- Further Photos-
- Follow QPR REPORT on TWITTER!
- QPR REPORT MESSAGEBOARD - Visit the cutting-edge, football-only, QPR Report messageboard (and see items you won't usually read elsewhere
- Visit the truly-fascinating Bushman QPR Photo Archives
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- Could-have-been-QPR, Ranieri Axed
- Beyond QPR: In the World of F1 Daily Mail: "Fernandes spy row: Caterham could be kicked out of F1 in new scandal"
- QPR CEO Philip Beard Speaks Later this week at the Soccerex European Forum, in Manchester on "The Financial Management of Clubs"
- QPR Chairman Tony Fernandes View of Israel - Fernandes one the VIP Endorsers of the forthcoming "Global March to Jerusalem"
- Statement and Signatories - About the Global March to Jerusalem
-SOME OLDE QPR VIDEO
- Video: 192 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
- 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.)
- 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!)
- 1962 Brentford Fans Protesting Planned Merger with QPR
- Video: Martin Allen Being Fined for Being with His Baby:
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ROWAN VINE COST GILLINGHAM NOTHING?
Gillingham Official Site
HESS: "VINE WILL BE AN ASSET"
Posted on: Mon 26 Mar 2012
Andy Hessenthaler says Rowan Vine's presence from now until the end of the season can only have a positive effect with Danny Kedwell and Gavin Tomlin struggling for fitness.
The on-loan QPR striker came off the bench during the 2-2 draw against Bradford on Saturday, and Hess said the deal to bring him to the club was `a no brainer. `non
Following the match on Saturday he said: "Rowan isn't match fit - he has been at QPR for a while and he's still under contract there. To be fair to the lad he's just hungry to get out to try and get some games and for me it was a no brainer as there was no cost in it
"He was even prepared to pay his own way to come to us so that just shows the dedication.
"He's just hungry to get playing football again as he has had an horrendous time and was out through injury.
"We will try and get him as fit as we can over the next eight games with us and I think he will be an asset.
"He's experienced, he's one that can come on and he showed glimpses Saturday and it was difficult for him to get into the game but he's another body for us.
"We lost Kedwell with a bad back after the game Tuesday, he didn't realise it was that bad and it looks like he will be missing midweek as well so it's the same old thing with players going down injured.
"He's another body as Tomlin is out too."
As for team news going in to the game at Burton on Tuesday, the manager may bring Danny Spiller and Charlie Lee back into the action, both of whom have served their three-match bans.
He said: "We have Spills and Charlie back but Charlie hasn't done a lot of training as he's had some trouble with his ankle so whether he is fit enough to be involved Tuesday let's wait and see.
"Spills will do a session but he's had injections in his ankle too, it's a regular thing that he has to have and whether that will prevent him being involved Tuesday we are not sure.
"Both will definitely be available for the Macclesfield game."
Hess reflected on the draw against Bradford, and although he admitted the equalizer awardedto the hosts was frustrating, he is adamant his squad do what what it takes to make the play-offs.
He said: "Of course. There are eight games to go, we have had five wins, two defeats and a draw but it could easily have been another win Saturday.
"They gambled off the bits but I don't think Paulo had much to do second half shots wise so we're disappointed because the referee's decisions have cost us the game.
"We started the day in the same position that we are now. I know Crewe won but Cheltenham and Oxford drew and we were four points away from Oxford and that's still the same." Gillingham
HARSH CRITIQUE OF JOEY BARTON (Beyond the Playing Field)
MAIL/Laura Williamson - How will football cope without the spiteful rants of this humourless, angry little man?
Some joyous news from Queens Park Rangers this week, amid the gloom of a relegation battle.
After being booed off by his own fans before his team-mates staged a remarkable comeback against Liverpool, then dropped for the 3-1 defeat by Sunderland on Saturday, Joey Barton has decided to take a ‘little Twitter sabbatical’.
The midfielder tells us he is anxious to avoid saying something he’ll ‘end up regretting’. Presumably he didn’t intend this to be a joke, but it is very funny. After 4,598 tweets it’s a bit late for that, Joseph.
Shouting his mouth off: Joey Barton has earned a reputation for making his voice heard on Twitter
BARTON ON TWITTER
On Madonna at The Superbowl: Half Time show. This could be like watching ur grandmother lip syncing in her knickers and bra. I shudder at the thought.
On Beckham’s H+M underwear deal: Is there no limit to what “Brand Beckham” will endorse for a pound note. Surely they both have enough cash now.
On religion: I am very Darwinian in my thinking but there’s also a lot unknown. That’s where spirituality comes in I think. Everything starts somewhere!
On Shearer: Bad shirt, shoes and views from shearer again. Sort it out slaphead........
On politics: Hate to say this but I struggle with Ed Milliband because of his lisp. Sorry leader of the country cannot have a speech impediment
On overcoming alcoholism: I am no different because I kick a ball and am known. I have many failings. “I am a human and I need to be loved......”
We shall miss him, of course. We will pine for the incessant, sanctimonious musings of Twitter’s self-appointed sage. As Lent draws to a close, it is we who will be cast out into the wilderness without football’s unofficial spokesman and resident philosopher to show us the light.
Will the game be able to cope without born-again Barton taking a sip from his cappuccino and casting judgment on the burning issues of the day, trampling over those who disagree and basking in the unashamedly ego-stroking nonsense of it all? We may not function properly without our all-seeing overlord.
In his attack on the media, published in The Times this year, a comically oblivious Barton wrote: ‘This is the medium of Generation Y, the kids today that will become tomorrow’s leaders. These are my people… I want to be one of them.’
It was a statement of such misguided arrogance it would have been amusing if it wasn’t so scary. Joey Barton, a convicted thug, the spokesman for my generation? What a depressing thought. This is a man who wants desperately to be a football thinker, a voice of authority who speaks and people listen. But, instead of replicating the enigmatic brilliance of Eric Cantona, another footballer with a violent past, he is often just Vinnie Jones with Wi-Fi.
Barton has tried hard, too hard, to shed the skin of the man who stabbed a lit cigar into a team-mate’s face at a Christmas party, served 74 days in Manchester’s Strangeways prison for assault and left another team-mate unconscious after a training-ground attack. The fact we still give his opinions credence is itself remarkable, but also a testament to his intelligence, determination and sheer gall. But, even today, it still takes more than a username, a password and a BlackBerry to change the world — and the world’s perception of you.
Benched: Barton has struggled for form in recent weeks and was booed by QPR fans against Liverpool
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He wrote in The Times: ‘Last year I realised no journalist was going to tell my tale truthfully. So I’m doing it myself. Anything I said, anything I did, was given an angle to fit in with the bad-boy image.
‘They projected someone who was not the real me: it was the “me” that the press wanted to project. People are now beginning to see the man I am.’
Are we, though? Is anyone capable of reflecting the ‘real me’ in 140 characters? It is doubtful. The ‘virtual’ Barton is a different beast to the one described by those who know him well.
‘Generous’, ‘thoughtful’ and ‘good fun’ were just some of the words associated with a man capable of committing little acts of kindness — a round of golf here, a bottle of champagne there — without ego or ceremony. This is so far removed from the angry, humourless little man behind @Joey7Barton that it was hard to imagine we were talking about the same person.
Yet he is a Premier League footballer who contributes a column to The Big Issue and a Liverpool-born athlete who has used his 1.3million Twitter followers to campaign passionately for justice for the victims of the Hillsborough disaster. He is the capitalist with a conscience: the man who swapped a £170,000 Aston Martin DBS for a Toyota Prius, a moped and an Oyster card, allowing him to travel on London’s Underground network concealed by a pair of Harry Potter glasses and a hat. He wears a £6 plastic watch instead of £500,000 of designer bling.
In action: Barton was named QPR captain after his move from Newcastle last summer
But, just as the newspaper interviews to which Barton now seems to object reflected journalists’ interpretations of the man, his Tweets project their own self-portrait.
He may decry the ‘bad-boy image’ he considers a media fabrication, but he repeatedly enhances that negative persona. If you do not like what you read in the papers it will always be somebody else’s fault, but you have no excuse if you actively celebrate the fact it is you, unfiltered, behind the Twitter avatar.
The result is certainly not pleasant. Barton comes across as a mean, dislikeable individual; the classic playground bully who revels in snide ripostes and stamping on those with a lower profile — simply because he can.
His tweets come like bullets, one after the other. He doesn’t interact; he just spews vitriol on the screen whenever he feels like it. ‘He tweets when he wants,’ sang the QPR fans. Don’t we just know it.
Barton’s behaviour was particularly despicable when he insulted Neil Warnock earlier this year. The former QPR boss said owner Tony Fernandes had been ‘slowly poisoned from outside the club and no doubt from within the club as well’. Barton responded by telling Warnock to ‘shut it’, calling him ‘embarrassing’ and comparing him to Mike Bassett, a fictional football manager and a figure of fun.
Court dates: Barton was in trouble with the law during his spells with Manchester City and Newcastle
‘If I talked about Neil, he’d do well to get another job,’ added the player Warnock made captain of QPR after Newcastle United were so desperate to get rid of him they let him leave for free.
It was unprofessional and smacked of ingratitude, but it was typical of the way Barton responds to those who hit back. He simply dismisses them with utter contempt.
‘I don’t want or need ur advice, praise, negativity...or any other thing that u offer,’ he wrote. ‘U will never effect me. I am far to driven for u.’ Barton isn’t interested in dialogue. Monologues will do nicely, thank you very much.
‘Spineless maggots’ was the phrase he used to describe two journalists who dared to criticise him. ‘Numpty’ was another example. The fans who have paid good money to watch a string of average performances at Loftus Road from QPR’s No 17 this season are ‘bells’ and ‘trolls’.
As Barton himself has noted, form is temporary but class — or lack of it — is permanent. For all his highfalutin talk about freedom of speech and his undoubted intelligence, his responses are consistently shallow and insulting.
The anonymity of a Twitter account encourages people to pour bile on you, unacceptably so, but ignore them or argue coherently — do not retreat into a shell of abuse. We had just begun to hope you might be better than that. Mail
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