Daphne Biggs R.I.P.

Think of QPR and you immediately associate names such as Les Ferdinand, Stan Bowles, Rodney Marsh and Gerry Francis. For QPR fans though there is another name we all associate with QPR and one without the other just doesn’t seem right. That person of course is Daphne Biggs who sadly died last Sunday after a short illness.

Since that sad day, tributes have appeared all over the Internet and I am sure more than a few tears have been shared at this great loss. Daphne has been associated with QPR for as long as I and almost every QPR fan can remember. She has worked with the supporters club for years and was one of the most loyal and passionate fans you could ever wish to meet.

Ever since I can remember I have seen Daphne at QPR. Daphne has been associated with QPR for more than 60 years and was even working at the club right up until the time she was admitted to hospital last week.

As a kid I used to think of Daphne and Jim Gregory as the mother and father of Queens Park Rangers. Jim always seemed to be the Dad who looked after QPR and everyone did what Jim said whilst Daphne was without doubt the mother who loved and cherished our football club.

Every time we went to get tickets or see a game she was there and she was so well known and loved by everyone who knew her. I never knew Daphne to speak to but she was always around looking after supporters and showing her love and loyalty to Queens Park Rangers.

I remember getting on a coach to an away game during our relegation season from the Premiership. We had just lost at home to Chelsea and had Tranmere in the cup. Myself and a few others were standing around looking terribly depressed from the previous weeks result when Daphne came out and said "For Gawds sake cheer up you lot, we haven’t lost yet!" Those words made us all laugh as she walked off shaking her head at us being so downhearted when we had a new game and new hopes set to start in a few hours.

The club held a minute's silence in memory of Daphne Biggs before the game against Plymouth on Saturday August 31st. It was a very moving moment and the club honoured her memory by having club captain Steve Palmer lay a wreath in the goal at the Loft End. The players as well as supporters feel this loss badly. Ranger’s players who are also fans like Marc Bircham and Kevin Gallen grew up the same as we did knowing Daphne and this loss will upset them in the same way it has us.

The club has also made a nice gesture to make the Young Player of the Year trophy named in Daphne's memory

David Davies told the official QPR website: "Loftus Road has been a solemn place this week as we mourn the passing of one our longest serving fans and employees. Daphne, along with her husband, was associated with the club for nearly 60 years and although she passed away on Sunday surrounded by those that she loved, she will long live in the minds of all who knew her"

It’s hard to find the words to express what a great loss this is to all QPR supporters. As mentioned before tributes have been flooding in. Here is a selection of them taken from the QPR mailing list.

Dave Thomas, editor of A Kick up the R’s had this to say: I didn't know Daphne at all well. Daphne the person away from QPR, that is. Then again so few of us really know those people around us, familiar faces all, with whom we share so many emotions associated with supporting a football club. But Daphne the club stalwart, on the other hand, is as integral part of my 36 years supporting QPR as anyone could be. I can hear her distinctive voice even now.

"She will be missed. But more importantly she will be remembered with great affection. Even if you didn't know Daphne, you knew of her, and couldn't fail to have respect for her unstinting loyalty to Queens Park Rangers Football Club."

"Daphne was visited in hospital just after the Peterborough game and was told we had won, something that delighted her, frail that she was at this point. She talked about the game with her visitors, before they said their goodnights. She died the next day."

"I'm glad Rangers had won for her. I don't imagine for one moment that something so important to her in life would be any the less important in her final hours. Football may not be more important than life and death, but for many of us it's far from separate. Rest in peace, Daphne."

Other comments on the Mailing list included this from Ariel: "It is impossible to imagine Loftus road without her being there, as she was throughout the qpr experience of so many of us ... from handing me my very first supporters' club membership card ... to always making time during the craziness of the pre-match box office to come out and say hello when I turned up from Virginia for my once-a-year visit"

Dave Hantman said: "She was part of the furniture and I mean that affectionately. If she answered the phone (particularly in recent years) I was relieved that at least I was speaking to someone who cared about the club like us, and could be trusted to try and sort out a query. She had an amazing capacity to remember names of supporters, faces and events. Like Dave Thomas I can close my eyes see her and hear that voice. Unlike Managers, Chairman, and indeed players who come and go, its the supporters who are "always there". Even though she has passed away I am sure she will truly be "always there"."

John Allen said:"QPR without Daphne. That is hard to fathom. I remember when I left England at Christmas, 1984, my boys Ben and Tom were 5 and 2. I think the next time I was able to come back was Christmas 1991 when we beat Man U 4-1 and the first thing Daphne said to me was how are her little Ben and Tom. She had an uncanny gift of making the club seem incredibly intimate. She made it seem as though the number of supporters that she knew well numbered perhaps 20 in total when in fact it must have been in the hundreds and probably in the thousands.

The sentiments expressed here about some significant memorial named after her at Loftus Road are very apt I feel. Certainly for me she symbolized and embodied the very essence of my life-long love affair with Queen's Park Rangers.

Those were just a handful of the tributes paid to Daphne and I am sure we will see many more in the coming weeks. The loss of Daphne Biggs feels like the loss of a family member to most of us even those like me who hardly knew her. Daphne was a part of our family as Queens Park Ranger’s supporters and she will never be forgotten.

Rest in Peace Daphne.