streak on the line in this Championship fixture.

It was my turn to drive as Sam and Lofty were the other two Lofty Heights travellers to Robin Hood Country. The journey up the M1 was smooth and posed no real problems as we rolled into Nottingham at 1 and made our way to the Bridgeford Fish and Chip for a really highly rated lunch, definitely a place to visit next time the R's travel to Forest.
We made our way to the stadium and arrived unusually early for us and we met up with Michael before heading in and bumping into Tony Binks and family for a pre-match pint as we debated who would come in for the suspended Matt Connolly. We made our way to our seats having heard that Aston Villa had blown a 2-0 lead against Man United and drew 2-2, that meant that the R's needed at least a draw to remain with United as the only unbeaten teams in England.

Neil Warnock only made the one forced change due to Matt Connolly's suspension with Hogan Ephraim coming in to take the place.
This meant there was a reshuffle as Jamie Mackie moved to right back, Kyle Walker to left back and Clint Hill moved to centre back. Hogan played on the left side of midfield and Tommy Smith went out to the right hand side.

Photobucket

The first half was one of few thrills as Rangers' looked a tad reluctant to push too far up field and risk being caught by Forest on the counter, especially with the in-form Lewis McGugan as one of the home sides main threats.
Taarabt had the best of Rangers' chances as he put a free kick just wide and then forced Camp into a fantastic save after he curled one from around 30 yards out.

The game was anyone's to win if they wanted to put a little more at risk after the half time interval and we were hoping that after a Warnock half time team talk that this maybe work in our favour.

Photobucket

The second half showed much of the same as Rangers' were content to give Forest time and space but hold firm and be difficult to break down before trying to break away on the counter.
Again it was a half of few chances and it was that man Taarabt that had Rangers' best chance. Rangers' broke away and the ball made its way to Taarabt on the edge of the 18 yard box, he tried a delicate lob that seemed impossible to execute but as it looked as if the ball would loop into Lee Camp's goal the former R's keeper managed to tip the ball over the bar.
Forest had a bit more life in them in the final 15 minutes and created their own chances but McGugan found Paddy Kenny more than level to his long range effort.

Photobucket

With the game ending 0-0 I feel that both sets of supporters would've probably walked into the game thinking that a draw would've been a good result but having seen the 90 minutes it was disappointing to not see either of the teams try and commit a little more in an effort to snatch all three points. Rangers' definitely had an extra gear in them but maybe due to the reshuffle forced upon them then maybe we just wanted to be as solid as possible and just try and gain a clean sheet whilst trying to nick a sneaky goal on the break away.

Today's Man of the Match saw us have two contenders. Lofty selected Kaspers Gorkss after a fine performance at the heart of the R's back line but Sam and myself both voted for Shaun Derry after yet another battling performance at the heart of the midfield. Unfortunately the stalwart picked up his 5th yellow card of the season which means he will miss next weeks home game against Preston but will be back in time for the following weeks crunch game versus Cardiff, was this done on purpose with an eye on Cardiff? A wise man would say yes.


Nottingham Forest: Camp, Bertrand, Chambers, Morgan, Anderson, Cohen, McGugan (Tyson 79), Gunter, McKenna, Blackstock (Adebola 61), Majewski (Earnshaw 61).

Subs: Smith, McCleary, Moussi, Lynch.

Bookings: Blackstock (28), McKenna (85)

QPR: Kenny, Hill, Derry, Taarabt (Rowlands 89), Faurlin, Mackie, Gorkss, Walker, Hulse (Agyemang 68), Smith, Ephraim (Clarke 79).

Subs: Cerny, Hall, Borrowdale, Andrade.

Bookings: Hulse (65), Derry (90)

Referee: Mr A P D'Urso

Attendance: 22, 859 (2,076 QPR)

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home