Dear readers,

My current season numbered 8 should be the most successful in the whole story. That's because Queens Park Rangers is still on its course to win several trophies including Premier League and Champions League.

I played 15 matches which resulted in 11 wins, 1 draw, 3 losses.

 

Premier League

It's interesting that all 3 losses happened in Premier League but it doesn't hinder to stay at the table top having 6 points distance from the closest persecutor - Man Utd.

As for the losses I uncovered some information already about tough away games against Arsenal and Manchester United at my FM Crowd blog:

Arsenal - Q.P.R. 3:0

Manchester United - Q.P.R. 3:1

Chelsea - Q.P.R. 0:1

It was really great that my players coped with their feelings after the loss at Old Trafford and were quite confident in the next game at Stamford Bridge. Q.P.R. was playing without Carlos Fierro but anyway managed to grab the victory against arch-rivals thanking to Douglas Costa.

It was particularly important victory!

Unluckily, this win became painful for my squad due to 2 sudden injuries and 3 suspensions. Therefore I had no rotation options in the next match against Liverpool what caused another our loss in a quite equal game.

Chelsea is still having an advantage in past meetings:

 

Carling Cup

If you look into Q.P.R. story achievements, you will see that Carling Cup has been the most difficult tournament for me since the very first season. It sounds funny but in the majority of cases Q.P.R. gets out of it it the 3rd/4th round. Twice we managed to qualify to quarterfinals. This time we excelled ourselves to become semi-finalists! At last!

It happened in the nervous and somewhat weird game with Wolves. It look like an equal game by shots. Albeit, by possession and passing percentages, The Rangers were better.

 

Champions League

It was not too difficult, but it was not too easy as well.

Napoli was beaten at home with ease but Sevilla is still very strong. We could only manage to play draws against Spanish champions. It confirms there can be a lot tough matches on our way to so dreamed trophy. Though my first priority is Premier League now.

Carlos Fierro scored 10 goals in 6 Champions League games and goes the 2nd with this amazing statistics. His attack partner in the national team of Mexico has 2 goals more.

 

Q.P.R. will meet with Lyon, very experienced Champions League club as you can see from the next screenshot. So it's going to be a tough challenge for Queens Park Rangers.

 

All clubs in the first CL knockout round:

 

Q.P.R. players

Only 6 guys have average rating below 7.00! Should I not be happy with that? Of course, I am happy!

All those 6 underperformers are young and should probably play better in future. I am slightly worried about Johannes Geis who is not so young actually being 25 years old. I expect the German to show more confident and stable football.

At last, I got reliability and great constant creativity from John Fleck. Now he has 10 assists in 17(6) matches.

Carlos Fierro is definitely the best and most valuable Q.P.R. player of the reported period. But today I would like you to pay attention at Abdel Hamid Gomaa, my substitution player who is having brilliant progress in trainings and overall.

Abdel Hamid Gomaa

My assistant manager suspects I am wrong putting Gomaa onto substitution bench and using James Rodriguez instead. Who knows, maybe he is right…

The Egyptian scored 2 wonder goals which I am sharing with you.

Gomaa was dribbling from the right flank

Lucky strike by Gomaa

 

Next matches

I would say Q.P.R. has easy matches ahead. Just think we will only play 2 matches with grand clubs in 2.5 months. Both at home. Serious opposition is going to happen from Wolves as well. All other games should won including Carling Cup semi-final legs against Bolton.

As for Lyon, it will be outstanding Champions League encounter!

What's your forecast for it?

How do you think will my Q.P.R. hold the 1st PL table line or even increase distance from other clubs to 10 points, for example?

Truly excited to blog for you,

Vitaliy Mokosiy