• Rangers fear John Terry court case will increase tension
• ‘Anton Ferdinand will let his football do the talking’
Queens Park Rangers will increase security, with a greater police presence, for the FA Cup fourth-round tie with Chelsea on Saturday week. There are concerns that an already hostile atmosphere for the west-London derby will be heightened due to John Terry’s imminent court appearance for alleged racist abuse of the Rangers defender Anton Ferdinand.
Although talks are at an early stage, as QPR progressed in the competition only on Tuesday when defeating MK Dons 1-0 in a replay, it is understood more police will be inside and outside the stadium for a derby match to be played four days before Terry’s hearing at West London magistrates’ court.
The Chelsea and England captain is charged with committing a racially aggravated public order offence during an altercation with Ferdinand at Loftus Road on 23 October. Terry denies the charge.
Ian Taylor, a QPR spokesman, said: “As with every other fixture we host at Loftus Road, all procedures are pre-planned with the emergency services and local authorities, and this will be no different for the visit of Chelsea in the FA Cup fourth round. Our priority is always to ensure the safety and enjoyment of both sets of supporters, and stewarding, security and policing numbers will reflect that. As a club, we are looking forward to what promises to be a mouth-watering west-London derby.”
Regarding the alleged racist incident between Terry and Ferdinand, the latter’s fellow defender Danny Gabbidon said: “We try to move on, that’s what happens in football. There’s always another game and you focus on that.”
Ferdinand is “an experienced player and [he has] played in big games”, Gabbidon added. “It can be tough when everyone is talking about it, and your family is getting threats from people. It’s not nice. But he’s level-headed and he will just go out there and let his football do the talking.”
The defender feels that the situation has affected Ferdinand, too. “I’m sure he would like to have had it sorted out weeks and weeks ago – it’s dragged on longer than we thought it would and that makes it harder for him,” Gabbidon said. “When it first happened, the first few games after that he wasn’t playing. But he has come back now and he will want to put in a good performance in that game.”
Gabbidon also outlined how the new manager Mark Hughes has begun to alter QPR’s play after he took over from Neil Warnock as manager last week. “He just wants us to express ourselves a bit more, try to keep the ball more. He says it’s very important to keep the ball in the Premier League. And we’ve tried to do that. We are trying to work more as a team in terms of keeping our shape. He wants us to be more compact, close the ball down, things like that. It’s early days and he doesn’t want to bombard us with too much information too early. I think over the next few weeks they will feed us with little bits that they want us to do and we can improve.”
QPRChelseaJohn TerryFA CupFA Cup 2011-12Jamie Jackson
guardian.co.uk
