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Desperate day in the capital
If we thought the defeat against Stoke eleven days earlier had been bad, then this was far worse and as bad as anything we've seen since Steve Cotterill became manager. Very little can be said that is positive, if indeed anything at all from a performance that quite frankly had “We're in a relegation battle” stamped all over it.
Even the sight of Andy Gray back on the field for the last twenty-five minutes or so could do little to brighten an afternoon in West London, and you could hardly criticise the travelling supporters as they loudly booed the players off at the end.
As expected, new signing Steven Caldwell didn't make the starting eleven but was passed fit to take a place on the substitutes' bench. There was a boost for the Clarets with Steve Jones also named amongst the subs and an even bigger boost when Andy Gray was also amongst them, back in the squad for the first time since the end of November.
The starting eleven showed just one change from those on the pitch for much of the last twenty minutes of the game at Derby, the one change seeing Chris McCann return for the suspended Eric Djemba-Djemba. In the absence of Wayne Thomas the captain's arm band was somewhat surprisingly given to Ade Akinbiyi.
I thought we looked good in the opening exchanges, we were passing the ball well in midfield and getting those midfield players up in support of the forwards. It was a really positive start for us but it soon came crashing down as Kyle Lafferty lost possession just inside the Rangers half.
A quick ball saw Lee Cook go clear down the left, the mistake had left Stephen Foster out of the game, and although Michael Duff came across he couldn't get there in time to prevent Cook shooting low into the far corner of the net.
Thirteen minutes gone and a goal down, and that led to one supporter getting up to leave shouting, “We can all go home now, this team of ours doesn't score goals.” And he did leave, not bad I suppose £24 for thirteen minutes of football.
He hadn't gone long when he missed something that hadn't happened since 16th December – we actually did score a league goal. Foster and Joey Gudjonsson linked up down the right hand side and when the latter hit the ball into the box there was Chris McCann to climb above the defender and head home past the helpless Simon Royce.
It wasn't so much a goal of the season contender for Chris as his goal there was last season, but who cared, we'd got a goal, it wasn't going to be Burnley nil. And for one Burnley supporter, currently based in the south of England, who isn't able to get to too many games, it was the first league goal he'd seen us score since Ian Moore got our third in a 3-1 win at Sheffield Wednesday in 2002.
If we thought the goal would spark a much improved performance we were disappointed and apart from a couple of half hearted efforts at either end, precious little happened in the rest of the first half and so the teams went in level at half time with the score 1-1.
Most fans seemed happy enough with that, believing that having gone in level, having gone in having scored a goal, we could really lift our performance in the second half and go on to win the game to give our season the kick start it so obviously needs.
To say the supporters were to be disappointed is the understatement of the year as the second half performance was just about as abject as it could have possibly been. We didn't trouble them with one goal attempt worthy of the name, but at the other end we conceded two dreadful goals and it could have been more.
The first came from a left wing corner. Foster and McCann got in a tangle and that left Dexter Blackstock with the easiest of headers to restore the home side's lead. You just shouldn't concede goals so easily from a set piece as that.
There was no obvious response from the players on the pitch, so Cotterill decided to change things from the bench with not one, not two but three changes. Off went the desperately poor Alan Mahon, the disappointing Gudjonsson and the shell shocked Foster to be replaced by fit again Jones and Gray along with debutant Caldwell.
In truth it made little difference, and just to prove it we went and conceded again from a corner. Mike Pollitt had made a superb stop down to his left at the expense of this flag kick. This time it was Jon Harley and McCann who failed to stop Steve Lomas getting in the header and with just under twenty minutes to go it was time for a quick emptying of the away end.
QPR knew they'd won it, took the foot off the pedal and watched us do nothing with our possession for the rest of the game. The final whistle couldn't come soon enough and when it duly did it was met by the boos from those Burnley fans still inside the ground.
We've gone from promotion/play off contenders to a side facing a relegation battle in the space of fourteen games, and make no mistake, unless there is a quick and big improvement a relegation battle it most certainly will be.
We're only a point behind last season at the moment, although we did get four points from the next two games last season. A year ago we didn't need any more points, courtesy of Brighton, Crewe and Millwall. But there aren't three clubs like those three last season and we are going to need quite a few more points. I'm beginning to wonder now just where they are going to come from.
Did we come away from Loftus Road with any positives? That's an easy one to answer, it is no. That is unless you consider the referee. Having suffered at the hands of the headline grabbing fool Mike Riley on Tuesday I have to say Dermot Gallagher was a breath of fresh air. Apart from missing John Gregory punching Jon Harley on the touchline, he got little wrong and allowed the teams to get on with playing, had of course they had both wanted to play.
We're back home next, against a Sheffield Wednesday side who themselves have lost their last five league games. We need two things from that game, we need a good performance and even more so we need a win. We cannot wait any longer to start picking up points. Only a complete fool would consider us to still have play off aspirations, but make no mistake, we desperately need points.
The teams were;
QPR: Simon Royce, Michael Mancienne, Danny Cullip, Damion Stewart, Gareth Ainsworth, Adam Bolder, Steve Lomas, Sampsa Timoska, Martin Rowlands, Dexter Blackstock, Lee Cook. Subs not used: Jake Cole, Zesh Rehman, Marc Nygaard, Ray Jones, Jimmy Smith.
Burnley: Mike Pollitt, Stephen Foster (Steven Caldwell 66), Michael Duff, John McGreal, Jon Harley, Alan Mahon (Steve Jones 65), Joey Gudjonsson (Andy Gray 65), James O'Connor, Chris McCann, Kyle Lafferty, Ade Akinbiyi. Subs not used: Danny Coyne, Wade Elliott.
Referee: Dermot Gallagher (Oxfordshire).
Attendance: 10,811.