My Word! Newcastle United 1, Queens Park Rangers 0.
Posted on January 15th, 2012 | 27 Comments |
Date: Sun 15th Jan 2011.
Kick-Off: 1:30 pm.
Referee: Chris Foy.
United came to this game on the back of 2 excellent straight wins against Man Utd 3-0 (got that one in early today!) and Blackburn 2-1 in the FA Cup. In contrast, Queens Park Rangers had taken only one point from their last 6 games.
Everything pointed to a fairly routine, comfortable home win. However this was the first league game without Demba Ba and Cheick Tiote, and the other potentially influencing factor was the appointment of Mark Hughes, who took charge of QPR for his first game following the sacking of Neil Warnock.
The match referee, Chris Foy, was the man who had sent off Man City’s Captain Kompany the previous week for that 2-footed challenge about which there has been much subsequent debate.
United Manager Alan Pardew was asked by Sky TV before the game about Ba and how he would deal with losing such a prolific goalscorer. He replied that it was about the team, not individuals and that Best and Ameobi would be a handful.
The day got off to an annoying start for those watching on Sky as they insisted on calling St James’ Park the “Sports Direct Arena” for some inexplicable reason. You’d think they would have asked somebody what the proper name was if they didn’t know?
QPR kicked off towards the Gallowgate end with Helguson getting an early shot on goal which was never going to beat Krul. Almost immediately, Rangers then had another chance following a mistake by Santon and Krul had to make another save.
QPR were playing well in the first part of the game and this was assisted by United, who were clearly under instructions to play the long ball to the two big forwards up front. Unfortunately the long balls we played invariably found a QPR player and just led to them coming back again. After ten minutes, Sky reported with glee that QPR had so far had 5 attacks to United’s 0. Ex-QPR player, manager and Uncle Fester lookalike – Co-commentator Ray “my word” Wilkins was positively having an orgasm.
In contrast to the way we normally start games with energy, it was about 11 minutes into the game before United settled down and started to keep the ball and exert some influence. However QPR came at us again and Sean Wright-Phillips hit the bar on 16 mins after some sloppy play by the United defence.
On 19 minutes, Shaun Derry was yellow-carded for a bad tackle on Yohan Cabaye – who needed to be stretchered off. Cabaye was not a happy bunny about the tackle and made his feelings known to anyone within earshot as he sat on the pitch waiting for the stretcher. Hatem Ben Arfa came on to replace him. Whilst all this was going on, “my word” Wilkins was having a right whinge about Cabaye and saying he should get up and get on with the game! He then had a whinge about how long it took HBA to get ready to come on – impartial commentating at it’s best…NOT! Is it just me, or is watching Shaun Derry like watching Vinnie Jones?
On 26 minutes Guttierez got his head onto the end of a Ryan Taylor free kick which followed a foul on Ameobi, but he couldn’t get the header on target. On 30 minutes we heard the first actual “my word” from Wilkins as Bothroyd fired a shot past Krul’s left post. Clint Hill was then shown a yellow card for a tackle on Danny Simpson on the popular side.
One shot on target, one goal!
After a couple of failed attacks first by Taylor and then Ben Arfa, a miracle occurred and Newcastle United finally took the lead after 36 minutes, with their first shot on target in the entire game. It came through Leon Best out of not much really and was a good one though. He got the ball in the area with his back to goal, cleverly turned and after a couple of touches hit the ball nicely into the bottom right-hand corner.
Shortly after that, on 38 minutes, Bothroyd was yellow carded for a crude tackle on Santon. The crowd had been very quiet up to this point, but burst into “you’re getting sacked in the morning” which I thought was a bit premature considering it was Mark Hughes’s first game in charge!
Half-time arrived after an extra 4 minutes had been played due to the Cabaye kerfuffle, and those watching on Sky TV were treated to Jamie Redknapp waxing lyrical about Besty’s goal “if that had been Thierry Henry, they’d be talking about it for years to come”. Nice lad, Jamie, nowt like his dad and he doesn’t have the family twitch yet.
Second Half
United kicked off the second half and Wilkins’ first “my word” of the half came after only 13 seconds this time. In the 50th minute, Bothroyd had a free shot in the area with his right foot but put it well over. He’s left-footed apparently according to Wilkins. Bothroyd had another shot with his left shortly after and Krul saved it. My word!
The next “my word” came on 53 minutes when Wilkins didn’t like where QPR had placed the ball for a corner (it was behind the line and therefore technically off the pitch). The Magpies had pretty much ditched the long ball game in this half and were playing the passing game that we are much better at. The Sky people were disappointed that we were on top as today was clearly supposed to be about Mark Hughes and his first game for London giants, QPR.
In the 61st minute QPR got away with a handball in the area, and it was so blatant even Sky reluctantly agreed. After 64 minutes Helguson trotted off to be replaced by Gary Neville look-a-like Tommy Smith. Paddy Kenny was involved in a bizarre incident when he ran out to the touchline to put the ball out. United took the throw in quickly and Gutierrez curled an on-target shot towards goal, but the QPR defence had scampered back to cover.
After 75 minutes Buzsacky was hauled off to be replaced by Man United’s Macheda. Of course we’re not afraid of Man Utd players since we dismantled them 3-0 on Wednesday 4th January – oh…have I mentioned that before? Perch also replaced Best as Pardew clearly decided QPR’s attack was powder-puff and we’d just shut up shop, park the bus and see the game out. This tactic was further confirmed after 81 minutes when Ryan Taylor was replaced by Dan Gosling. By this stage “my word” Wilkins had decided “Sean” (Wright-Phillips) was a “wonderful player”. I wish I had a fiver for each time he mentioned the lad and talked him up!
After 79 minutes Sky tried to balance things up by pointing out that United had only had the ball on target once and had scored, whereas QPR had 13 attempts on target but hadn’t scored. They forgot to mention the bit about “goals win games”.
United were passing the ball around neatly now and Macheda showed his frustration when he was booked for a tackle on Guthrie. Wilkins tried one final roll of the dice by doing the “commentator’s curse” thing – praising how solid United looked. It didn’t work. Shortly before the end, it was announced that Danny Guthrie won the Barclays Man of the Match.
Overall, not the most exciting or glamorous game for the spectator’s, the TV audience or even for Ray Wilkins. But good teams grind out results – and that’s what we did today. 3 points from this game saw us leap-frog Liverpool and move onto the same points as Arsenal. Should be fun again when they start having those “lets look at the top of the Premiership” discussions, because “Invisible United” are back in 6th place! Wonder if we’ll get a mention?
Teams and stats
Newcastle United (4-4-2): Tim Krul (G), Danny Simpson, Mike Williamson, Fabricio Coloccini, Davide Santon, Ryan Taylor (Dan Gosling 81), Danny Guthrie, Yohan Cabaye (Hatem Ben Arfa 25), Jonas Gutierrez, Shola Ameobi, Leon Best (James Perch 77).
Subs: Rob Elliot, Shane Ferguson, James Perch, Dan Gosling, Mehdi Abeid, Gabriel Obertan, Hatem Ben Arfa.
Queens Park Rangers (4-4-2): Paddy Kenny (G), Luke Young, Danny Gabbidon, Anton Ferdinand, Clint Hill, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Shaun Derry, Akos Buzsaky (Fred Macheda 76), Jamie Mackie; Heidar Helguson (Tommy Smith 65), Jay Bothroyd
Subs: Radek Cerny, Bradley Orr, Fitz Hall, Hogan Ephraim, Tommy Smith, DJ Campbell, Federico Macheda.
Goals: Leon Best (37).
Yellow cards: Shaun Derry (20), Clint Hill (32), Jay Bothroyd (39), Fred Macheda (89).
Red cards: None.
Possession: Newcastle United 60.9%, QPR 39.1%.
Post match interviews
Alan Pardew
Mark Hughes
NUFCBlog Author: UTD111
UTD111 has written 59 articles on this blog.
My word! It’s Butch!