No Championship team has won more away games than QPR since the start of April, and Rumarn Burrell's goal was enough to put another notch on that particular bedpost at Swansea on Wednesday night.

For the last decade, Queens Park Rangers’ taste in strikers has resembled the body count of your common or garden British soap star.

Forwards of all shapes and sizes have come and gone. Each bringing a new wave of optimism, with the occasional hot streak or goals-per-shot percentage anomaly to think we might have cracked it this time. You can just see Gillian Taylforth on the front of Take A Break magazine, cuddled up under a big hooped scarf with Seb Polter – “I’ve got my man now and I couldn’t be happier”. Friends of the star said she was “positively glowing” at Seb’s seven goal haul from 33 appearances in 2015/16.

We’ve done our best to dress up our poor decision making. Lyndon Dykes brings a lot to the team other than goals (just as bloody well really) we earnestly say to doubting friends, pointing to things like clearances at defensive corners (vital work for your main centre forward). Years, literally years, we spent telling ourselves we just weren’t using Conor Washington correctly, that he couldn’t play as a lone striker (or with a partner, as it turned out). I think even Sharon Watts, who my grandad used to take great delight in calling “Lateeta” and Wikipedia reports has been married on four occasions and had an affair with a bloke called Keanu who ended up stabbed to death in a row over her baby’s parentage, might have looked down her nose at the money we paid for Macauley Bonne – QPR Championship record, 12 shots on target, 18 times caught offside. But Idrissa Sylla had that weirdly high goals-to-shots ratio for a while, remember that? And My Chemical Hugill’s propensity to score from 20 yards and miss from 20cm was cute for a while.

So, we’ve got to be careful, haven’t we, about picking up the phone to mum too soon. “It’s different this time”, “this one’s the real deal”, “I won’t make the same mistakes again”. The source of our disappointment changes, but the common denominator is we’re always disappointed in the end. The nearest we came to replacing Charlie Austin was signing Charlie Austin back again at the other end of his career. Which means when Richard Kone turned up here in the summer I wanted to physically poke and prod him a bit to find out what was wrong with him. Luton tried to spend £7m+ on this guy in January, half the Championship has had a sniff since, Swansea themselves were linked before splashing a reported £6m+ on Adam Idah, and he’s here, now, in the flesh, playing for QPR, on a transfer fee we can afford? What’s wrong with him, Billy? Why do I feel like you’re picking my pocket?

So far, nothing is wrong with him. Legs like the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels, arse like a moon of Jupiter, he’s mixing his days bodying centre backs and scoring four times already (halfway to last season’s top scorer total). We might have a live one.

Would it be greedy, or tempting fate, therefore, to think we might have a live two? Listen, I spent a year (well, the warm bits of the year) watching Tomer Hemed going through the motions, I’m a bit concerned about summoning a demon here but, while Kone was certainly the biggest feather in Christian Nourry and the recruitment team’s collective hat this summer, Rumarn Burrell is tickling my balls more and more every time I see him. Nobody’s going to pretend he’s technically proficient, he’s got a first touch that would make quite a nice penalty and you wouldn’t expect anything more of a player who was at Burton Albion last season and Cove Rangers the year before, but his pace and athleticism and runs and reading of the game make some difference to our team.

There was a lot wrong against Millwall at Loftus Road on Saturday – first and foremost, they’re a better side than us at this point – but one of the main issues was Burrell didn’t start. Apparently incapable of playing after a week in business class aircraft cabins (and zero minutes for Jamaica) we missed him badly, and only scored the goal we did once he’d come on to get it for us. At Swansea on Wednesday night he was back from the start and it took little more than two minutes for him to go haring after a ropey channel ball and turn it into a throw in for Rangers in a dangerous position through sheer bloody mindedness. His speed and work rate frequently turns bad balls into good ones. Keeping defenders honest, running laterally across the shoulder of the last man, closing things down, winning set pieces and throw ins. QPR fans are always drawn to players like this. We don’t mind if you’re not that good, if you run your blood to water. Jamie Mackie became a folk hero at Loftus Road and played Premier League football despite not being able to trap a planet. We might have a live two.

The Jamaican was heavily involved again on the quarter hour when – minute this – THE GOAL KICK ROUTINE WORKED. Nardi out to the recalled Mbengue and swiftly onto Jimmy Dunne, back inside to Isaac Hayden getting a rare start and out again to Paul Smyth who touched back to Dunne. This is it lads, this is the key, move the ball quickly, you don’t need that second touch, get it shifted, inject pace, use the momentum, feel it flow. Dunne committed two which allowed him to get Burrell one on one with his man – you don’t want that in your life, ain’t nobody got time for that. Cameron Burgess predictably got his arse handed to him and when Burrell’s cut back was touched off by Kone into the path of Nicolas Madsen it was time to put seal on the goal of this, or any other, season as early as October 22. Lawrence Vigouroux, a good goalkeeper but clearly not somebody invested in narrative arcs, dived left and made a strong save. Bastard. Mind you, probably just as well, if we’d scored that I’d have cum enough to pebbledash a lighthouse. Good football, from a good football team.

An actual full goal was not long in coming. The move on this occasion built down the opposite side of the field, and began not from slick QPR build up but a tremendous recovery run, tackle and pass all in one from renaissance man Madsen retrieving a counter attack caused by one of Paul Smyth’s “long throws”. Swansea committed, Madsen’s intervention so purposeful on a night where he was again the best midfielder on the pitch, there was suddenly space wide left for Koki Saito to draw Ethan Galbraith out into some deep water for a ritual drowning on a sodden night. Ball into the unmarked Isaac Hayden, cut back immediately first time, whipped into the far corner by Burrell for his third of the season and second of the week. Eat that and tell me you’re still hungry. Come on you R’s. I’ll travel all over the country to watch stuff like that very happily indeed. Lovely, as Barry Davies might have cried. Lovely indeed.

All in rather stark contrast to Rangers’ last visit to this corner of Wales on Boxing Day – the worst performance of last season without question, the worst performance in many a long year according to those who would know about these things. Whatever we’re calling the Liberty Stadium these days has not been an unhappy hunting ground for the R’s in recent times though – the four games prior to that three-for-nil-declared debacle all finished 1-0 and QPR won three of those. As both regular readers of the match preview will know I fancied Julien Stéphan’s team to repeat that dose on Wednesday and given how appalling my predictions are usually you’ll excuse me swinging some dick when I’ve got some dick to swing.

Simple reasoning, I don’t think Swansea are very good. They haven’t carried the momentum of Alan Sheehan’s caretaker spell on at all, despite a summer recruitment that saw their net spend second only to Wrexham and in Galbraith arguably the best pound-for-pound signing of the whole window in this division (though I did say that about Jordan Cousins once (none of you read that bloody preview anyway so why can’t I recycle the jokes?)). The Swans had three wins prior to kick off, against the bottom three in the league – both Sheffields, and League One-bound Blackburn. They’d won one in five prior to this, the stadium’s half empty, and you only need read our oppo profile to know how bored and fed up they all are down here. The glory years where they repeatedly thrashed QPR out of sight, with the likes of Michu running riot, are so far gone it’s hard to believe they ever existed. With the three promoted teams certainly not going back to League One this year, and a few Derby and Charlton-types chucking reasonably big money at it, it’s not a good year to be shit in the Championship and there a few clubs like this lot, Blackburn, Preston etc who’ve had the stench of death about them a while and need to mind their arse. They paid north of £5m for that Inoussa lad, they reckon? Hmmmm.

That was 11 v 11. Rather than stem the bleed, the home side decided to hemorrhage a whole player in utterly braindead circumstances. Eom Ji-Sung, probably the best of the home team on the night, had already dived under Jimmy Dunne’s clumsiness looking for one penalty when Brighton loanee Malick Yalcouyé did the same under challenge from Kone looking for another. Steve Cook baited the hook with a remark on the run, waited for a bite, and got an absolute chomp. Yalcouyé going head to head with the veteran centre back, thrusting his neck forward, Cook stopping only en route to the ground long enough to collect his receipt, and a red card from referee John Busby.

Not a great advert for modern football all round really. Alan Sheehan was soon carded himself when Paul Nardi bought a free kick of his own with a pretty obvious dive and Steve Cook took half-hearted pelters from what there was of a home crowd here for the rest of the night. But, really, what do you want the referee to do with that? Thick as a whale butty. Deary me.

Rangers were now in that uncomfortable territory of being expected to win, expected to take the game to the opponent, expected to dominate possession. Gareth Ainsworth turned out to be something of a visionary with his “possession can do one” mantra. The stats on this one just keep growing and growing. With 41.6% of the possession, Bristol City away was the eighth QPR win in a row where the R’s have succeeded while having less of the ball than their opponent. In defeat to Millwall on Saturday the R’s had 58% making it 11 games since Rangers were able to win while having more of the ball – 2-1 against Blackburn in February.

For a while that discomfort and unease was evident. Jimmy Dunne was booked for time wasting in the first half. Paul Nardi had to get a sharp, smart block in at the near post right at the start of the second half to prevent an equaliser. Amadou Mbengue was a very welcome return, arguably QPR’s best player, and makes a hell of a difference back there with his pace versus the rather leaden footed defence from Saturday – but when one of his charges through the middle of the park went wrong on the hour he needed makeshift left back Sam Field to come in with a big recovery rescue.

Incidentally, can we park the Sam Field disrespect a little bit? He’s had a poor pre-season and a lousy start, he’s come out of the team, we know his limitations, but he’s a decent player, good clubman and great lad who does not deserve the online fire that goes his way. He’d have been absolutely slaughtered in certain quarters had he turned in Jonthan Varane’s performance against Millwall. Here, having been bombed out and ignored, he was asked to play out of position at left back on a wet Wednesday night in Wales – not the first time QPR have gone with a high and mighty back four to combat Swansea’s propensity for width-way switch balls on top of small full backs – and he did everything that was asked and more. Not great going forwards, because when is he ever going to be that, but pretty faultless defensively and a vital cog in the machine of an away win.

What it needed, really, was a killer second goal. Without it we risked dropping two points and being subjected to a long and torturous use of the word “efficiency” in Stéphan’s post match interviews.

Here, more good news. Ilias Chair not only back from injury, but back in flying form, and showing that he can play the Burrell role when the Jamaican isn’t available. Hopefully Illy’s cameo here, which was a goal away from him winning star man from 19 minutes of action, will hammer another nail into the idea Kone and Frey should partner each other when Burrell isn’t fit.

Chair improved QPR 30% across the board. He was terrific. A game being allowed to drift towards a 1-0 suddenly became a forceful attempt at a 2-0, 3-0 away stonker. He might have scored with a reverse shot into the bottom corner blocked by a defender soon after coming on. He really should have done so when beautifully put through one on one by fellow sub Dembele but Vigouroux made an exceptional save. Steve Cook headed a resulting corner straight at the keeper when either side it was in at the same end of the ground he won a game here the season before last. QPR looked wonderfully fluid with Chair in the attack, and soon they sprang Dunne for a trundle into the area, shot off the base of the post, and remarkable miss of a near open goal on the rebound by Jonthan Varane. Here comes that efficiency word again.

It certainly would have done had Swansea equalised. Having missed all those chances QPR just had to hope they wouldn’t be punished in the closing stages of a sodden wet night in South Wales. Hope isn’t a strategy though, and top scorer Zan Vipotnik might have scored with a near post header well saved by Nardi, and really should have done when he missed the ball entirely from a low cross that seemed to present him with an open goal. Gotta love a Slovenian striker.

With Saito hobbling around effectively reducing it to ten on ten, Swansea came home with a wet sail and it was Rangers now hanging on. We never make things easy to we? Can’t just have a nice time. The game looked up when Swede Melker Widell caught an unlikely 25 yard full volley nice and flush in stoppage time, but the ball flashed wide of the post with Nardi rooted to the spot. Prolapsed rectums all round, the whole world certainly fell out of my arse as he hit it, but sometimes it’s your night. Sometimes it is written.

What is written for QPR winter and 2025/26 season we’ll only find out in time, but they’ve got a lot going for them as it stands. Not least up front.

And the possession stat? QPR... 46.8%.

Links >>> Ratings and Reports >>> Message Board Match Thread

Swansea: Vigouroux 7; Galbraith 5, Cabango 6, Burgess 5, Tymon 6; Franco 4 (Key 46, 5), Stamenic 5 (Widell 82, -); Inoussa 5 (Ronald 46, 6), Yalcouyé 5, Ji-Sung 7 (Cullen 73, 5); Idah 5 (Vipotnik 82, -)

Subs not used: Casey, Fisher, Fulton, Samuels-Smith

Red Cards: Yalcouyé 38 (moron)

Yellow Cards: Idah 41 (foul)

QPR: Nardi 7; Dunne 6, Mbengue 7, Cook 6, Field 6; Smyth 6 (Dembele 60, 6), Hayden 6 (Varane 71, 5), Madsen 7, Saito 6; Kone 6 (Frey 88, -), Burrell 7 (Chair 71, 7)

Subs not used: Hamer, Morgan, Morrison, Norrington-Davies, Vale

Goals: Burrell 18 (assisted Hayden)

Yellow Cards: Dunne 29 (time wasting), Cook 35 (unsporting), Kone 87 (foul), Chair 90+1 (foul)

QPR Star Man – Nicolas Madsen 7 Burrell’s the narrative, and the game winner, but Madsen set that goal in motion and was the best player out there again last night. The Dane made 81 passes, fully 20 more than any other QPR player, at 91%+ accuracy. Seven tackles, blocks, interceptions or clearances on the defensive side of the ball (Dunne and the much maligned Field the only two with more).

Referee – John Busby (Oxfordshire) 7 Big decisions all correct. Ever experienced Steve Cook has, of course, talked a young player into a reaction and then milked it like a fat dairy cow to get an opponent sent off. Do I like that? Not really. But as Roy Keane says when he reflects on his career red cards, did you give the referee an opportunity to send you off? If you don’t want a red card, don’t dive in the penalty area and then get all aggy when somebody says you’ve dived in the penalty area. It’s easy to blame and have a go at match officials, but what do you really want them to do with braindead behaviour like that?

Attendance – 14,254 (600+ QPR approx.) A chunky following on a wet Wednesday a long way from home included a chap to our left who started singing Julien Stéphan’s blue and white army a minute after the kick off with a steady seat slamming beat, and was still doing that, without stopping, 93-minutes and a half time later. You’ve got to admire that in a lunatic.

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Pictures - Reuters Connect

Gus_iom added 21:24 - Oct 23 That last line 😄😄
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Hooping_Mad added 22:18 - Oct 23 Great write up, how's the lighthouse looking.
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PhilT added 22:30 - Oct 23 Good point well made regarding Sam Field
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snanker added 00:41 - Oct 24 Top notch as ever Clive. Pretty in pink and back in black. U R'ssssssss
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extratimeR added 00:55 - Oct 24 Completely agree about the Sam Field Varane comparison, yes amazed Chair was so sharp, ( should have buried it), he looks rarity to go, like new signings really, will be interesting when Pukho back, yes terrific stuff from Madsen, only negative really is Vardi terrifies me, ( yes, great stop at the end), but you know he won't catch it, you know he won't come off his line, bloody heart failure when he starts thinking about it when he's got the ball at his feet in the six yard box, but oh well, clean sheet and great Dave. Cook looked sharper last night, Absolutely agree about Burrell, Kone worked hard, very funny match report Clive! ( And I did read the bloody pre-virw!. Cheers Clive!

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Antti_Heinola added 09:22 - Oct 24 I was saying Boo-urns. I mean, I read the previews.
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tsbains64 added 11:07 - Oct 24 What a singer! Hope he is there for the Derby game
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tstarhoop added 11:39 - Oct 24 trying not to chortle to loudly about lighthouses while drinking coffee in south Wales - top reporting as ever Clive!
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Burnleyhoop added 21:37 - Oct 24 I don’t think Burrell could trap Kone’s arse if he twerked right in front of him. No matter, Chair and co can trap the balls, just need Kone and Burrell to stick it in the back of the net. This team is only going to getter better as the season progresses. Exciting times.
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TacticalR added 11:40 - Oct 25 Thanks for your report. Yes, Swansea could have won it at the end. That was because even though we played well we were never quite able to make the extra man count. We won through moments of class, one in particular, and that was Isaac Hayden's completely unexpected (and untracked) run from deep in midfield which created the opportunity for Hayden's cutback to Burrell (who took his chance well).

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