- QPR Metro Blog "Diary of a depressed, discombobulated QPR fan! And where’s the player of the year dinner?
- 44 Years ago Today: Gerry Francis Makes his QPR Debut (Note that of the QPR Team and Sub - Nine were "Home Growns"
SUNDAY TIMES Blackpool 1 QPR 3
30 March 2003
A Richard Langley hat-trick kept Queens Park Rangers comfortably in a playoff position and all but ended injury-hit Blackpool’s hopes of promotion. It was Blackpool’s sixth match without a win, a run that has included four defeats. Much of the talk before the match was of left-back John Hills turning down a new contract. The likelihood is that he will not be at Bloomfield Road next season and after this performance other defenders could be joining him. Langley, who scored in the win at Loftus Road earlier in the campaign, had completed his treble before Scott Taylor’s late consolation
Blackpool: Barnes, Richardson, Flynn, Grayson, Hills, Bullock, Wellens, Coid, Taylor, Robinson, Walker
QPR: Day, Kelly, Carlisle, Shittu, Padula, McLeod, Palmer, Bircham, Langley, Gallen, Furlong Sunday Times
Mirror - Steaming: Samba says critics of QPR's 'mercenaries' have it all wrong
Paul Gilham
He defends himself, the dressing room and Queens Park Rangers' owner with the ferocity that has made him one of the best centre-halves around.
If Chris Samba’s team-mates follow suit in QPR's last eight games of the season, they could yet pull off Mission Impossible.
Last summer, the west London club had to contend with criticism aimed at supremo Tony Fernandes for bringing in too many average players.
Now, Fernandes is receiving stick because of the additional cash he spent in January to put things right.
Samba believes his boss can’t win. And he has a point.
The ex-Anzhi defender’s arrival - along with those of Loic Remy, Jermaine Jenas and Andros Townsend - has given Rangers half a chance of being a Premier League club again next season.
Victory over Fulham on Monday would make it three wins out of four and put QPR back on course for an achievement they still believe they can pull off.
Yet still the talk is of huge wages and big price-tags - Samba's own £12million fee included.
The 29-year-old, now “massively sick” of the focus on his salary, told the Mirror: “I have to defend against this.
“Nobody put a knife at the throat of anybody at QPR to come and discuss contracts.
“They wanted to extend my contract for another year at Anzhi. I could have earned more there. But I wanted to come back to England.
“The club believes in the players that have been brought here. They believe they are the right players for the club.
“What would people have said if the owner didn’t try anything? If he didn’t spend any money? They would have said that he didn’t care. But he did what he believed was right.
“The owner really is a passionate man. He is shown a fighting spirit for the club by doing all the business he could have done to improve the team.
"What would people have said if he didn’t try anything? If he didn’t spend money? They would have said he didn’t care": Samba has Fernandes' back
“Us players have come in to try and prove him right. Remy, Jenas and Townsend have been fantastic. We all know what staying in the Premier League means to the fans.
“But people still think that our attitude is, ‘Whether we win or lose, we get paid.’ They are wrong.
“If I lose a game, I might get paid but I go home and it affects me.
“I am not doing anything. I am not going to restaurants. I am not going out at all. I’m not a nicest person when we lose.
“That’s how it affects your life. Ask any player at any club, and they will tell you the same.”
Defeat at Aston Villa before the international break came after wins at Southampton and at home to Sunderland.
But Samba maintains there is now a unity within the squad as Rangers bid to regain the winning habit.
“What we have done is bring everybody together so that we all respect each other.” he said. “At every club you have affinities. You can’t change the fact that the French talk more with the French, the Spanish with the Spanish and so on.
“But the most important thing is to respect each other on the pitch. To be honest with each other too. Now we are able to tell each other what we think. That’s how you create a unit.”
Asked if he is a nervous watcher of his relegation rivals on TV, Samba went on: “I don’t watch any Premier League right now. It just reminds you where you are and it can kill your spirit. I want to keep a smile on my face and to focus on my job.
“So I prefer Real Madrid v Barcelona. Or the Champions League. Or I watch movies or play video games. Other things.”
Samba could have joined QPR 15 months ago, when the club first made their interest known to his former club Blackburn.
Instead, Rovers refused to sell to a Premier League rival, exiling the defender to Anzhi.
With Blackburn now a parody of the Premier League winners from 18 years ago, Samba believes he was right to get out.
He went on: “I still have contact with players there. I’ve spoken to some about what is going on there and its crazy. Blackburn were a Premier League club. They did not have the biggest budget but they were a strong club in the Premier League.
“The idea that they could have been in danger of slipping out of the two top leagues was unthinkable.
“I had a little bit of grief from the fans who have left, but I saw all that coming from a long way off. Its not fair on the fans but its also not fair on the players that have been fighting for the club.
“It's a whole town, a whole fan-base, a whole community that has been hurt by what has happened. But there is nothing much you can do.”
There is still much more that he and his current team-mates can do to save QPR however.
He said: “Now, when you look at the team-sheet, you can see there are players that opposition teams see make a stronger team.
“Our mentality is that we do not want to simply allow what has happened in the past to continue.
“We are a unit now. And we will fight.” Mirror
Old QPR Video
- Video: 1923 QPR vs Sheffield United
- Video II: 1923 QPR vs Sheffield United
- Video: 1962 QPR vs Newport
- Video: 1948: QPR vs Derby County
- Video: 1958 QPR vs Southampton
- 1962 Video Interview with QPR Manager Alec Stock
- Video: 1962 QPR vs Hinckley
- 1981: QPR Go Plastic - The Opening Game vs Luton
- 1948: Athlete McDonald Bailey trains for Olympic competition: Sprinter Emmanuel McDonald Bailey begins training for the 1948 London Summer Olympics with the Queens Park Rangers football club
- Video (Silent): A Younger Jim Gregory Talking about Selling Phil Parkes (Lip Readers Only!)
- VIDEO: Last Kick of the Game Winner for QPR - In 1974, QPR Played Coventry in the FA Cup Fifth Round. Moving Into Injury Time, at 2-2 Stan Bowles Took the Free Kick( Parkes - Hazell Mclintock Mancini Clement - Venables Leach Francis, Thomas Bowles Givens.)
- 1962 Brentford Fans Protesting Planned Merger with QPR
- Video: Martin Allen Being Fined for Being with His Baby
