Following today’s clash between Queens Park Rangers and Bolton Wanderers, here are the instant reactions from both managers.
Queens Park Rangers hosted Bolton Wanderers at Loftus Road for a 3pm kick off on Saturday February 17, with two second half headers giving the hosts victory.
A straight red card for Mark Little in the 54th minute turned the game in QPR’s favour and with just under 20 minutes remaining Joel Lynch turned Matt Smith’s header into the net and in stoppage time Smith got himself on the scoresheet to double their advantage.
Teams:
QPR:
Smithies, Onuoha, Lynch, Robinson, Wszolek, Luongo, Scowen, Freeman, Bidwell (Smyth 64), Smith, Washington (eze 82).
Substitutes:
Furlong, Ingram, Baptiste, Chair, Osayi-Samuel.
Bolton:
Alnwick, Burke, Wheater, Beevers, Little, Derik (Morais 81), Henry, Vela (Karacan 45), Robinson, Walker (Le Fondre 69), Ameobi.
Substitutes:
A Taylor, Dervite, Howard, Clough.
Speaking to the BBC’s cameras a short time after match day referee Scott Duncan blew the final whistle, QPR manager Ian Holloway explained.
‘Even Ruud van Nistelrooy needed four chances to take one. I’m delighted with Matt Smith because I’ve been working him – we’re bringing him in earlier than everyone else. We feel he can get a lot fitter than he has been before. He’s feeling the benefit of it. We were professional today and we did what we needed to do. I’m delighted with that. Even though we didn’t get what we deserved in the first half, we still kept going and we looked dangerous. Hopefully our fans will go away feeling happy and feeling that actually that wasn’t bad. The performance today I thought merited a pat on the back for my lads because I thought they were professional.’
Bolton manager Phil Parkinson in his comparative interview explained.
‘Mark Little’s feet left the ground and he’s given the ref a decision to make. Away from home, when you’ve got the weak officials we had today, it was always going to end up in a red. I can see why he’s given that one, but I thought the all-round performance of all four officials was very poor. Loftus Road is a tight ground, the crowd are on top of you and Ian Holloway’s jumping up and down appealing for everything and having a go at the ref at half-time. You need strong officials and we didn’t have them today. I think if that had been a QPR player it would have been a yellow card.’
