What a game; that's more like it. Today, Hull beat a lacklustre QPR under the lights of the MKM Stadium and in another critical game. If we lost this, our playoff hopes would have been over, but, thankfully, we didn't mess-up and we have now jumped up to 7th place, 6 points behind Norwich, with a game in hand. Coventry and Preston both lost, so if we can keep pushing, we're the likely candidates for the sixth spot; however, we need to rely on the Canaries to slip up somewhere.
Before the match, the Watsons met up with General Secretary of the Free Speech Union and Editor-in-Chief of the Daily Sceptic Toby Young and his son, Charlie, for lunch. Except for getting on the wrong bus, having to switch and getting off the wrong stop (you would have thought we were the ones from London!), the meal was lovely and everything went to plan. It was also great to catch up with Toby and Charlie. The only problem is if we do go up this season our meetings would have to come to an end.
Back to football: Rosenior made no changes to our outing against Boro on Wednesday, save for Matty Jacob replacing an injured Lewie Coyle. That meant we lined up in a 4-4-2 as follows: Ryan Allsop between the sticks; Matty Jacobs, Alfie Jones; Jacob Greaves and Regan Slater holding the line; Tyler Morton and Jean Seri in the middle, with Philogene and Omur on either side of the flanks and that leaves Carvalho and Tufan up-front.
The visitors came out feisty, pressing high and earning their first shot on target within the first minute, which was saved by Allsop and out for a corner, which nothing came from. Then, they earned a corner in the 5th minute, which was put wide of the left-hand post. This was expected, to be honest, given that Blackburn won, which put QPR 19th and closer to the line.
Then, we settled into the game nicely and took control; it did not take long for us to draw first blood as in the 8th minute, Tufan scored, probably, the goal of the season for me. He received the ball on the left flank, cut in and from outside the corner of the box, he let rip, which flew over Begovic, their keeper, dipped onto the bar and made the net bulge (you can watch the goal on X here). The keeper could do nothing about it, but this was a huge confidence booster for the Tigers.
We continued to press after this, putting the ball into the box more and getting into some great positions. Tyler Morton had a great chance in the 22nd minute after a great ball was put into the box, but he headed it over. Not to worry, though: we doubled our advantage in the 26th minute. Tufan received the ball in the middle of the park, turned and neatly threaded a ball, which released Carvalho, who was one-on-one with the keeper, and he calmly chipped it over him, which ended up in the back of the net. Brilliant, it’s been a long time since we have been two to the good at half-time.
The rest of the half was just us keeping the ball and pinging it around amazingly, without getting dispossessed and making petty mistakes. We were able to hold out the remaining minutes, allowing the Rs just two shots, one of which was on target.
The second half was less entertaining than the first, but we still played some exquisite football and could have scored a lot more. It started positively, though, as we increased our advantage in the 52nd minute; we were awarded a free kick, which was put in by Morton and headed out by one of their players, but only to Philogene, who on the half-volley, whalloped it into the net. Three goals in three games for him, let’s hope he continues this great form.
The visitors came out of their shell more after our third goal, mainly due to us making a couple of substitutions, which slowed the game down and disrupted our flow. Their best opportunity came around the 60th minute mark, when Chair waltzed past two defenders and drove into the box, but instead of shooting first time, he took it around the keeper and whilst he was doing that Matty Jacob tracked back and was able to clear the ball off the line.
Our best last chance of the game came shortly after this, when Carvalho spotted Philogene making a run into the box, and the former lays it on for the Aston Villa loanee, but his shot was saved well by Begovic. Then, we used up the remainder of our substitutes, one of which was Liam Delap, who had been a huge miss, and he nearly made an instant impact, but his attempted chip over the keeper was cleared off the line. Afterwards, the game died out and we were able to secure the three points.
A great day for us, but probably not the best away game for QPR fans, including Toby and Charlie, especially after giving away their lead quite late on away at Plymouth in midweek. I do think they will do enough to stay up, though. For us, the playoff charge is back on and if we can play like we did today, we shouldn’t have any problems with picking up points. Let’s hope Bristol, Swansea and Birmingham can do us a favour by beating Norwich.
You can watch the highlights on Sky Sports here, or, even better, read a match report by Toby Young on his substack here.