Newcastle United 1-0 Queens Park Rangers
Moussa Sissoko 78
Harry Redknapp has long admired Moussa Sissoko, but he could have done without the France midfielder cutting through the Tyneside gloom and scoring Newcastle United’s winning goal, on a day that can hardly have enhanced the QPR manager’s job security.
A couple of months ago, Alan Pardew found himself in a similar boat, but six straight victories – five in the Premier League – and four successive clean sheets have resulted in Newcastle’s relegation fears being replaced by European ambitions.
For just over 30 minutes, the afternoon belonged to Ryan Taylor. Making his first Premier League start for two and a half years after two cruciate ligament injuries, Taylor shone in midfield. Sometimes breaking up play effectively from his central midfield role, sometimes unnerving QPR courtesy of expert dead-ball delivery, he played like a man who had never been away.
Then he went down. The physio arrived, manipulated his knee and immediately put a consolatory arm around him. Eventually, Taylor got to his feet and limped off to a standing ovation, tears streaming down his face. With Pardew offering a sympathetic embrace things did not look good.
It all rather put a blight on an afternoon when Rob Green had earlier tipped Taylor’s chipped shot over the bar after Rémy Cabella’s outswinging corner and Jack Colback’s clever decoy run.
Then, with Redknapp’s side increasingly fazed by Newcastle’s pace on the break and their enthusiasm for forcing a high tempo, Ayoze Pérez sped away on the counterattack, Cabella threw in some penalty-area trickery, and Taylor’s shot forced Green into a decent save.
The tears came soon afterwards and the game did not really get going again until the second half. Evidently galvanised by Pardew’s half-time chat, Pérez and friends threw everything at Steven Caulker, Richard Dunne and company.
Undeterred, QPR clung on as, minute by minute, they came closer to claiming their hitherto elusive first away point of this Premier League campaign. If there was little to suggest they might return to west London with all three points, the first-half moment when Paul Dummett slipped in front of Bobby Zamora and the striker sent a shot drifting across the face of goal offered Redknapp a glimmer of optimism.
Aware that injuries had deprived Pardew of, among others, his first-choice central-defensive combination of Fabricio Coloccini and Steven Taylor, QPR’s manager had switched from 4-5-1 to 4-4-2. On paper, the attacking combination of Zamora and Charlie Austin looked fairly formidable, but, all too often, they were left chasing long balls and lost causes.
Joey Barton has always liked a cause. By his standards, this proved a relatively quiet return to St James’ Park, but he was quick to intervene when Chris Foy, quite reasonably, lectured Zamora after the striker, leading with an elbow, had clattered into Colback.
There was also a minor contretemps with Cabella but, largely, Barton concentrated on attempting to get QPR back into things. He generally did a pretty decent job, particularly after Redknapp shifted him from wide on the right to the central midfield role, which arguably suits him much better.
By now, Pardew had switched to a twin striker system with Papiss Cissé stepping off the bench to join Pérez, but it was Sissoko, who finally eluded Green.
Having played a one-two with Sammy Ameobi, Sissoko shot through a packed penalty area and into the top corner. At the end of an afternoon in which Dummett’s penchant for whacking long balls up field emphasised how important Coloccini’s customary composure and ability to build from the back is to Newcastle, the relief was palpable.
Although Barton contrived to have the last word – clearing a late Cissé shot off the line – even he could not silence the triumphant choruses of Blaydon Races.
