 Thursday, 28th Jul 2011 00:00 by Clive Whittingham QPR slipped to their first defeat of the summer pre-season campaign, losing 1-0 to Serie A side Cesena in San Marino thanks to a goal from Albanian striker Erjon Bogdani. Technology is a weird and wonderful thing. Once upon a time there were four television channels in the UK, and everybody would sit down and watch the same programme at the same time and then go to work and talk about it the following day. Then multi-channel platforms exploded onto the scene and suddenly we had 800 different stations to choose from and conversations about television all but died because while one person was watching The Apprentice another was watching Air Crash Investigation and three others were watching pay-per-view porn. Now though - thanks to Twitter, Facebook and other such tools of the devil - we’re all watching programmes together again. Or, rather, we’ve got the same programmes on in the background so we can pay attention to them for one minute in every four in order to Tweet something absolutely hilarious about them. Similarly, back in the bygone days, football fans would gather around their sets every summer to watch grainy images and commentary that sounded like it was coming down a piece of string connecting two tin cans together as World Cups unfolded in far flung lands. Now when we watch England (still as shit as ever as it turns out) in South Africa it’s all in high definition with surround sound which make it feel as if the game is taking place at a stadium in the next street. But tonight I found myself back in that bygone age. I’ve recently treated myself to an HDMI cable, which is a simply marvellous piece of kit that enables me to take whatever is on my laptop and put it onto my television screen. It’s opened up a whole world of streamed football to me (Lindsey is delighted) but it all comes with that distinctly 1970s picture and sound quality. Televisions have already accelerated ahead of me – my HD ready set looks positively obsolete against the new internet connected televisions that could have streamed tonight’s QPR game for me all by themselves. Mind you, that would have freed up my laptop for Tweeting and other such wanky pass times and I would have missed the majority of the match so maybe it’s for the best. Yes we’re in the big time now folks, live streaming on San Marino TV of a pre-season friendly between Cesena and QPR. It seems like only yesterday Tracey, Paul and myself were hanging off the back of a temporary stand in Sorrento watching a QPR team that included Tony Roberts in attack lose 5-1 to a team of part time footballers, many of whom looked suspiciously liked the waiters from our hotel. Early team news provided by QPR turned out to be complete nonsense, blamed on “translation issues” – call me a philistine if you like but I would have thought the Italian for “Fitz Hall” was “Fitz Hall.” Clearly I’m wrong and I’ve been told often enough to remember it’s only official when you’ve read it on the official website or associated social media outlets. Or not, as the case was tonight. The official QPR website said we’d be starting at 7.30pm British time as well, which was also wrong. By quarter to eight the boys were coming out onto the pitch and the team had much more of a ‘first team’ look about it than for our other friendlies so far this summer. The favoured 4-2-3-1 formation was in place and Adel Taarabt was selected for the first time since his move to Paris St Germain fell through. He lined up as one of the three man supporting cast behind Jay Bothroyd the lone striker – Tommy Smith and Hogan Ephraim made up the trio. Further back the usual holding midfield of Shaun Derry and Alejandro Faurlin paired up once more while in defence Danny Gabbidon celebrated his recently signed one-year deal with a start alongside trialist Bruno Perone in between full backs Clint Hill and Bradley Orr and in front of goalkeeper Paddy Kenny. Rangers emerged onto the screen looking absolutely fantastic in their new third kit – red and white quarters with red socks and shorts. It’s a classic QPR strip, let down slightly by the needless white sash arrangement across the shoulders, but still an absolutely superb look for us to be really proud of. Let’s hope that the second shirt, said to be bright orange, is revealed and then consigned to the kit man’s darkest cupboard for the rest of the season. As for Cesena, well, who knows? With all Italia commentary and no onscreen graphics to speak of it was impossible to name more than a handful of their players so expect a lot of “the number seven” and “the quick fella” through this report. Former Chelsea bad boy Adrian Mutu did start in attack - the central striker in a flexible 4-3-3 formation which quickly slipped into 4-5-1 whenever QPR had the ball as is the modern day style. On a sopping wet pitch that looked more appropriate for growing rice in than playing football on the game started, and continued, at the sixty percent pedestrian pace we’re all old and wise enough to expect from such games. Adel Taarabt, looking like he’d indulged rather too much in his own wedding cake during the break, gave a brief glimpse of his talent by skipping past two players and unloading a low shot that the keeper dealt with comfortably. That was all the warning Cesena needed to get wise to the Moroccan and he spent most of the next hour picking himself up from one gratuitously violent body check after another. If he is to move from QPR, perhaps Italy isn’t the ideal destination for him. In response Cesena’s star man Mutu tried a shot from similar range which Paddy Kenny, less resplendent than his team mates in a bright pink goalkeeping jersey that caused my television to vibrate and my eyes to bleed into my brain, needed two attempts to gather. The game then settled into a steady pattern of play. QPR were keen to work the ball out from the defence on the floor to a greater extent than they had been last season, but Jay Bothroyd often found himself isolated as the lone striker with Taarabt mainly playing wide on the left and Ephraim completely anonymous through the middle. Cesena were able to handle this with some considerable ease but struggled to pose any threat of their own in return. It looked like a fitness exercise, which both managers will tell you was exactly the intention of it. Things came to life a little on the quarter hour. A poor piece of judgement from Perone saw him step up and play offside when his man was clearly on and subsequently able to run into the penalty area unchecked. To be fair to Perone he quickly got back into position and calmly robbed his opponent of possession as he prepared to threaten the goal. Rangers often looked dangerous when working the ball wide right to Tommy Smith in the first half and having done so in the immediate aftermath of the Perone incident the ball broke to Alejandro Faurlin on the edge of the area and his left foot volley sailed straight to the Cesena keeper. As well as the fairly cynical approach to marking Taarabt, the Italian stereotypes were also being conformed to by the match official. Midway through the first half the first really incisive QPR move of the game concluded with an intelligent ball into the area from Orr after a fine crossfield pass from Taarabt and suddenly Jay Bothroyd found himself in the six yard box, with the ball under control and only one defender for company. With his back to goal he controlled the ball immaculately on a difficult surface, held off his man and then just as he was about to shift the ball out of his feet and slam home the opening goal of the game he was crudely and obviously hacked down from behind. The referee, all of five yards away, ignored the appeals and played on. Rangers subsequently forced their first corner of the game but it was cleared to much shaking of heads from the visiting players. Things didn’t get a great deal better with the Cesena number six hacking through the back of Tommy Smith after being turned on halfway a minute later, a certain booking in competition but nothing more than a warning here. Then Bothroyd required treatment after landing awkwardly under a high ball. Having lasted just half an hour against Plymouth in his first friendly this summer, and with LFW writing extensively this summer about his propensity to bugger off early in games with trivial injuries, I thought that might be the last we would see of him but to be fair he played on and would craft out our best chance of the half before the break. Before that though Rangers had to endure a torrid five minutes in which they almost fell behind on four separate occasions. The trouble started with some poor judgement from Perone, who allowed a high ball to drop in behind him while appealing for offiside and pointing for Paddy Kenny to come and get the ball at the same time. This allowed Mutu, not offside, a sight of goal but Kenny saved his Brazilian trialist’s blushes with a trademark one on one stop down to his left. Danger survived, QPR could really have done with getting the ball to the far end of the field and regrouping but when Clint Hill hesitated in doing so he was quickly robbed of possession by Cesena’s Dominque Malonga who accelerated to the byline, cut the ball back to the near post and then watched hands on head as the ball bobbled fractionally wide of the post for a corner. QPR, typically, seemed fast asleep from that set piece and allowed a two on one situation to develop from a short delivery – when Malonga took advantage and whipped a low ball into the near post again Cesena’s nine nipped in and poked a powerful low effort off the base of the upright. Frustratingly Rangers hadn’t learnt their lesson and again allowed a subsequent corner, awarded after Kenny dived left to save, to be played short but this time the nine fired a shot embarrassingly wide and out for a throw on the far side. For me Perone, who started the trouble there, looked like you would expect a Brazilian centre half to look. He constantly wanted the ball to his feet and looked very confident when he got it there. But he would regularly charge off into the defensive midfield area leaving gaps behind him and his judgement of when to push up and play offside, when to get involved, when to leave it to others and where to stand was wildly erratic. I’ll use the phrase “on this evidence” a few times in this report I suspect because it’s impossible to judge anybody on 90 minutes of football under normal circumstances, and it’s grossly unfair to try and do so in a meaningless friendly, but on this evidence we already have three or four better centre backs than him in our squad. By contrast I was impressed with Danny Gabbidon who looked strong and composed with and without the ball alongside him. That said the Welsh international (copyright qpr.co.uk) didn’t get across quick enough to block another shot from the nine which beat Kenny all ends up but missed the far bottom corner by an inch or two. He’d skipped past Derry en route to that shooting opportunity, and that was the first of several occasions on the night when I really thought Shaun was starting to look his age for the first time since joining QPR from Crystal Palace. After all that pressure it was something of a relief to see the ball up the other end of the field for a while, and as is often the case in football when a team doesn’t take chances created while on top it almost resulted in a goal against the run of play. A ball in behind the Cesena back line gave Jay Bothroyd a chance to run in on goal from the shoulder of the last defender and after accelerating to the ball and holding off his man impressively he cracked a low shot across the goal that drew a fine save from Paddy Kenny’s opposite number. A further low shot at Paddy Kenny by Malonga should have been the incident that preceded first half stoppage time, but there was none. In fact our referee blew for half time a minute early and off everybody went for refreshments and adverts targeting companies who may want to hold their conferences in San Marino. There was some half time analysis with two elderly gents on the touchline who shared a single old style microphone between them, both looking and sounding remarkably like two of the Dolmio puppets, before the teams re-emerged onto the field. As you would expect, there were changes a-plenty and Neil Warnock had introduced Patrick Agyemang, Kieron Dyer and Fitz Hall for Jay Bothroyd, Tommy Smith and Bruno Perone during the interval. There were several flaws in this QPR set up that I shall address at the end but the changes did little to combat them and the second half started at a pace that would insult the terminally lazy were I to call it lethargic. Shaun Derry, once again looking old and off the pace I’m afraid to say, conceded a free kick that Cesena worked tamely through to Kenny and then in the fifty fifth minute QPR’s first promising attack of the half came to a juddering halt when Agyemang touched Taarabt’s well flighted cross back towards Dyer on the edge of the box but he lost his footing as he prepared to shoot. On the hour; total farce. Fitz Hall, looking a lot better than his Brazilian predecessor in my opinion, started a move with a well executed interception and ball out of defence. Taarabt collected possession in the middle of the park, where he didn’t spend nearly enough time on the night in my opinion, and threaded a perfect pass through for Kieron Dyer to run onto. Now suddenly QPR were in, and the very least they should have had as a reward was a penalty kick when Dyer appeared to be cleaned out as he entered the area. With no whistle forthcoming Dyer still managed to get a shot away that was smothered by Antonioli the Cesena goalkeeper. The ball broke loose to Taarabt who attempted to set Dyer up again but although the pass was good Dyer, appearing to believe the game had stopped, was now too busy arguing with the referee to do anything with it and the ball bounced off his shins to a Cesena player who brought it away into open field. He’s going to fit in nicely. Midway through the half Warnock replaced Derry with Petter Vaagan Moen. The Norwegian joined the three man supporting cast in attack leaving Dyer to drop back in alongside Faurlin to play a sort of passing-quarter-back style game similar to that which Jimmy Bullard executed so well at Loftus Road for Ipswich last season. Whether Dyer’s future lays as a strong running attacker or that more considered role further back we’ll only know when the competitive action starts and I sense it probably depends on who else we can bring in between now and then. The change almost had an immediate effect. Mutu had a shot blocked on the edge of the QPR area in what was a rare Cesena attack and the R’s cleared the ball away. It seemed certain that the ball would be coming back at them when Dyer committed a blatant foul on the halfway line but the match official bizarrely allowed play to continue and Dyer, as surprised as anybody else, sent Taarabt through one on one with the goalkeeper. I’m sure we’ve all seen Mario Balotelli’s ill-advised back heal and subsequent hooking by Roberto Mancini in a similar situation this week – Taarabt’s poorly executed chip wasn’t anywhere near as bad as that but it was a poor finish in a promising situation and I can’t imagine it is the option he would have taken in competitive football. Cesena and their supporters, serial collectors of big gay flags it seems, were relieved to see it plop down onto the roof of the net. Further substitutions followed as Matt Connolly replaced Danny Gabbidon and Akos Buzsaky came on for the hard working but otherwise anonymous Hogan Ephraim. Connolly started at centre back, then moved to right back when Kaspars Gorkss, rumoured to be Southampton bound, came on for Bradley Orr. Mutu found himself crowded out of a chance in the area and Vaagan Moen barely tested the Italian keeper with a low shot as the game started to peter out. The Italians for their part had also brought on a number of players, including a young lad at number 17 who looked a lot like Luis Suarez of Liverpool. He was clearly keen to impress and dragged a shot wide ten minutes from time after a forceful run, then had three touches in a flowing move that ended with a shot wide from a colleague. The new Cesena coach Marco Giampaolo then made the crucial substitution in the game. His new high profile signing Adrian Mutu was withdrawn with seven minutes left, and veteran Albanian target man Erjon Bogdani came on to replace him. Bogdani has been repeatedly linked with a move to QPR over the last three years since Falvio Briatore took over at Loftus Road. He was head and shoulders the best player on the pitch in W12 two summers ago when Chievo won a pre-season game against Iain Dowie’s QPR side and judging by what happened immediately after he came on here he’s still more than useful. With Matt Connolly appealing in vain for an offside flag Bogdani strode onto a long ball over the top of the QPR defence, brought it under control in the area and then from a tight angle calmly curled a fabulous finish past Kenny and into the far top corner. It was his first touch of the ball after coming on and Giampaolo saluted his decision by launching a small cigar – which frankly you don’t see enough of in English dugouts these days. Fine words are said about the meaningless nature of results at this time of year, but if you think there aren’t some Stoke City fans sitting at home with a little doubt in their mind after weekend defeats to Brentford and Aldershot then think again. Nobody wants to lose a game of football and QPR set about trying to equalise here with some purpose. Taarabt saw a long range free kick easily saved, and a sublime through ball from Akos Buzsaky had Clint Hill in the clear but although he beat the keeper with a tentative finish Ceccarelli got back and cleared it from the goal line. As the game became stretched Kenny was forced into a nervous save under his cross bar from a lobbed effort. Alas the referee’s dodgy time-piece didn’t stretch to too much stoppage time and the final whistle signalled QPR’s first defeat of the summer pre-season campaign. As already stated, it’s almost impossible to judge anything from such a game. Mitigation accepted – dodgy pitch, only a friendly, trying new things, first serious opposition of the summer, still time to go before the first match, should have had two penalties etc – the opinion I formed watching this game was that we are four good quality players short of a competitive Premiership side. At centre back Gabbidon looked composed and we must hope he achieves something he hasn’t done for three years and stays fit, but we lack a partner for him. I’m seriously unconvinced by Perone and would rather see Gorkss stay and play there. To rely on both Gabbidon and Hall to stay fit and partner each other would be ignoring the clear facts in front of our faces and Matt Connolly has shown little in the past 18 months to suggest he’s a Premiership centre half. At full back, Orr and Hill were very solid defensively as always but the lack of any attacking threat from either of them was really noticeable here against better quality opposition than we faced last season – judging by Cesena’s team, league positions, history and recent record I think Wigan would be a fair comparison football wise. And in attack there was clearly one piece of the puzzle missing. Bothroyd showed nice touches and aerial ability in the lone striker role, Taarabt caused some problems from the left and Smith started brightly on the right before fading but that left a gaping hole in the middle of the park which left all three of them isolated. Taarabt usually fills that area, and maybe he will do once his fitness is up to scratch although Warnock was quoted at the end of last season saying we would use him differently in the Premiership. Kieron Dyer, equally, might be the man. However Bothroyd seemed to quite often drift off into the right channel from where he scored an astonishing goal against QPR for Cardiff last season. That’s fine for him but it left a vacant penalty area so I wonder if the interest in DJ Campbell is because Warnock would like a busy, hard working, penalty box striker to play off the main target man. On this evidence, with the positions Bothroyd took up, that could really work. It will work a whole lot better than persisting with Hogan Ephraim anyway. So that’s two full backs, potentially another centre half and a quick and lively attacker to play off Bothroyd. And, as mentioned, Shaun Derry concerned me a bit tonight as well. Still, loads of time yet. QPR: Kenny 7, Orr 6 (Gorkss 78, -), Gabbidon 7 (Connolly 70, 6), Perone 5 (Hall 7), Hill 6, Faurlin 6, Derry 5 (Vaagan Moen 65, 6), Smith 6 (Dyer 46, 7), Ephraim 5 (Buzsaky 75, 6), Taarabt 6, Bothroyd 6 (Agyemang 46, 5) Cesena: Antonioli, Comotto (Ceccarelli 78), Ricci, Rossi, Lauro, Colucci (De Feudis, 87) Parolo, Candreva, Malonga (Cesar Meza Colli, 57), Giaccherini (Livaja, 63), Mutu (Bogdani, 83) QPR Star Man – Danny Gabbidon 7 Calm and composed in a rickety and frequently changing back line. If you do want to Tweet us about how awful Twitter is then please feel free to follow @loftforwords for regular grumpy old man updates. 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