| F.A. Cup Third Round Replay | |
| Tuesday January 13th | |
|
Burnley
2
|
Queens Park Rangers 1 |
| S.Thompson | S.Di Carmine |
| J.Rodrigrez | |
Rangers FA Cup dream is over for another year although technically we got further this year than we have for eight years thanks to taking a replay to extra time. This was always going to be a tough game with a midweek trip to Burnley low down on the list of games QPR fans want to go to but the clubs offer of free travel was a good one and full credit to the 350 QPR fans who made the trip to see if we could finally win a game in the FA Cup. Paulo Sousa was forced into more changes to the side with Wayne Routledge unable to play as he wasn’t registered in time fir the FA Cup third round. Dexter Blackstock was missing through illness whilst Matt Connolly was dropped to the bench as he continues to recover from a back problem. Fitz `Zoro` Hall stepped in at right back as Rangers switched to a 4-3-3 formation. Gavin Mahon came back into the midfield alongside Rowlands and leigterwood whilst ledesma and Alberti took their place out wide with Di Carmine up front. Listening to the game on BBC radio London is sounded like a practice match in the first half with neither side creating much or sounding too interested. Rangers took the lead after half time after good work by Leigterwood picked out Di Carmine in the box and the italian picked his spot with a cool finish. This should have been the cue for Rangers to go on and win the game as Rowlands hit the bar soon after but poor defending got Burnley back in the game. A corner on the right was flapped at by Cerny and Steve Thomson converted from close range after a goal mouth scramble. That was the end of the scoring in normal time with Rowlands having Rangers best chance during injury time as he was put into the box but he sliced his shot wide of the post. Rangers had the better chances in the extra half an hour with Rose and Ephraim forcing excellent saves from Jensen but it was Burnley who went through with a late winner. A long ball was allowed to bounce by Stewart and Rodriquez broke through and chipped it over Cerny for a 120th minute winner. Poor play by Stewart and Cerny and Rangers were out. It had been a good effort by a patched up QPR side but another year without a win in the FA Cup. Here are the thoughts of Dave Thomas editor of A Kick up the R's as posted on the QPR Yahoo Mailing List. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - The FA Cup is like death by a thousand cuts. In reality, we had enough of the play, the possession and chances to have won this. Within the accepted limitations of where we are - a team very much in transition still - it wasn't a bad shift from the entire team, in terms of effort and commitment. In fact, I would go so far as to say that overall we looked to want it just a little bit more than Burnley. As expected, the QPR support was just over 200. Rangers had sold 185 tickets ahead of the game, and the girl on the gate said she had sold just 20 on the night! I know Burnley have a lot of big games behind them and coming up, but I was shocked at how low the gate was. It was like a reserve fixture. In fact, I texted someone to say I thought there were 'around 4,000', so even that was being optimistic. Even so, there was a lot of noise from the Rangers
contingent - the only noise until the second-half, when the stand
to the left of us began a It was frustrating to see Sousa start with just Di Carmine up front - and he obviously was wearing Dexter's boots... the ones with the non-slip soles. He spent an inordinate amount of time on his backside. Someone commented later on that Burnley looked a shadow of the team that beaten us at Loftus Road - and it was hard to escape the feeling that two up front might have swung the game our way within the 90 minutes. Our goal was a neat passing move, nicely swept home by Di Carmine. Seconds later, Rowlands hit the bar with a long-range effort. The lead didn't last long. Burnley equalised from a scramble, after Cerny had failed to hold the ball cleanly, and despite a couple of blocks it was hammered in off the underside of the bar. In the first-half of extra-time, something I have never seen before. Helguson found himself in the clear, with the ball. He actually stopped completely, along with the entire Burnley defence, and looked to the linesman. I don't mean he hesitated, or checked his run. He stopped dead and looked over, questioningly. The flag stayed down. So Helguson carried on. Jensen came out to attempt a save, but the ball was steered past him and into the net for a 2-1 QPR lead. Except at this point the linesman put his flag up. Ludicrous. Jensen had kept Burnley in it earlier, with a twisting
save. A shot from Delaney took a deflection, catching Jensen going
the wrong way (think You know the rest, of course. Stewart, who'd had
a solid enough game overall, seemed to tread on the ball, was dispossessed
and the Burnley Of course, it wouldn't. We QPR, aren't we? And this is the FA Cup, isn't it? It's a cruel game. I still think we can get something at Derby,
though. There... I'm feeling better already. |
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