Kicked in the R's

Queens Park Rangers 1:0 Leicester City (Miller)

Leccy Board Championship : 05/03/2011

Loftus Road, London (Ground No: Already achieved)

It's a cruel game this sport. As per the cliche, I suffered both flipsides of it's cruelty in the space of 24 hours. 12.30pm on Sunday afternoon, I walked off a pitch having captained my Sunday morning team to a 8-0 loss. No excuses, we lost to a better side. No point in finger pointing, everyone of us was poor and there was no point in arguing with each other. After a mini-unbeaten run of four games where we claimed a 7-0 win and upset some title chasers with a 4-4 draw, the grit of previous weeks fell apart as we just gave up effectively as the goals rolled past us.

Then there's the other flip side of that cruelty. 86 minutes into Saturday's game taking place at Loftus Road, everyone in the stadium was probably content with a draw. A competitive, entertaining spectacle had been played out where neither side deserved to lose but one team did, Leicester as always with that familiar feeling of pride before result as Ismael Miller slotted past Ricardo into the net with just a minute of normal time remaining. The ground erupted and that horrid feeling developed as an away fan surrounded by three stands exploding into delight, you want a little hole to emerge in the ground swallowing you up.

They'd taken a huge step towards promotion, every other team lost around them. Every team around us won including two old-boys bagging for their current clubs claiming impressive victories. I wanted to be more bitter, someone to blame. I was trying to find some reasoning to be so gutted. No dodgy referring decision, no player to scapegoat ala Yann. QPR took their best chance, we didn't. Simple.

So what's the best remedy to that feeling? Placing the result in context. Driving back from a 6-1 hammering to Portsmouth in October, I began to ask question my support and why do you enjoy following your team. Well I didn't see the whole occasion of Saturday falling as it did and just proving the very reason you do follow your team. A three-game stumble including this result sees us just five points away from 6th, we were bottom with five points from nine games. Neil Warnock marked us as their hardest opposition all season and it appeared all 3,200 in the away end agreed too. We were going to give them a game regardless of our performance against Coventry and so, we did.

Now, English football has it's critics whether it's pointed at the 100mph footballing style or the whole atmosphere created by it's support. If I was to raise a defence to such a critic, this whole day and game would fit perfectly. A sell-out crowd at a tight Loftus Road which is close to the pitch, surrounded by flats three sides of the way around and just a ten minute walk from Shepherd's Bush, a hive of activity which is sadly lacking from the outer city, new build's across the country. Take it in, this is why us English get so protective of it.

This game scored highly in terms of a competitive bout; it's often remarked how brilliant a nine-goal thriller. Exciting, it maybe but where's the appreciation of organisation and defensive work as showcased throughout by Shittu, Mee & Bruma in this encounter? It's the defender in me talking that I prefer a good quality ding-dong regardless of scoreline. Both teams were organised, calculated on the ball and played with suitable aggression without ever boiling over. Proper football, not ping-pong. I was cheering like we'd scored a goal when Ben Mee went thundering into Adel Taarabt, man and ball...into the stands. You don't see them often nowadays, it was met by a large roar across the Leicester end. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZywHy3XQ1Hk KABOOM! Watch quick before Football League get their hands on it.

The man Taarabt fits the villain of a Championship game perfectly, he loves a flick or a trick, he's gifted, he's scored goals these past two seasons which completely leave you astounded but typically there's a sulky edge. Picked out now game after game for special treatment...it supposedly opens up the game for QPR to exploit, well I didn't really see that on Saturday as City perfectly dealt with him and his partner in crime, Routledge (until the 89th minute). Taarabt's performance was summed in a sign of a dissent kicking the ball into the crowd after being caught off side. He's supported to the tilt by the QPR fans, his cock-up's are even applauded but surely it's frustrating.

There's a similar defence from QPR fans of Paddy Kenny, whose an equally superb performer on his day making fine saves from Yakubu's clever volleyed lob and Andy King's header towards the end. Ever since an incident with a diet pill and his missus running off with a friend of his, he's been a target for abuse (god knows why) but this season, he's on his own personal mission to prove everyone whose written him off that they are wrong. It's easy to criticise his explosive delight during the goal and final whistle, he looked straight at the away end and gave it both barrels. You'd like to think he'd be educated enough to recognise that he's proven nothing yet thawing Leicester City, that's next season when Arsenal attempt 675 shots on his goal at Emirates.

Ricardo, another topic of constant debate from us Leicester folk, was in equally good nick saving well from Helguson's low drive in the first half and bar the odd misunderstanding had his best Leicester game to date. Similar line followed in the performance of Mee and Bruma. Mee looked comfortable at left-back, nullifying the QPR wingers and Bruma with his Kisnorbo-esque mannerisms grew as the game wore on.

The best two Leicester chances fell to crowd favourite, Waghorn who came on in the second half for a poor and to me, clearly unfit Vassell. He twice bullied Connolly into mistakes off long balls and twice gave the Leicester fans something to worry about with wayward efforts placed towards Row C, Upper tier of the School End. All this was building up though, City had the flow of the game as time ticked down the ball was towards the QPR goal. A goalmouth scramble later when a nice bounce would have seen Waghorn with a tap-in, Routledge produced a through ball of pure quality beating Naughton to the ball initially and splitting the two Leicester centre-backs. Miller did the rest despite Bambi's best efforts.

So the Loft lost it's roof, QPR's lead was expanded to seven points and a difficult obstacle passed whilst we are picking up the pieces of a play-off bid. We shuffled off back to the Bush, trying to ignore those top of the league chants. It wasn't until about a hour after the final whistle, when I visited a bar off Goldhawk Road with a couple of old schoolmates and overheard a QPR fan at the bar commented on the battle they'd just had, that I began placing it in context and started chinwagging away rather than adopting a gutted silence. Forgot it I thought, don't let five minutes spoil a good day...normally with Leicester, it's the entire ninety minutes which do that.