[FrogMan]

November 1, 2007

Pkd	Inf	Name	Position	Morale	Form	Con	Apps	Gls	Av Rat
GK		Simon Jentzsch	GK	Good	8-9-8-8-7	100%	13	-	7.62
DR		Steve Finnan	D/DM R	Superb	7-7-8-7-8	99%	5	-	7.40
DL		Juanfran	D/DM L	Good	7-7-7-7-7	97%	11	-	7.00
DC		Abubakari Yakubu	D/DM RC	Okay	7-8-7-7-6	97%	11	-	7.45
DC		Danny Shittu	D C	Okay	8-7-7-8-6	98%	14	-	7.43
DMC		Freddy Guarín	DM RC	Poor	7-6-7-7-5	96%	8 (2)	2	7.00
MR		Christian Wilhelmsson	AM/F RLC	Okay	7-7-7-8-6	98%	11 (1)	-	7.42
ML		Fabrice Fernandes	AM RL	Good	7-8-7-8-7	97%	8 (5)	-	7.38
AMC		Cedric van der Gun	AM/F C	Superb	7-7-7-7-9	95%	1 (1)	-	8.00
FC		Jon Dahl Tomasson	F C	Good	7-7-7-8-7	94%	7 (7)	5	7.14
FC		Güiza	S C	Superb	7-6-7-7-8	95%	4 (2)	1	7.17
S1	Lst	Generoso Rossi	GK	Superb	8-8-7-8-7	100%	1	-	7.00
S2	Trn	Fábio Rochemback	DM C	Poor	7-4-8-7-8	100%	6	1	6.83
S3		Pascal Cygan	D C	Okay	7-7-7-8-6	96%	12	1	7.17
S4		Damiano Zenoni	DM RC	Okay	7-7-7-7-6	94%	2 (7)	-	6.89
S5		Tomas Locatelli	AM LC	Very Good	7-7-7-7-7	100%	1 (7)	-	7.00
S6		Peter Løvenkrands	F LC	Superb	7-7-7-7-8	95%	5 (3)	1	7.25
S7	Unh	Raúl Sánchez	S C	Superb	8-7-8-7-7	100%	2 (1)	1	7.33
-	Unh	Scott Donnelly	AM RC	Superb	7-7-7-7-9	96%	1 (2)	3	7.67
-	Inj	Youssouf Hersi	AM C	Okay	7-7-6-7-7	78%	6 (2)	1	7.00
-	Ine	Grzegorz Rasiak	S C	Good	7-7-7-7-7	100%	2 (2)	-	7.00
-		Bonaventure Kalou	AM/F RC	Very Good	7-9-7-8-7	84%	7	4	7.57
-	Inj	Cristiano Lucarelli	S C	Superb	6-7-7-10-8	47%	13	10	7.54
-		Michael Ball	D/DM L	Superb	7-7-8-7-8	98%	3	-	7.67

EUFA Cup group stage, Match #1: we play Lazio at Loftus Road. They're currently in 16th place in the Italy Serie A and in a major funk this season. Prior to this season they'd never finished any lower than 9th place in the last ten years. They lost 1-4 to Real Sociedad in their first group stage match and are evens favourites to win this game.

We're in trouble at the AMC spot as Youssouf Hersi is injured and Bonaventure Kalou's condition is very low. Cedric van der Gun gets the start. Even more, we play Manchester United in three days so I'll sit Kalou from this one completely.

This game is on TV and Simon Jentzsch is presented as our key man. The Rs have conceded only 13 goals in the 13 games that the goalkeeper has played in. Striker Rubén Castro is Lazio's. He has scored 6 goals in 13 appearances this season. They are predicting a draw for this game...

They show a 3-4-3 formation to start the game.

We take the lead early on when Fabrice Fernandes plays a corner kick short to Christian Wilhelmsson who wates no time centering it to the near post where Danny Shittu is waiting to head it in. Up 1-0 after 8 minutes!

They tie it in the 23rd minute after they catch our defensive napping with a long pass over everybody's head and their striker ran right past Abuabakari Yakubu to beat Simon Jentzsch one-on-one. Tied 1-1. Dang guys, give your keeper a chance!

This is the halftime score and we're getting outshot 11(5) to 4(3). That wasn't a pretty half although we did spend a whole lot of time on their end of the field. Freddy Guarín needed the physio early on and his condition is only at 68% at the half. I pull him out and replace him with Damiano Zenoni.

We get a great sequence moving the ball in the 73rd minute and it ends with a lovely overhead kick by Jon Dahl Tomasson on a center from Peter Lovenkrands to the 6 yard box. The keeper can't do a thing about that kick and we're up 2-1.

I decide to pull back the troups a bit and I Cedric van der Gun is taken out of the game and replaced by Pascal Cygan as a 5th defender. We go with a 5-1-2-2 formation.

We've put the lid on them and we control the ball from there on out and in the 83rd minute, Steve Finnan plays a nice 60 yards pass forward, ahead of Lovenkrands. All alone with the keeper, he shakes him out and scores the 3-1 goal.

Final Score: Q.P.R. 3, Lazio 1

I'd call that an "intelligent" win, as we got outshot 17(7) to 11(7) but we had the right tactics to convert our chances.

Fabrice Fernandes was selected as Man of the Match with a rating of 9. Christian Wilhelmsson, Cedric van der Gun, and Peter Lovenkrands all rated at 8.

We received $160k for the win and the $1.3M we collected in gate receipts for this game was a record high for Q.P.R.

Among other games in Group D, Real Sociedad won easily, 3-0, over Hannover 96. Here's the Group D table as it stands now:

Pos	Team	Pld	Won	Drn	Lst	For	Ag	G.D.	Pts
1st	R. Sociedad	2	2	0	0	7	1	+6	6
2nd	Q.P.R.	1	1	0	0	3	1	+2	3
3rd	Pasching	1	1	0	0	1	0	+1	3
4th	Hannover 96	2	0	0	2	0	4	-4	0
5th	Lazio	2	0	0	2	2	7	-5	0

Hannover 96 and Lazio have already both suffered two losses...


FM