As we come out of a period of seven games in 28 days LoftforWords will be playing catch up with features over the next seven days starting with a look back at our trip to Barnsley.

1 - The Match

Reasonably decent Championship fair but sadly one sided from a QPR point of view. Barnsley actually looked very decent with Bogdanovic cutting in from one flank to join Mifsud in attack to great affect. Colace and Teymourian provided quality in the middle of the par that Rangers simply could not match and that was enough really. Rangers started reasonably well but conceded a soft headed goal to Bogdanovic on the half hour. After that point Barnsley were the better team but Rangers did force an equaliser when Damien Delaney started and finished a flowing move down the left flank just before half time. How irritating that having got an undeserved equaliser QPR then immediately blew it with another defensive shambles that allowed De Silva, another impressive Barnsley player, to score. After the break QPR did what they have done so often this season and failed to register a serious shot on the goal. Time constraints created by seven games in 28 days means this review is late and of course since this match Barnsley have been fairly terrible and are now in serious relegation trouble. How strange football is, they looked far superior to QPR in this match.

6/10



2 – QPR Performance

Poor. QPR were excellent at Cardiff on the Tuesday night but Sousa copped grief from his own fans for showing a lack of ambition by remaining in a 4-5-1 formation when it was perceived that the Welsh side was there for the taking. This game showed just how foolhardy that criticism was. Sousa switched to a 4-4-2 formation and QPR were a shadow of the team that should have won at Ninian Park and should really have lost this game by more. The addition of Dexter Blackstock to the attack brought nothing but two further good chances missed in the first half and a wide open midfield shorn of its extra protective man. After a
reasonable start the Delaney goal was against the run of play and the second half could easily have been spent at nearby Meadowhall or, preferably, back in the rough pub we were in before the match.

4/10



3 – QPR Support

Having spent my entire life sitting with QPR supporters, travelling the country with QPR supporters, sharing hopes and dreams with QPR supporters and writing for QPR supporters far be it from me to criticise QPR supporters but I have to say singing about how great it was that “Paulo Sousa plays 4-4-2” for the brief period our woefully inadequate team managed to hang onto Barnsley’s coat tails was, kindly put, ill advised. Still it wasn’t the supporters’ fault that Sousa picked that team or that the players played like that and therefore everybody deserves credit for making the long trip north and singing their hearts out when the season looks increasingly like petering out.

5/10



4 – Atmosphere

I don’t now if it is the way the ground is laid out, the distance of the away fans from any home fans or the small numbers we always bring up here but the atmosphere when we come to Oakwell is always abysmal. The QPR fans did their best to make some noise and I think there were some singers in the stand at the far end of the ground in the home end but largely it was a match played out in near total silence. Not as bad as the midweek game in high winds last season, that was like watching a reserve match, but not great all the same.

3/10



5 – The Ground

Oakwell is a ground that has sort of grown up before our eyes since our relegation from the Premiership back in the mid-90s. On our first visit here after relegation we were in the wooden side stand behind the dug outs. That remains in place and unchanged although more than half of it now seems to be closed and unused except for the big games. The stand on the opposite side and behind the far goal were new when we first came here and still look reasonably impressive. The stand the away fans are now kept in is always massively too big for the following we bring here but after starting as an open terrace and then an open bank of seats that I distinctly remember freezing my arse off on a few years back it’s a relief to now have a decent view of the pitch and a roof. The bookies was actually a wooden shed from Homebase that closed at half time with a sign on the window offering a mobile number for you to call and claim winnings which I felt was a quaint typically northern aspect to the experience. Facilities decent, ticket prices reasonable. Not bad all in all.

7/10



6 – The Journey

One of the shortest of the season for us, a quick train up from Sheffield for us and then the same back again after the match. No delays, no extortionate ticket prices and no problems.

8/10



7 – Pre Match

The advantage of a local game means the Northern R’s can frequent their usual haunts beforehand. We went to Cream in Broomhill on the west side of Sheffield in the morning for one of the finest cooked breakfasts you’re ever likely to get anywhere. It’s a bit out of the way for our visits to Wednesday and United but if you do ever find yourself in the area, essentially the first major district as you come off the Snake Pass, then give it a go. Then it was down into town for beers and the lunchtime match at The Old Monk. The food in the Monk is dreadful, the beer is overpriced and it’s one of those places that looks like it is skimping on its cleaning budget. I’m not sure why we use it to be honest but it does have the football on a giant screen – Everton won, West Brom should have done, story of their season I suppose – and it is close to the station without being prone to the sporadic outbreaks of violence that you sometimes get in The Howard on a matchday.



The plan was to jump on the train at about 2pm and then go straight to the ground in Barnsley but we arrived at the station for an earlier train which left us with an hour in Barnsley to kill. I would happily have gone to the ground and watched the players warm up but Young North had other ideas and demanded we found a pub near the station. The first one we saw was the home fans only (northern accents, no replica shirts, no problem) Grogger’s Rest. This was a proper spit and sawdust pub with plenty of Barnsley’s finest in Stone Island gear. I do love a pub with the Racing Channel on the big screen. Even in plain clothes and keeping ourselves to ourselves in the corner I felt a little too conspicuous for my liking to we drank our cheap as chips bottled beer and beat a hasty retreat. Pretty damn rough it has to be said.

6/10



8 – Police and Stewards

Not many of the former and the latter as always allowed the QPR fans to stand at the back which I always think fosters a good atmosphere between supporters and those in charge and shows a great deal of common sense. Credit to them for that.

8/10

Total – 47/80

Photo: Action Images

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