Sunday Times
West Ham 2 QPR 1: Harewood to the rescue
John Aizlewood at Upton Park
THREE points were theirs, and so was the fifth place in the Championship that belonged to Queens Park Rangers at kick- off, but yesterday West Ham United begged more questions than they answered.
In Rangers, they met opposition who, for all their brave defending, were overrun in midfield and intimidated by Upton Park at its most partisan.
With West Ham stung by Tuesday's 4-1 hiding at Cardiff, for which manager Alan Pardew offered no excuses, Rufus Brevett and Bobby Zamora found themselves on the bench. Don Hutchison's first start of the season saw the 33-year-old featuring as a forward, ahead of Zamora and Sergei Rebrov. Age may have withered his speed, but as Danny Shittu discovered, Hutchison's combativeness remains undimmed.
"He did himself a lot of good," agreed Pardew. "He looked really clever out there."
Rangers should have eased ahead in the fifth minute when Paul Furlong sidefooted tamely into Stephen Bywater's arms after Tony Thorpe had released Jamie Cureton.
Disjointed once Thorpe had hobbled off after half an hour, Rangers were outmuscled, surrendering vast swathes of territory as Matthew Etherington and Luke Chadwick swept forwards on each wing.
Chris Day saved acrobatically from Marlon Harewood and Etherington and when the goalkeeper was beaten by Carl Fletcher's piledriver, Frankie Simek, an American on loan from Arsenal, headed to safety.
Just when it seemed West Ham could be no more profligate, Rangers gifted them the lead as Chadwick danced into the penalty area only to be felled by Shittu.
"I don?t believe he touched the player," mused visiting manager Ian Holloway. Harewood stroked the penalty past Day.
After the break, both teams seemed at a loss as to how to proceed. West Ham, nervy after Cardiff according to Pardew, eschewed the gung-ho in favour of an approach based upon containment, although there was still time for Harewood to miss further opportunities.
If Rangers had been overly delicate during their troubled first half, with a deficit to remedy they were timid, struggling to commit men forwards.
Indeed, they had only Kevin Gallen's 59th-minute 20-yard volley, expertly turned aside by Bywater, to savour until manager Ian Holloway introduced substitute Kevin McLeod.
First, the former Everton starlet crossed for fellow substitute Gareth Ainsworth's header to bring another fine Bywater save. Then, in the 72nd minute, West Ham paid the price for their policy of containment.
Marc Bircham's long throw from the right was headed on by Georges Santos. McLeod, unmarked by claret and blue, tapped home at the back post.
After that, it was a test of nerve and character as both teams slugged it out like a pair of punch-drunk boxers.
Unsurprisingly, the featherweights of Rangers buckled and West Ham seized the moment. In the 84th minute, Zamora brilliantly stepped over Chris Powell's cross-shot and Harewood, lurking unmarked beyond the back post 10 yards out, gleefully crashed home the winner. "A great strike," said Holloway. "If it hadn?t been for the net, it would still be travelling.?"
Harewood doubles up
Dan Rookwood at Upton Park
Sunday November 7, 2004
The Observer
In a fiery encounter that had threatened to end in a damp squib for West Ham, a late cracker from Marlon Harewood sent West Ham soaring over their London rivals QPR in the Championship.
Adding to the penalty he dispatched in the first half, Harewood emphatically clinched all three points with a thunderous drive seven minutes from time, after QPR had drawn level through a Kevin McLeod tap-in.
'It was a fantastic finish, wasn't it?' said West Ham's upbeat manager Alan Pardew. 'If the net wasn't there, it would still be going now,' added his redoubtable opposite number Ian Holloway.
'I'm very proud of my players and I couldn't ask any more of them today,' continued Holloway in the 20-minute diatribe of passion and mixed metaphor that passed for his press conference. 'Our lift hit rock bottom but we're on our way up. We're all going to the Promised Land, and when you get there, it ain't that promising. It's a struggle from hell just to try and stay in it... I'm probably sending you all to sleep, aren't I? I'm a very lucky man and I love this game and that's all there is to it.'
But for the goals from Harewood - whose shooting was often hit and wayward miss - QPR's never-say-die character might have earned them a point they scarcely deserved. The muscular striker was strutting around upfront like Foghorn Leghorn on overdrive, with plenty to I-say-I-say for himself.
'You can say what you like about Marlon, but he affects the game, he's a real handful,' said Pardew.
Having scored from the spot after Luke Chadwick fell rather dramatically in the box under Daniel Shittu's challenge, Harewood might have earned himself a second penalty. He rounded Georges Santos, only to feel a sharp thorn in his side from Matthew Rose.
The defender calmly disappeared with the ball as Upton Park appealed, but the referee correctly waved play on.
Except for an early moment of prophetic vision from Tony Thorpe, that resulted in a tame effort from Paul Furlong, the first half was all one-way traffic for West Ham. And yet they didn't get very far, such was the profligacy of Harewood.
His supporting partner Don Hutchison almost scored a wonderful goal on his return to the starting 11, after a long lay-off with a knee injury. Bringing the ball under control with a touch of balletic delicacy, he unleashed a right-foot shot which didn't quite have the requisite bend to bring it inside the far post.
Though they had their fair share of second-half possession, there was little for QPR to shout about - though someone should tell that to the ever-effervescent Marc Bircham, who reinforced his growing reputation as the Robbie Savage of the Championship with his unapologetic belligerence.
'Nobody likes Birch, but I do - because he cares and you need players like that at your club,' said Holloway.
It was from Bircham's long throw that QPR found their equaliser. Santos flicked on with a back header to the far post, where unmarked substitute McLeod crashed the ball over the line from two yards.
West Ham, disgusted at the perceived injustice, rallied back in a ding-dong finale, full of cartoonish clouds of clashing limbs. In the end, they got the winner that their earlier dominance merited. Chris Powell, on loan from Charlton, saw his shot deflected across the edge of the crowded six-yard box. Bobby Zamora's canny dummy brought Harewood the time and space to pick his spot, which he did, with eye-catching ferocity, into the top left-hand corner.
'If I've got to lose to anybody, it's good old Pards - that's the way it goes,' smiled Holloway. 'I'll get him next time.'