Far from a Wales of a time

We were on our travels to this away fixture with a full car once again. In attendance today was Me, PK, Sam, Justin and the driver for the day was Mark. Unfortunately Lofty couldn’t make the trip into Wales this weekend due to a family birthday, but if I’m perfectly honest he wouldn’t have minded missing the fixture had he known the type of encounter we were about to witness.

Before we went into the ground we decided to go into the Harvester by the stadium and enjoyed a light beverage or two. We were joined by our welsh friends Richard and Sophie as for once they had the short visit for a game rather than driving the miles we had to for this fixture. The pub is recommended for our next visit to The Liberty Stadium.
A quick meeting with Gobi and friends was the next order before we took our places inside the ground to see what would be served up this afternoon.

For the third straight league fixture the same starting eleven was named by Jim Magilton.

With Rangers showing a positive passing mentality over the past few weeks we expected a very good showing and hopefully the three points that would’ve cemented our place in the top half of the table coming into the international break, not that the tables mean much at this stage of the season.

Rangers had the better of the opening twenty minutes.
At times Rangers put together some really crisp passing but for periods it did look as if we had turned up for a training game and invited Swansea to run at us and allow them too much space. To be fair though, for all of Swansea’s good passing in midfield it was much like watching the QPR side from the end of Paulo Sousa’s reign last year, all huff in midfield and no puff up front.
Buzsaky had an effort from 25 yards out land on top of the net, Routledge ran from the halfway line and dragged a shot wide and Simpson also dragged an effort wide, those were the only major efforts in what was a pretty lacklustre first period.

The halftime get together was one that was uninspired by the football and mainly spoke of the memorable night that a few of us enjoyed at St James Park on Wednesday night, a place where a few players may of left their heads.
We decided to indulge in a few of the culinary delights on offer from the kiosk downstairs also. Justin and Sam went for the burger. It scored a very poor 1/10 with both of them as it looked like it had been micro waved nine times and even the cheese had disintegrated! PK went for a hot dog, again this scored 1/10! Again it had been micro waved to the max and if I’m brutally honest the burger and hot dog could’ve been road kill for all we knew. I went for the steak slice that was on offer; it was piping hot and was ok to be fair. I would compare it to a slice that you would get from an esso garage. It scores a 4/10 for effort. On a plus note the coffee that was on offer scores well, mainly because it was so hot that it scolded your tongue so bad that you couldn’t taste it. Nothing to really recommend from here again.

We just about made our seats ready for the second half.
Rangers looked as if Magilton had tore into them a bit at half time as they looked the more fired up of the two teams. There was more urgency in the passing and we looked as if we wanted to take the game to the Swans.
Within the opening ten minutes we had more action than the entire first half but that proved to be both good and bad.
A Rangers corner from the right hand side caused all sorts of problems in the Swansea area. Watson’s centre was sent goal wards by Simpson and his effort was fantastically saved by the Swansea goalkeeper.
Seconds later another corner come across from the same right hand side, this time it found Gorkss rising highest at the back post, only for his powerful header to go agonisingly wide.
Minutes later the game turned on its head, only it didn’t go the way you would expect it.
Rangers broke away once again, Vine fed in Routledge and the tricky winger cut in from out wide, passed four defenders (dummying two of them in one go) and found himself in space and only 12 yards out. He decided to aim for the left side of goal and once again a stunning save was pulled off. The save was parried and cleared high, Vine aerially challenged and was pulled down but no foul was given..... Dyer then controlled the ball and Rowlands, who was already on a yellow card for a hard first half challenge, threw himself at the ball and caught Dyer. There’s no doubt about it, it was a second yellow and we were down to ten men, just as we had the game by the scruff of the neck.
A 4-3-1-1 was adopted as the R’s continued to try and press a vulnerable looking Swansea team.
However with Swansea packing out their midfield with five in there they were carving through the R’s midfield and soon made their numerical advantage count.
Angel Rangel raced down the Swansea right and drove a cross in that evaded the R’s defence and Gower arrived at the back post unmarked to slide home the first goal of the game.
Three minutes later and further damage was done.
Watson slipped when challenging in midfield and inadvertently handled the ball on purpose and picked up his second yellow of the afternoon.
Despite being down to nine men Rangers continued to press in hope of getting an equalizer.
Taarabt, who had just come on, found himself in space and pulled an effort wide.
It did prove to be too much to claw back and with 85 minutes on the clock the game ended as a contest.
Once again Swansea broke away down their right hand side and another ball found its way to the far post and Lee Trundle was on hand to put away the killer goal.

All in all we may have lost 2-0 but had it not been for the two sending’s off and some dubious refereeing decisions then Swansea would never of got close to winning the game, a Rangers win or a bore draw would’ve been the result. You could not take away the effort from the players today, despite being stuck in first gear throughout the first half. It’s been a good six match unbeaten run and this international will prove useful to charge the players batteries up once again and then once again attack this league.

Man of the Match today is being given to Damion Stewart for a near faultless effort today. He made quite a few vital interceptions and his distribution was very good also.

The journey home took us two hours from Swansea to Maidenhead, a record that would be hard for anyone to beat. We also found out our winner for the away prediction competition, in 5th was Mark, 4th was PK, 3rd was Sam, 2nd was Justin and for the 2nd time I won the prize money.

Swansea City: de Vries, Williams, Tate, Britton, Pratley (Lopez 86), Dyer, Dobbie (Beattie 72), Monk, Rangel, Gower, Butler (Trundle 61).

Subs not used: Orlandi, van der Gun, Cornell, Richards.

Scorers: Gower (74), Trundle (85)

Bookings: Gower (74)

QPR: Cerny, Stewart, Leigertwood, Routledge, Vine (Faurlin 61), Buzsaky (Taarabt 76), Gorkss, Rowlands, Watson, Simpson (Pellicori 76), Borrowdale.

Subs not used: Ramage, Mahon, Heaton, Ephraim.

Bookings: Rowlands (37 & 53), Gorkss (42), Watson (72 & 77)

Red Cards: Rowlands (53), Watson (77)

QPR fans in attendance - 602