QPR Match Ratings

[Citizen Journalist Foghorn 0]

Gallacher - 9   two absolutely superb saves

Spillane - 6 average

Doherty - 6 average

Shackell - 6 average

Drury - 6 average

Hughes - 3 awful

Robinson - 5 poor

Etuhu - 6 improving

Huckerby - 7 looked threatening - did he win a header

Erny - 8 2 good goals with zero service

Jarvis - 6 tried hard but needs more games

Subs

McVeigh - 7 He CAN pass the ball!!!!

JJ2 - 7 he needs to be played so we can sign him

Hendo not on long enough to merk (I didnt know he had been brought on)

Worthy - please leave......

[Huddy 0]

Gallagher      8         Mades some great saves, but maybe could have done more with the 1st goal.

Spillane         7         Looked good, confortable on the ball and looked solid defensively.

Doherty         6         Average, poor distribution and looked unconfortable at times.

Shackall         6         Same as Doherty.

Drury            6         Dis ok, but not his usual self

Hughes         4/5      Ok 1st half, but his right back performance was awful. Kept giving it away etc.

Robinson      5         Got involved more than usual, but gave it away far too much

Etuhu            6         Poor 1st half, but did well late on and helped the comeback.Stillmore to come.

Huicks         8         MOTM, POTS,   When given the ball was great, scared too use him in the 1st half. A headed goal (sort of) and caused havoc late on.

Ryan J         6         Quite, But no service

Earnshaw      7      2 goals for his confidence, but as usual no service for 75 minutes.

Subs

Mcveigh      8         Badly missed in the 1st half. Looked good on the ball and got crosses in

Johansen     8      One of the main forces behin the comeback. Showed passion, commitment and should perhaps be tried with earny up front.

Hendo      7      Neat and tidy. Did his job quietly unlike his fellow super subs.

[DONT REMEMBER YOUR TENURE AS ENGLAND MANAGER 0]

Gallacher 9 Man of the match

Drury 6 Did enough

Spillane 8, Great potential

Hughes 3, think the crowd is affecting him

Docherty 6

Shackell 6

Robinson 5

Etuhu 6 there is potential and a player there somewhere

Huckerby 8

Earnshaw 8

Jarvis 6

subs

JJ 6

Hendo 7

Mcveigh 7

[ncfc4eva 0]

Gallacher 9. Superb saves.possibly saved worthys job also?

Spillane 7. Very composed performance, always looking to pass the ball. Great potential. His withdrawal was due to injury.

Doherty 5. Usual challenges etc but distribution was incredibly poor. Unlike Spillane, always looked for long ball. Frustrating!

Shackell 6. Didnt notice him much but again long balls instead of looking for pass.

Drury 6. Guilty of few long balls up to earnie which would never make him, better than that.

Hughes 4. Poor geezer got rollocked. Extremely poor, simply not good enough, 2nd goal his fault. BUT does not deserve the booing and chanting against him he recieved.

Etuhu 5. At times showed good potential, but mostly didnt....whats wrong with this guy?

Robinson 5. I watched this guy closely today...got critised alot for what i thought, wasnt a bad game for him. Together both him and Etuhu offered very little.

Huckerby 6. Quiet first half...second half came alive for about half an hour.

Jarvis 5. Guy worked hard but didnt create or influence the game at all

Earnshaw 8. Worked very hard today, even came into midfield to win the ball himself and try to create, scored 2 from no service, this guy could be a legend here if only worthy could see!

Worthy....Just go...

[andy laz 0]

gallacher 8 two great saves when 2-1

spillane 6 looked to help out  our inefective midfield

doc 6 normal self

shack 6 same as above

drury 6 tried to help inefective midfield  with forward play

hughes 3 dont know why he is in the team let  alone at the club

etuhu 5.5 want him to do well but he is not quite there yet

robinson  4.5 treats the ball like a hot potato and has no pace so cant go past opposing players

huckerby 7 never stopped  trying, without him we would be f*cked

jarvis 5 not really his fault as the service was awful

earnshaw 6 caught offside too many times took his goals well

subs

mc veigh 7 in the 45 mins he was on the pitch he look head and shoulders above any other norwich midfielders

johansson 6 should have started this game looks far better down middle as to on right side midfield

henderson ? didnt realise he was on pitch

[Silver Canary 0]

Hux did a couple of headers in the last match to. Mostly average accept Hux of coarse (specially in the 2nd half), Ernie for the goals; keeper looked good (so no doubt hel''l go int he summer!). Have to admit that Etuhu looked good at times - what would he be like with a decent manager?

[bethan sommerfield 0]

of corse the crowd is affecting him!! how would u feel if you got put in a position where u dont normally play and then have thousands of people shouting stick at you. he must have lost his confidence!! wouldnt you?

he did well considering some of the thoughtless people there is at carrow road he kept battling

[Dionysus 0]

Gallacher 8 - two very good saves but flapped a bit at corners and crosses into the box.

Spillaine 7 - looked comfortable on the ball, made one or two nice passes

Doherty 6 - steady

Shackell 6 - as Doc

Drury 7 - his consistent self, made a few decent attacking runs

Hughes 3 - awful on the right wing, even worse at right-back

Etuhu 5 - didn''t look interested for much of the game, gave to ball away easily at times

Robinson 4 - useless, no wonder Sunderland wanted rid of him

Huckerby 7 - didn''t get the ball much in the first half but always looked dangerous when he had it

Earnshaw 8 - worked hard and showed patches of class, two goals as well

Jarvis 6 - tried hard but I''m not convinced he has what it takes, still young though

[AP16 0]

Gallacher - 9   For a goalie that rarely plays, two world class saves did him no harm what so ever.

Doherty - 6 Please stop hoofing it

Shackell - 6 As Above

Drury - 6 average

Hughes - 3 It annoys me to think this goon has made a living from professional football

Robinson - 4 We play in Yellow robbo

Etuhu - 4 No positional sense what so ever and lazy. What a waste of 500k

Huckerby - 7 Looked dangerous every now and again.....

Erny - 7 3million quid and we persist in hoofing them to his head....

Jarvis - 6 Good effort but yet again no service.

Subs

McVeigh - 7 Played well when called upon

JJ2 - 7 Played ok, but IMO we need better than this if we''re to challenge next year

 

Worthy out....

[ZLF 271]

I cant believe 12 good minutes against a shockingly poor QPR team can turn a baying crowd into one that gives such generous scores!  Woeful passing, limited movement, players not wanting the ball, too few efforts on goal with only gallacher earning his money and keeping us in the game  neither us nor QPR deserved aything from.

Gallacher 9  Kept us in a game that should have been well beyond us - 4 memorable saves, although the fumble for the ''non goal'' (so far over the line it nearly touched the back of the net! - thanks blind lino) was poor.  Clearly reads these pages as constantly looked to roll the ball out.

Spillane 5.  Excellent on the ball and looked to go forward.  Bu defensively looked like what he was - a central player out of position.   Would love to see him in central midfield if he fit again.

Doc    5 No rotection from midfield, not out ball from midfield leading too many hoofs. 

Shacks 5 See above

Drury 5.  Was todays end recipient of teh shuffle theball along the back line because Idont want to be the one to hoof it game, looked to pass the ball but simply no one on.

Hughes 4 - Appalling but still does not merit the abuse he got.  Cant beleive the manager left him on so long to suffer that.  So many passes going straight out of play.  Did get two assists - one for each side - with his cross for the second (?) one of teh best of the game, but far too little far too late.

Robbo 5 - a cultured man who should be making himself available for the ball but went missing to often. 

Etuhu 5 - frustrating.  At times in the second half there were glmpses of strong challenges, surging runs forward, link up play etc of the player he could be, but for the other 85 minutes he was anonymous and lightweight. 

Huckerby 6.  We did not get the ball to him enough but looked danagerous when we did - in those fabulously unbeleivable last 12 minutes.

Earnshaw 5 weak in possession, offside law foreign to him despite his pace, yet has the knack of getting the ball in the net.  We have to get more movement and a better from him but also give him better service.

Jarvis 5. Worked hard on scraps as another striker who preferes the ball to feet yet only got it in the air.

WLY - 5 No real impact on the game beyond a few good touches on the right  -  look far better once moved to the centre of the park.

Hendo  5.  Yet another game for the poor boy, a striker, on the flank.  What did he do to upset the manager?

JJ2.  7 Oozes class and if we need to sign a striker for next season he would be excellent - but again only if we change our style of football and use his skills - sticking him on the right is not an option and the big ball to him is not best either; we may as well sign mamady sidibe with our current ''style''.

 

[Citizen Journalist Foghorn 0]

* * * The Foxtrot Report * * * by Ottoson Foxtrot

NORWICH CITY 3 QUEENS PARK RANGERS 2

It seems that a small minority of people have come to keenly anticipate The Foxtrot Report, almost expecting it to provide a humorous take on a Norwich City performance, whatever the result.

Well, let me open by saying that there is absolutely nothing funny – at all – about the way Norwich City won this match. There is nothing amusing about a team playing excruciatingly poor football for 80 minutes of a game, by which point they should be five or six goals down rather than two, only to somehow score three scrappy goals and end up winning right at the death.

This becomes even more tragically heart-rendering when one considers that the QPR fans had spent the whole game mocking both our support and our star striker Robert Earnshaw, who was already disheartened by the scathing reviews of the film he recently made with Ant and Dec. I didn’t laugh once as I watched the furious QPR fans file out of the Jarrold Stand (where I was sat) the second that Norwich City scored their well-deserved third goal, and you should not have either. If you laughed yesterday, or are deriving any amusement from these paragraphs, please go and take a long, cold shower. Now.

I was unable to hear the Norwich fans, for the most part, over the incessant noise of the QPR fans, who – bless them – kept singing right until the 85th minute. So I missed the booing of Andy Hughes’ every move and the group of Norwich fans who apparently cheered QPR’s second goal. For my money, I didn’t cheer – I simply watched and admired, wondering how I’d feel if Norwich were to score a “goal” of their own. Luckily, I got to celebrate three in what was subsequently to become the greatest afternoon of my life.

The first half was a tense, engaging affair – a brilliant, taut tactical battle between two talented, experienced minds. The first forty-five minutes rarely promised a break to the deadlock, but then one side made a move that blew the game wide open.

“B5”, I said. “Curses!” replied my father. “You sunk my battleship!” I had packed the Travel Battleships in anticipation of the football being an embarrassing, scrappy, artless, witless, eyeball-gougingly poor contest between two thoroughly pedestrian teams, and I was right.

Occasionally, though, I bothered to watch it, seeing as I’d paid twenty-three pounds to watch it (which at least provided better value than the THIRTY POUNDS I spent at Selhurst Park). Nothing of any worth happened at all. Carl “Gary Neville’s mouth, Philip Neville’s feet” Robinson managed to misplace a 5-yard pass to Andy Hughes, and then had a little argument over it, probably over which one of them least resembled a Championship midfielder.

Despite the presence of much-loved courtroom jester Georges Santos in the QPR defence, Norwich created the square root of nothing in the opening half. Robert Earnshaw scuttled around up front, doing nothing but wave his arms around every time he got caught offside, which was once every three minutes. One of Norwich’s pre-planned set-pieces came off perfectly, though: Dickson Etuhu rolled a dead ball to the feet of Darren Huckerby, who blasted it into Row Z, the players congratulating themselves on replicating a well-rehearsed set-piece routine in a “real match” situation.

QPR were the better side without creating a clear-cut chance. Stylishly-haired winger Gareth Ainsworth presented the biggest threat, and it was no real surprise when he capped QPR’s best move of the game with a well-taken goal right on half-time. Nobody in the Jarrold Stand seemed to care at all – perhaps they, like I, could tell from the first-half performance that we were definitely going to win this game.

However, what the club needed was a brilliant, rousing, inspiring half-time team talk, much like the speech delivered by Kirk Douglas to the court in Paths of Glory.

The Norwich dressing room, half-time:

GARY DOHERTY: (Grabbing Nigel Worthington’s head and banging it against the wall) How many times do I have to tell you, eh? How many feckin’ times? Playing 4-3-3 doesn’t feckin’ work!
NIGEL WORTHINGTON: That hurts, notmean!
DOHERTY: (Banging NW’s head) And Hughes, Robinson and Etuhu isn’t a feckin’ midfield, for feck’s sake! It’s so feckin’ obvious! How many feckin’ times?
STEVE FOLEY: Nigel, he’s banging your head on the wall there.
ANDY HUGHES: The nasty men keep making nasty noises at me!
DOHERTY: Why don’t you play feckin’ McVeigh? (Bangs NW’s head) Put him in the feckin’ team, he saved your feckin’ job, you big feckin’ eejit!
WORTHINGTON: (Crying) I’ll pick him, I’ll put him on, notmean.
MICKEY SPILLANE: (In tears) I want to go home!
DOHERTY: Oh for feck’s sake, go and write your feckin’ crime novels! (Bangs NW’s head again)
WORTHINGTON: OK, OK, I’ll put Andy Hughes at right-back, notmean! I’ll bring on McVeigh, I’ll do it, just stop banging my head on the wall, notmean!

Doherty lets go of NW’s head.

HUCKERBY: This is rubbish.
EARNSHAW: (Waving his hands around a lot) Yes, our collective performance in the opening half was most disappointing. I insist that we reconsider our methodology post haste.
ROBINSON: What’s the problem? We’re definitely going up next season, I promise. With me in the side we really can’t fail.
HUGHES: (Crying) Why don’t they like me? I clap them all the time!
SHACKELL: There, there, Andy.
THORNE: I’m ninety-two years old!
RYAN JARVIS: Are you still here? Go home!
THORNE: I want to but I’ve forgotten where I live.
DOHERTY: Right, for feck’s sake, get back out there and start playing feckin’ football, or I’ll trow you to me feckin’ dags.
DRURY: Hey Gary, that’s a good motivational speech. Where did you pick it up?
DOHERTY: Thanks Adam. Roy Keane taught me how to do it. Now let’s feckin’ do it! (Turns to NW) And I don’t want any more of your s**te, alright?
FOLEY: He’s having a go at you there, boss.
WORTHINGTON: Just go and win the game.
LIVERMORE: Great tactics, boss!
McVEIGH: (Under his breath) Big feckin’ eejit.

So the second half started very differently, with Norwich abandoning their hopeless 4-3-3 for a 4-4-2 that incorporated their most skilful attacking player and better suited Ryan Jarvis, Huckerby and Earnshaw. Andy Hughes made a Sutch-like switch to right-back, with Etuhu and Robinson pretending to be central midfielders by themselves, and McVeigh playing in his favoured right-wing position, being the natural right-winger that he so undoubtedly is, and always has been.

That didn’t stop QPR’s Lee Cook walking through our defence with the ball and making it 2-0, a goal that was greeted with cheers by both QPR and Norwich fans. I laughed helplessly rather than cheered, at much at the QPR who celebrated as if the match wasn’t entirely meaningless as at the haplessness of the Norwich “defence”.

Thereafter, Paul Gallacher made a series of brilliant saves to keep the score at 2-0, and in truth QPR probably should have been 3-0 up after Norwich cleared a shot that probably did cross the line. As the strains of “You’re even worse than us” rang out from the away end, some miraculous things happened. Dickson Etuhu started to look like he cared about playing football, and had a bit of a barney with some QPR players. The Norwich players started to “pass” the ball, sometimes even to Paul McVeigh, and even “tackle” the opposition.

After 78 minutes Norwich put together their first really threatening attack. A seemingly innocuous cross by Hughes was hashed by QPR ‘keeper Paul Jones, and Darren Huckerby scored a header (or some sort of header/shoulder combo) to make it 1-2, the crucially important goal sending Carrow Road into rapture and proving beyond all reasonable doubt that Nigel Worthington is a truly brilliant manager, and not a desperate man devoid of ideas and floundering around in a pathetic attempt to keep his job like you all thought.

Immediately after helping Norwich pull a goal back, Hughes was taken out of his doubtless misery, which was met by applause from much of the Norwich crowd. I’d be lying if I said I was sorry to see him go off, but I, and most people around me, didn’t go so far as to celebrate his departure.

That said, without Hughes and with Jonatan Johansson, Norwich looked a far more dangerous proposition. Henderson replaced Ryan Jarvis, leaving Norwich with five centre-forwards on the pitch. (Who says Nigel is negative? Eh?) JJ2’s cross was met by Earnshaw after McVeigh did it, and then Earnshaw did his little double-somersault-and-show-the-crowd-his-massive-teeth celebration, which makes him look nearly as cool as Robbie Keane. The QPR fans, furious that the Alien had scored against them, promptly shut up, meaning that I could finally hear how the Norwich fans were turning Carrow Road into a Galatasaray-style cauldron of hatred for their own team.

Five minutes later Earnshaw scored again, and Carrow Road, like an over-enthusiastic referee being broadcast on Radio Norfolk, blew up. The QPR fans left immediately as I laughed like a simpleton, celebrating what was undoubtedly the greatest, more deserved comeback in all of football history, engineered by our beloved tactical genius at the helm.

MATCH RATINGS (First half ratings in brackets):

PAUL GALLACHER: 8 (6).
Made some very impressive saves in the second half and looks like a decent prospect. The likely departure of Robert Green after the World Cup worries me far less having seen flashes of Gallacher’s ability.

MICHAEL SPILLANE: 6 (-).
A reasonable performance, out of position. Substituted with an injury at half-time.

ADAM DRURY: 5 (4).
Nothing of any note can be said about Drury’s performance.

GARY DOHERTY: 6 (4).
Involved in the build-up to the winning goal, and more assured in the second half.

JASON SHACKELL: 5 (4).
Failed to get a tackle in for Lee Cook’s goal, and didn’t look too comfortable throughout.

DICKSON ETUHU: 9 (for the last ten minutes), 5 (for the rest of the game).
Lazy and disinterested for much of the match, once Dickson spotted the opportunity of getting into a fight (or at least some embarrassing pushing and shoving) he was a changed player, tackling well, playing some good passes and driving forward. More please.

CARL ROBINSON: Shit (f**king s**t).
Chasm-gobbed mediocrity Carl Robinson has taken it upon himself to be a club spokesman in recent weeks, much to the annoyance of anyone who is still trying to establish exactly what it is he’s supposed to do on a football pitch. Ineffectual, flimsy and bad-tempered, Robinson’s performance summed up everything that been wrong with our midfield this season. Dismal.

ANDY HUGHES: 3 (3).
I was tempted to be harsher on Hughes, who I cannot warm to, but the over-reaction of the crowd to his (admittedly obvious) ineptitude seems a touch unfair, especially when, whatever Hughes’ limitations, he cannot be accused of not trying. That said, when a player is so technically limited he really has very little choice but to work hard.

Hughes was involved with the first goal, but misplaced numerous simple passes, displayed very little positional sense and barely (if at all) won a tackle. Sadly, Hughes’ extortionate price tag (ten times as much as Robinson!) and continual indulgence by the manager means that he has come to epitomise everything that has gone wrong with Nigel Worthington’s tenure, and so has become an obvious target for disgruntled members of the crowd. A shame, but that’s football, I suppose.

DARREN HUCKERBY: 7 (5).
Barely featured in the first-half, but was central to our deeply satisfying comeback. And he scored with a header! Brilliant.

ROBERT EARNSHAW: 7 (4).
Spent the whole first half waving his arms about. Scored two simple goals at the end. Did his little flip thing. Lovely.

RYAN JARVIS: 5 (4).
The 4-3-3 didn’t suit him at all, and he struggled to get into the game in the second half. Substituted.

SUBS

PAUL McVEIGH: 6.
We looked more of an attacking threat with the Little Man in the side. Caused the QPR defence real problems.

JONATAN JOHANSSON: 7.
A genuine attacking threat, and involved in Norwich’s better moves of the last ten minutes.

IAN HENDERSON: 6.
Like Jarvis, he struggled to make an impact on the game, but his arrival co-incided with a significant upturn in our performance.

NIGEL WORTHINGTON: 10 x 10³ (0).
Worthington’s substitutions were unquestionably brilliant. He had obviously planned to lull QPR into a false sense of security by instructing his team to go 2-0 down and play like a group of people who had only met each other at a Police identity parade, before bringing on his most creative attacking players from the bench and winning this unspeakably important contest. Worthington is still quite obviously doing an absolutely amazing job and should be given a contract for life. In fact, his children should inherit his job when he dies – he’s simply that good.

Posted By: Ottosson Foxtrot on April 18th 2006 at 11:22:44

[AJ 1,218]

Gallacher - 9   Won the game for us, two world class saves!

Spillane - 8 - Looked good, and going into half time was my MOTM, dunno why he was taken off, injured or not, he would still have been better than hughes

Doherty - 7 - Did ok, nothing special

Shackell - 7 - as above

Drury - 7 - must be one of the first times he has been beaten down the left when QPR scored their first!

Hughes - ''Unable to rate''

Robinson - 6 - not a bad game, looked bit lost now and again

Etuhu - 8 - changed the game in the second half, close to winning motm

Huckerby - 7 - wasnt usedin first half, but when he got the ball in 2nd was dangerous, scored with his shoulder!

Erny - 8 - two well taken goals, thats about it

Jarvis - 8 - linked up well with spillane and looked good and sharp, made a good goaline clearence, did well as a target man, despite not being a target man! needs to be played more!

Subs

McVeigh - 7 - caused problems but you could tell he wasnt fully fit, nice step over to set up earny

Johanssen - 7 - set up earny, played well and made a difference, play him nigel you numpty!

Henderson - N/A