Bristol Rovers v. QPR (Pre-Season Matchday 4) [R]

[Atouk]

Bristol Rovers
v.
QPR
------
27 July 2004, 7:45 p.m.
Memorial Stadium
Testimonial for Jamie Shore
------

Rangers News:

Olly returns to his "other club" in a testimonial match for Jamie Shore, a promising young Rovers player forced into early retirement due to injury.

The report on QPR.co.uk (http://www.qpr.premiumtv.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10373~544892,00.html) doesn't mention if any of our players who are returning to fitness (Bircham, Cook, Edghill) are expected to play.

[Atouk]

A new story on the official site (http://www.qpr.premiumtv.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10373~544906,00.html) says eight players will miss tonight's game through injury! Here are the details:

Richard Johnson -- turned an ankle in training yesterday; expected back for Saturday against Crystal Palace
Lee Cook -- still nursing achilles injury; trained today, so could feature against Palace
Gareth Ainsworth -- groin; expected to play Saturday
Kevin McLeod -- thigh; expected to play Saturday
Matthew Rose -- ankle; expected to play Saturday
Marc Bircham -- making progress, but won't begin running until the end of the week, so is targeting a return for the opener
Dan Sh!ttu -- recovery still going very well and is now expected to return to full training in two weeks!

The article says eight will miss and only mentions seven. I assume the other is Richard Edghill, who has missed out of late with a minor injury.

Looks like we won't have much of a bench today.

Possible lineup sees Day with Bignot, Forbes, Gnohere, and Padula in defense, four of Ainsworth, Rowlands, Bean, Cureton, and Gallen in midfield, and two of Furlong, Thorpe, Gallen, and Cureton up top. Subs include the one left off among those twelve, plus Wes Daly, Nick Culkin, Jack Perry, and the trialists (Jon-Olav Hjelde, Serge Branco, Lewis Hamilton, others?).

[Atouk]

...four of Ainsworth, Rowlands, Bean, Cureton, and Gallen in midfield, and two of Furlong, Thorpe, Gallen, and Cureton up top. Oops -- that ignores that Ainsworth is out.

A few options are a) a Rowlands/Bean/Cureton/Gallen midfield, b) push Bignot up into the midfield and start Hjelde (or someone else) in the back, or c) give Wes Daly or trialist Serge Branco a start in midfield.

They should have kicked off by now, but neither site has the linups up as yet and I can't listen to the streaming audio.

[Atouk]

Reports elsewhere (QPRnet board) indicate Rangers hold a 1-0 halftime lead on a Furlong goal.

[Atouk]

or c) give Wes Daly or trialist Serge Branco a start in midfield.Looks like it's "c" -- according to a poster on QPRnet, our starting lineup was:

Day

Bignot
Forbes
Gnohere
Padula

Rowlands
Bean
Branco
Cureton

Furlong
Gallen

[Atouk]

A Tony Thorpe goal makes it 2-0 to the R's.

[Atouk]

Final -- Bristol Rovers 0-2 QPR

Furlong 17
Thorpe 82

Attendance 5,924 -- very nice for a weeknight friendly testimonial for a team that averaged 7,142 in league play last year according to FootballGroundGuide.co.uk (http://www.footballgroundguide.co.uk/).

The Bristol Rovers match report (http://www.bristolrovers.premiumtv.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10328~545124,00.html) is up and it looks like we could've had a few more in the first half as we really dominated things. Among other chances, Gallen hit the crossbar. According to the report, Rovers got back into things in the second half and had quite a few chances to score, but we killed it with our second goal.

[Atouk]

The QPR site match report (http://www.qpr.premiumtv.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10373~545135,00.html) sounds about the same as Bristol Rovers' -- Rangers were much the best in the first half, Rovers improved in the second, but Rangers had enough to end it with another goal.

Of note in the QPR story, Holloway was impressed with trialist Serge Branco, who went 90 minutes in an attacking midfield role, saying "He played very well for us tonight and with the Directors here, he certainly planed his flag in the ground."

Two trialists also got second-half run-outs: teenage Swiss forward Milos Malenovic (on for Furlong in the 58th minute) and Congo-born Swedish U19 international Ndiwa Lord-Kangana (on for Padula in the 63rd minute).

Other subs: trialist Lewis Hamilton on for Bignot at the half, Tony Thorpe for Rowlands in the 55th, and Richard Edghill on for Forbes in the 63rd.

Day, Gnohere, Branco, Bean, Cureton, and Gallen went 90.

[Atouk]

QPRnet's match report is online. (http://queensparkrangers.rivals.net/default.asp?sid=925&p=2&stid=8354297) It's a good write-up, including a look at the trialists who saw action. Marcus Bean was given the highest marks among our current squad.