QPR, with three wins in a row, will try not to do the most QPR thing of all when they head to crisis club Sheff Wed tomorrow afternoon.

Sheff Wed (1-1-4 DDLLLW 23rd) v QPR (3-1-2 DLLWWW 9th)

Sky’s Super Saturday Brunch Spectacular >>> Saturday September 27, 2025 >>> Kick Off 15.00 >>> Weather – Grey, breezy, dry >>> Hillsborough, Sheffield, S6

Jon, our regular Sheff Wed correspondent, filed his copy for this week’s Oppo Profile on Thursday lunchtime at which point his club were under two separate transfer embargoes – the EFL says Wednesday have not provided accurate forward financial statements and doubts they have sufficient funds to continue operating.

By the time we came to sub it and post on Friday morning, a third embargo had been added – for the fourth time in as many months the Owls have failed to meet their obligations to HMRC. In between posting that this morning and writing this now their transfer embargoes have gone from three to five – they owe money to other clubs for historical transfers and have outstanding payments to football creditors. Again, this is not the first time this summer they have been sanctioned for these offences. When payroll becomes due again on September 30 it’s likely a sixth charge will be added, because this club hasn’t been able to pay its wages in full (or at all) since the end of last season and will certainly not be doing so this time. A loan of nearly £8m secured against the ground may also be called in at the end of the month, which might finally be the tipping point into administration.

This is the life of a Sheffield Wednesday supporter at the moment. Every day, something new. Never something good.

Protests have been slow and steady so far. There were largely successful boycotts of League Cup ties at home to Leeds and Grimsby. Supporters are being encouraged not to attend at all, and if they must not to spend money in the ground – QPR fans are being asked to do the same in solidarity. There will be demonstrations outside the stadium tomorrow afternoon against the malignant ownership of Derek Chansiri which has this club in a lethal chokehold, but precious little seems to be changing and nothing at all seems to be getting done. There is a growing feeling, like Reading and Blackpool before them, that the rest of football will only start caring and acting on this long looming shitshow if games at this ground become unplayable. Perhaps P – P might start being a reasonable bet in these parts, and who could blame the locals for that?

Here at LFW we have written, for years now, in season preview after season preview, and oppo profile after oppo profile, that this meltdown was inevitable. Might not be this week, might not be next, might not be this month or even this season, but – like Mel Morris having the EFL “on strings” at Derby County – this lunatic was always going to sink this club sooner or later. Last summer, when Danny Rohl’s miraculous crisis management actually had the Owls marked down as a play-off dark horse, we said…

“Having Derek Chansiri as your chairman is like setting up your family home at the foot of a volcano that has a very recent prolific history of spewing liquified human shit into the air. One minute you’re having a nice time out in the garden, the next second the sky blackens and the bane of your existence hurls another load of Julia Hartley-Brewer broadcast your way. You can never fully relax, you can never truly switch off, with this guy around.

“The success or failure of this season in S6 will depend on one thing – who’s steering the boat? Potentially the division’s best manager? Or Little Lord Cuntleroy upstairs?”

It’s been incredibly obvious since Chansiri bought the club and spent a small fortune in transfer fees and wages on the likes of Gary Hooper, Fernando Forestieri and Jordan Rhodes that if Sheff Wed didn’t go up, and soon, they’d be in the shit. This has been a ship holed below the waterline since they lost 1-0 to Hull in a Championship play-off final even the Tigers didn’t really want to win – themselves battling their own egotistical maniac upstairs at the time. The Owls have been up and down to the division below since. There have been peaks and troughs, periods of good form and bad, times when you thought it might be fine. But with a tumour, you’re never fine until it's cut out. You might have a few years and some nice times coming from 4-0 down in play-off semi-finals, but it’ll get you in the end.

Get Wednesday it has. It would be very QPR to go there and lose tomorrow, and a win at Portsmouth last week shows there’s still life while Barry Bannan has blood in his veins, but they won’t be winning many this season and they won’t stay up. This is now an existential crisis, not a footballing one.

Chansiri has always said he’s happy to sell the club, and if the fans don’t want him he won’t stay, but he’s now leveraged so much debt from his overspend and other failing businesses against the club that just to get the keys here will cost you £100m. It is, needless to say, not worth that. Hillsborough is crumbling, the North Stand was closed altogether at the start of this season, the away end is a disgusting hovel. The only people even kicking the tyres on this place are chancers like John Textor, and that would very much be out of the frying pan and into the fire.

This situation provokes a lot of Maude Flanders-like pearl clutching. “Won’t somebody do something”. The new ‘football regulator’ clearly has this test case in its sights as a big early, easy win. Culture secretary Lisa Nandy has warned the Thai nutcase “change is coming” and says the new body will have the power to divest ownership in cases like this.

It is a difficult web to untangle, though. Football in this country, and particularly in the Championship where clubs are routinely losing more than £1m a month, is too far gone to impose things like supporter ownership. There isn’t a fanbase in this division capable of funding the losses their club currently records. The money has just become too silly, and rowing it back would be an impossibility. It's an interesting exercise - if you wanted to bring the German 51-49% ownership model into English football tomorrow, how would you start that process? What's the first thing you'd do?

Perhaps I’m being defeatist, but it is difficult to see how clubs at the top end of the sport in this country will ever not be beholden to the whims of a rich guy(s) unless there is literally a complete collapse in TV and revenues across the board and clubs have to start all over again – like ITV Digital on steroids. AFC Wimbledon is the dream, but their ceiling seems pretty set as a yo-yo club between the bottom two divisions.

In that most capitalist of structures rich guy(s) have to be allowed to spend money on their club, and as well as success there has to be failure. We can’t all be promoted. Some teams will be relegated, some owners will gamble and lose, some clubs will get themselves into the shit. It’s just part of the sport. Sure, they could (should), beef up the fit and proper owners’ tests, which are unfit for purpose when they allow the Oystons of this world to own a famous club like Blackpool and asset strip it through relegations from top flight to bottom tier. But Derek Chansiri would have passed that test, and any funding examination you like, when he bought the club. At what point do you turn around and say ‘enough is enough, we’re taking the keys back off you’? If a team gets relegated three divisions does the owner’s incompetence mean they lose custody? What about two relegations? Remember, this is a sport and a division that can’t even really make up its mind what to do with a game postponed ten minutes from the end because of heavy rain.

Let me be a little bit less defeatist and more proactive and positive. I do think there are changes the regulator could make…

The first is I would get rid of the FFP/PSR rules altogether. If an owner wants to spend to get his club from where it is now to where he wants it to be then they should be allowed to do that. All the rules do at the moment is protect the cabal at the top, and in the case of Man City and Chelsea they just find flagrant cheats and workarounds like the ridiculous situation currently going on with Strasbourg and ignore them anyway, while putting a glass ceiling on clubs like Villa and Forest.

However, at the same time, owners must not be allowed to leverage any debts accrued against the club. You want to play Football Manager, you want to spend £200m on wanker footballers and their agents, you want to have a go at getting into the Prem, that’s fine mate you knock yourself out. But, if you do knock yourself out, that £200m is on you, it’s not Derby’s problem, or Sheff Wed’s problem, or Man Utd’s problem, it’s yours. You can’t use the club’s debt to furnish the team, or buy the club in the first place. Your money is lost, the debt is converted to equity, the club does not pay for your mistakes. And it certainly isn’t to be used to prop up whatever other tuna canning nonsense you’ve made a mess of elsewhere – West Brom were lucky to survive their Far Eastern owner stripping money out of their bank account to prop up his Covid-hobbled business interests and it seems one of the chief problems at Hillsborough is Derek has run out of cash and has leveraged himself up to the hilt with loans secured against Sheff Wed.

The second is I do think there should be a method for taking the keys back, and there are two really obvious triggers for that. The first is failing to make payroll for more than a month, the second is failure to fulfil your tax responsibilities with HMRC. You do either of those things, for let’s say three months, and that’s it mate. No, that’s not how other businesses operate. No, it’s not a very capitalist structure. But football isn’t like another business. Football clubs should not just be allowed to perish at the hands of egotistical weirdoes like this fucking helmet. If a railway company fails in this country then there are still trains tomorrow because it slips under an ‘operator of last resort’ and football clubs should be the same the second that payroll and HMRC issues surface. It’s hard to feel much sympathy for footballers on £20,000-£30,000 a week, but what about the admin staff, box office employees, club shop attendants who are on £20,000-£30,000 a year and have a mortgage or rent payment due next week? Clubs like Wednesday and their employees can’t just be allowed to drift on month after month at the behest and whim of a shitgibbon like this. The keys should be taken off him, the club should be placed with an administrator who oversees its running and a sales process, and Chansiri’s money should be lost. If some debt collector or loan shark comes and breaks his fingers, well… shame innit, life’s a shitter.

It's another moment where, for all their mistakes and failures in turning us from a Premier League side into a Championship also-ran, you’re grateful for the benevolence and sense of responsibility shown so far by Ruben Gnanalingam and our ownership. They certainly didn’t get into this to own a shit Championship side, having bought in when QPR were on the up and in the top flight. It’s largely their mistakes that have ruined that position but they haven’t walked away, they haven’t saddled us with debt, and they have paid their dues and for their mistakes.

That, of course, could change. QPR, like Sheff Wed, are a club with a single point of failure. It’s reliant on a very tiny group of people funnelling a very large amount of money in each month to keep the lights on. They could walk away at any moment and Chansiri is a lesson in just how quickly payroll and HMRC racks up at a loss making Championship club once that tap is turned off.

So far, mercifully, they’ve shown no inclination towards that. The opposite in fact. They’ve invested in, and continue to invest in, long term projects like the club’s new training ground. But QPR’s need to become more sustainable through selling players is important for more reasons than simply wanting to have FFP/PSR room to make more transfers. It’s designed to get us away from that single point of failure.

Easier said than done, both for QPR, and wider football in general.

Links >>> Chansiri chokehold – Oppo Profile >>> Barker’s cheeky chip – History >>> Brooks was here – Referee >>> Sheff Wed Official Website >>> Sheffield Star — Local Paper >>> London Owls — Blog >>> Owls Talk — Message Board >>> Supporters Trust

Below the fold

Team News: The early prognosis that Kwame Poku might be back from his hamstring injury as soon as Wrexham away now looks rather optimistic as the former Peterborough winger is unlikely to make it back before Millwall on the other side of the next international break. Same with Ilias Chair although there is a chance Jake Clarke-Salter may play some role against either Oxford or Bristol City before that break. It will come as no surprise whatsoever to learn that Amadou Mbengue is already only one yellow card shy of a one-match ban. Joe Walsh is sidelined medium term with a broken wrist with Paul Nardi back between the posts and Ben Hamer on the bench following his free transfer switch from Saturday’s opponents Sheff Wed.

Michi Frey has yet to start a game this season and will likely be on the bench here, but that hasn’t stopped the club extending the contract of the 31-year-old beyond the one-year extension he already triggered over the summer. A new deal of REDACTED length was confirmed during the week.

Sheff Wed lost 14 players over the summer and were only permitted to add Man Utd youngster Harry Amass on loan at left back and Cardiff keeper Ethan Horvath on an emergency loan following an injury to star youth team keeper Pierce Charles. That injury, and another to Nathaniel Chalobah (can’t believe it) has stretched an already paper thin squad to breaking point. A three-match League Cup run gave 19-year-old Ernie Weaver and 18-year-old George Brown a first team chance which they have now carried on into the league games. Wednesday are currently under three separate transfer embargoes for failure to report future financial projections, having insufficient forward funds to run the club, and failing to pay HMRC.

Elsewhere: The Mercantile Credit Trophy lurches back into life tonight with a fairly typical Sky Friday night offering of West Brom v Marti Cifuentes’ Leicester.

Some really intriguing stuff among the Saturday 12.30 games. There was some idle speculation about Wrexham manager Phil Parkinson despite three consecutive promotions when QPR won their comfortably a couple of weeks back, but an impressive 3-2 win at Norwich to go with an earlier away win at Millwall seems to have calmed that. The Welsh side are now at home to Derby whose significant summer intake of 13 players has yet to pay in results – just one win in eight and a 1-0 home loss to Preston last week.

There’s a Midlands clash between play-off hopefuls Coventry and Birmingham, where the visitors are protesting at being charged £45 for tickets in the away end, while Swanselona are at home to Millwall. Weirdly, while QPR have won every game since their 7-1 shellacking at the hands of Frank Lampard’s men, the Sky Blues haven’t won since with three draws in the league and a cup defeat at The Den.

Chris Wilder’s return to Bramall Lane didn’t immediately move the needle on the Blades’ dire start to the year. A late defeat to Charlton started Wilder’s third spell with Sheffield red Stripe, and they now travel to one of his former clubs Oxford on a run of seven successive defeats and no goals scored in the last five of those. Charlton, meanwhile, host Blackburn, who were beating ten-man Ipswich 1-0 at Ewood Park last week with ten minutes left when the pitch became unplayable. The EFL have ruled that the whole game must now be replayed afresh, with Todd Cantwell’s goal scrubbed from the record but Jacob Greaves’ red card suspension still standing – because some events happened and some didn’t, apparently. A reprieve for stuttering Ipswich though, who now host Portsmouth.

Southampton are also struggling to live up to their summer billing as promotion favourites following a sound defeat at relegation fancies Hull. The Saints have a tough homer with early pacesetters Middlesbrough while Hull go to Watford who, despite some summer hype of their own, look like they’re going to be just as poor as always and work their way through three different managers again after Monday night’s loss at Millwall.

Stoke v Norwich and Bristol City v Preston Knob End round out the weekend list.

Referee: Premier League referee John Brooks is in the middle for this one – a regular face at meetings between these clubs. QPR are 3-2-2 from seven appointments with this official but if you take out games against Sheff Wed they’re 0-2-2 – just as well we’re playing the Owls again this weekend then. Details.

Form

- Having started with a draw and three straight defeats, QPR come into this on the back of three consecutive wins. They last won four straight league games in January, though that run sandwiched a cup defeat at Leicester. They last won three games straight at the end of 2023/24 when they beat Preston, Leeds and Coventry in the final three matches of the season.

- QPR have three wins from their first six Championship games this season – it took them 19 league games to record their third win last season.

- Sheff Wed were widely tipped to finish last after a disastrous summer in which Derek Chansiri’s malignant ownership came home to roost and they did indeed start with four defeats from the first five league games with only a 2-2 draw at Wrexham to break up that monotony. However, in the League Cup they beat Bolton and Leeds on penalties before succumbing to Grimsby, and in the Championship they surprisingly won their last league match 2-0 at Portsmouth last weekend. That’s just their second win in the last 15 Championship games.

- Sheff Wed have lost all three of their home league games so far without scoring a goal, going down 3-0 to Bristol City and Stoke and 2-0 to Swansea. Only once before in club’s history have they lost first four home League games – 99-00 in the Premier League

- Even before Sheff Wed collapsed completely their home form has been rotten for a while – just six home victories in the whole of last season despite finishing 12th, only Hull (five) won fewer on their own patch in the whole league and relegated trio Luton, Plymouth (nine each) and Cardiff (seven) all won more.

- Sheff Wed are the only side without a goal at home in the EFL. It’s just the second time in club’s history they have failed to score in first three league games at home and they’ve never failed to score in the first four.

- QPR will certainly be glad to see the back of Danny Rohl. Sheff Wed won three and drew one of the four meetings with Rangers under the German, with only Alfie Lloyd’s scrambled equaliser at Hillsborough a year ago to show for their efforts. However, Wednesday have won just one of their last six home league games against QPR (D3 L2), beating them 2-1 in December 2023.

- After winning four consecutive league games against Sheffield Wednesday in 2018 and 2019, QPR have now won just one of their last seven against the Owls (D2 L4).

- Sheff Wed and QPR have both conceded 12 goals – only Sheff Utd (13) have conceded more in the Championship. A clean sheet here would be Sheff Wed’s first back-to-back shut outs in this division since November 2020.

- Barry Bannan is the top scorer here with two, and also leads the Championship in chanxce creation despite playing for the second bottom side.

- QPR have lost three of their first four away games in all comps after winning their final three away matches of the 2024/25 season. They did win on the road last time out though, triumphing 3-1 at Wrexham.

As of GW6, QPR are currently the fastest team in transition in the division. A direct speed of 2.20 meters per second (as per @OptaAnalyst) is currently faster than any team in either the Championship or Premier League. A world away from last season (where Marti appears)#QPR pic.twitter.com/ojBnPqnwz0— QPR Analytics (@AnalyticsQpr) September 24, 2025

- Richard Kone has scored three goals in his last four games having gone scoreless in his previous 12.

- Harvey Vale created more chances than any other player in the match between Wrexham and QPR (five). He has two assists and a goal in his four appearances so far this season.

- QPR had a club record 23 different scorers in all comps last season and have set off in much the same vein this year with Harvey Vale the ninth different scorer already. Own Goals finished joint third top scorer with four last season, and Rangers have already had two in their favour this.

- QPR’s Championship games have seen 22 goals so far this season (F10 A12), with only Wrexham’s matches producing more (23).

Prediction

In our Prediction League for 2025/26 we’ll once again be handing out prizes for being top at Christmas and overall winner from The Art of Football - sample the merch from our sponsor’s newly extended QPR collection here. QPR_Hibs won last season’s Prediction League at a canter and is lending his thoughts to this year’s previews – that ‘first scorer’ guess is becoming a bit redundant mind...

“There’s an old Max Boyce joke about a Welsh rugby fan who travels to Twickenham without a match ticket in the early 1970s. Standing outside the stadium about ten minutes after kick off he hears a massive cheer. ‘What’s ‘appening?, what’s ‘appening?’ he shouts. An England supporter looks down on him from his seat high above and explains ‘All of the Welsh players, except Gareth Edwards, have just been sent off.’ Another ten minutes passes. A second massive cheer goes up. ‘What’s ‘appening?, what’s ‘appening? Gareth’s scored has he?’

“If that joke was rewritten about football and updated to the modern day, no doubt the punchline would be ‘Bannan’s scored has he?’ The diminutive Scotsman seems to have a habit of playing brilliantly against QPR, no matter how bad the rest of the Sheffield Wednesday team are. There’s a thread on the forum about whether we should try to go ‘man to man’ on him and, if so, who could do that job. Morgan or Field are mentioned as possibilities but that would mean dropping one of last week’s starting XI to the bench.

“I wouldn’t be surprised to see us go with exactly the same team that started against Stoke, with maybe the novelty of some substitutions made on the hour. It’s the start of a dreaded ‘three game week’ and Julien has already said that he will use some squad players, but this Wednesday side are surely there for the taking. Kone to score twice with a third coning from one of the substitutes. Wee Barry Bannan with their consolation.”

QPR_Hibs Prediction: Sheff Wed 1-3 QPR. Scorer – Richard Kone

LFW’s Prediction: Sheff Wed 0-2 QPR. Scorer – Richard Kone

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Pictures - Reuters Connect

snanker added 10:38 - Sep 27 Not Bannan again "oh woe ways me".........
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TacticalR added 14:56 - Sep 27 Thanks for your preview. That's a good point that an owner like Chansiri might have met the criteria when he bought Wednesday, but that doesn't mean he meets the criteria now. Yes, it would be good if clubs don't get saddled with all the past mistakes (and debts) of the owners. Ingham was always going on about this in this forum. Although things seem to be in our favour, you point out in your Form section that QPR just have not done well against Wednesday in recent years.

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