A poor performance and defeat at Falkirk on Saturday has some fans worried, for those that read things into pre-season games and results there's added meaning to Tuesday's match at Kilmarnock with just 11 days to go until the big kick off.

Kilmarnock v Queens Park Rangers
Rugby Park, Kilmarnock
Tuesday July 29, Kick Off 7.45pm
Pre-Season Friendly

After Saturday's disappointing performance and poor result at Falkirk Iain Dowie will no doubt be looking for big improvements from his team at Kilmarnock on Tuesday. With just two friendlies left until the big kick off against Barnsley it's worrying that the team seem to be going backwards rather than forwards - the crisp passing and playing out from the back at Northampton replaced by what was by all accounts a lethargic, disinterested performance in the first Scottish game on Saturday.

Not quite as worrying as Iain Dowie's post match interview it has to be said. Putting a poor performance down to the walkie talkies not working between the coaching staff is right up there with the Man Utd grey kit excuse and to praise his defence after a 2-0 defeat against a side like Falkirk is baffling.

With Falkirk's first coming off the boot of QPR centre back Damion Stewart and their second, some 90 seconds later, scored by a man left unmarked at a corner praise for the back four was not something I expected to hear at full time but apparently "as a unit our defence looks very solid. Aside from the goals Falkirk didn't create anything... and both goals didn't actually have anything to do with the defence - the first one, one of our lads let the runner go, and the second one from the corner again one of our lads lost his man on the edge of the box."

While the knives are not quite out they're certainly being sharpened across the message boards. While I would say you can't read too much, or anything at all, into pre-season results the lack of signings, the lack of quality in the team, the poor quality of our pre-season campaign, the interview given by Dowie on Saturday and a lot more besides is a cause for great worry.

We can't allow our side to under achieve for the next few seasons simply because they were bloody awful this time last year. Yes it's good to get a bit of perspective by looking back to this time last season when we close to administration and signing John Curtis and thank our lucky stars that we are where we are now. However a lot of people have paid a huge amount of money to watch QPR this season and, with due respect to the players, there are names featuring heavily in our starting elevens so far this summer that we would never have dreamed we'd be spending our £600 to watch.

People will want to see improvements this Tuesday in another tricky friendly against SPL opposition. The reaction to Saturday's defeat should leave the club in no doubt how quickly the atmosphere will turn at Loftus Road this season if the team doesn't perform to the fans' expectations - inflated by the bookies' odds and the inflated ticket prices.

Five minutes on Kilmarnock
Only the melt down at Gretna saved Killie from relegation last season as they finished one place off the bottom of the SPL - just for reference Falkirk finished in seventh position. This disappointing campaign came off the back of several seasons spent at the other end of the table. They finished fifth in 2005/06 and spent much of the campaign chasing third spot which is the best clubs of Killie's stature can hope for in this Old Firm dominated farce of a league. Another top six finish followed in 2006/07 and the club reached the League Cup final however they were soundly beaten 5-1 by Hibs.

Kilmarnock won the Scottish league title for the first and only time in 1965 when they won their final game of the season at Hearts by the two goals required to seal the title. They have won the Scottish cup three times, losing five other finals, but have never lifted the League Cup despite reaching the final five times. After a period of decline in the 1980s they returned to the top flight in 1993 and have remained there ever since – 15 consecutive years of top flight football at Rugby Park.

The problem Kilmarnock have, like every other club in the SPL, is that as soon as they actually start to put a decent team together and achieve some reasonable success their most impressive players are immediately snapped up by Rangers and Celtic. Kilmarnock lost Kris Boyd to Rangers in 2005/06 and then Stephen Naismith went the same way a season later. So having unearthed two very decent talents inside two seasons, talents you'd ideally want to keep and build a side around, Kilmarnock have had to sell both and are now essentially back where they started - struggling against relegation hoping to pick another star from the lower leagues or their junior set up. Obviously the same is true of teams like Fulham in the Premiership but with a 20 team league, more European qualification places and enough money to at least out muscle most of Europe and sign players it's not quite as depressing as it is for the "other" sides in the SPL.

Rangers have picked off Kevin Thomson from Hibs, Nacho Novo from Dundee, Alan Gow from Falkirk and so it goes on.

Charged with the task of keeping Kilmarnock afloat in the top division in this difficult climate is former Bradford City boss Jim Jeffries. He marks 20 years as a manager in September having started with Berwick Rangers in 1988. he broke club records for consecutive wins and games without defeat before leading Falkirk to the First Division title in 1994 in his next job. Jeffries won the Scottish cup with Hearts in 1998 but his career stuttered at the turn of the Millennium when he was given the unenviable task of following the Chris Hutchings disaster into Bradford City.

With the likes of Benito Carbone on a massive money, and the club in financial meltdown, Jeffries was unable to keep them in the Premier League and resigned in November of the following season after a bad start to life in the First Division. Three months later he was back in management with Kilmarnock and with his seventh anniversary fast approaching he is the longest serving manager in the league. Cup finals and consistent SPL status is testament to the job he’s done while selling his best players and reducing the wage bill.

Tuesday could be a nice comparison for those who like to read things into pre-season. While we were embarrassing ourselves at Falkirk Wolves were winning 3-0 at Rugby Park and at the weekend Coventry City are here. Of course the bookies would have you believe that we’ll do better than both this season so this could be interesting.

Who to watch out for
QPR fans may remember the exotically named Danny Invincible from his time with Swindon Town when we shared League One with them. The Australian forward or wide man joined the Robins from West Ham in 2000 and bagged 22 goals in 128 games over three seasons before moving north to join Kilmarnock in 2003. His record in Scotland is almost identical with 22 goals from 122 games. Invincible has regularly been linked with a move away from Kilmarnock turning down a move back to Melbourne in 2006 and talking about leaving to further his international ambitions. Jeffries has assured him he can get selected while playing for Kilmarnock and so he remains for 2008/09 after three goals in 30 appearances last season.

Veteran winger Allan Johnston played for many years in England with Middlesbrough, Sunderland, Birmingham and Bolton after starting his career with Hearts and then Rennes. His career has been on the wane somewhat since the turn of the Millennium with just 17 appearances in three years in a second spell with Middlesbrough, twelve at Sheff Wed in 2002/03 and then up to Kilmarnock where he started slowly but he improved after being moved to the centre of midfield alongside James Fowler.

Fowler has played for Killie his whole career since graduating form the youth set up in 1997 and is fast coming up on his 250th appearance for the club. Fowler has scored three goals for Kilmarnock, and four own goals, in his time with the club.

Spaniard David Fernandez, once of Celtic, carries a further goal threat in attack but it says something of their problems last season that Colin Nish was their top scorer last season with just seven goals and he has since left to join Hibernian. Allan Russell, who has spent his entire career in the lower leagues both north and south of the border with the likes of Airdrie, Hamilton, Mansfield and Macclesfield has arrived this summer along with Gavin Skelton released from the Gretna implosion at the end of last season.

Irishman Conor Sammon signed from Derry City yesterday.

Connections
Paul Wright
Striker Paul Wright was an instant hit with QPR fans in 1989 when he bagged two goals on his debut at Loftus Road against Crystal Palace. He signed for the R’s from Aberdeen and despite a slow start to the season he scored five goals in 15 matches including a great strike at Nottingham Forest and two in a memorable 3-2 win at home to Liverpool. Sadly he never settled in London and moved back north with Hibernian and then St Johnstone. He joined Kilmarnock in 1995 from St Johnstone for a club record fee of £300k and scored the winning goal for them in the 1997 cup final against Falkirk. He scored 70 goals in total for Killie until 2001 when he went on to join Greenock Morton and Falkirk.

Michel Ngonge
Ngonge was part of the worst QPR side in living memory in 2000/01. He started his career in this country with Graham Taylor’s Watford, scoring his sixth and final goal of the season in the play off semi final against Birmingham. Ngonge spent time the following season on loan with Huddersfield and after Watford’s relegation he was allowed to join Gerry Francis’ wretched QPR side for £50k. He bagged three goals for the R’s before joining Kilmarnock and scoring another three in 12 games. Certainly not the greatest player we’ve ever had down the Bush – prone to beating three men with searing pace and smashing the ball into the roof of the net one minute then missing a free header from two yards out the next.

Team News
QPR are likely to give a first start of the summer to Czech keeper Radek Cerny who has missed out so far with a hamstring complaint. Also suffering with a hammy is Peter Ramage but after sitting out the first hour on Saturday he’s likely to come in for Matt Connolly who left the field on a stretcher at the weekend and is awaiting the results of an ankle scan. We wait with baited breath for that as Connolly is the outstanding defender at the club in my opinion. Sam Di Carmine has not travelled to Scotland with the rest of the team, he has a calf injury.
Injury List

Prediction
Goodness only knows what to expect after Saturday. Things seemed to be going so well until the weekend and although I’m trying my best not to read too much into a friendly defeat alarm bells are ringing a little bit for me. Iain Dowie and the boys could really do with a good win on Tuesday to settle the mood back down and send us into our final friendly with Chievo in decent touch. More importantly though, with arguably our four best players already missing for the first games, is we get through this unscathed.
Kilmarnock 1 QPR 1

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