Every year the start of the football season seems to get earlier and earlier. This season by the time the schools go back at the end of the summer holidays in September, QPR will already have played five Championship fixtures. More than a tenth of the season will be gone.
What can we expect at Loftus Road this year? So far it's all a bit of a mystery.
Preseason games are rarely much of a guide but this season has been even stranger. We've won one game 5-0 and lost another 6-0. The rest have been little more than get-fit sessions, and getting to know the new manager.
Last season ended with the unceremonious departure of our last manager Marti Cifuentes, who had become a popular figure with the fans. Cifuentes did get us out of big relegation trouble. When he arrived we looked certain for the drop. He stopped the rot. But he clearly subsequently fell out with the club's hierarchy and in the spring was put on what was termed 'gardening leave'.
Exactly what happened remains shrouded in legal argument though it does seem the club were careful not call it a dismissal, to avoid making any redundancy payment. Cifuentes has now gone to Leicester. The timing of his departure was a mystery too as he had signed a new long term contract with the club at the start of the season.
The new man in charge of the R's is Frenchman Julien Stephan. He has formerly managed in France's Ligue 1 and has a reputation for developing young talent. One of his proteges was Ousmane Dembele, now with PSG.
Over the summer QPR have signed a number of seemingly promising players. But then we did that last season too and it got us to the heady heights of 18th in the league table. Hopefully though, one big difference this season compared with last is that some of the new players have some experience of the grind of English football. Too many last season didn't.
There has been a lot of talk at QPR recently about developing young players for their future potential and resale value. Quite a few experienced players have been allowed to leave. The recent fans forum sounded more like a business school seminar than a conversation about football. But with the club losing £25million a year, an obsession with the balance sheet is understandable.
The big football danger is that we end up with a team full of young potentials, but no one who is quite ready for the next game.
Last season one of the big gaps in the team was that we didn't have any strikers who could score. We had strikers with an uncanny ability to miss and a large roster of unsuitable stop gaps, but no one actually able to put the ball in the net.
One player who clearly can score goals is Charlie Kelman. He who spent last season on loan to Leyton Orient as they won promotion from League One. In the process he scored 23 goals for the O's. In a move which surprised many he has now been transferred to our Championship rivals Charlton for £3million. That balance sheet again.
One piece of definite good news has been the re-signing of Jimmy Dunne and the decision to make him captain. At one point he looked as though he was heading out of Loftus Road and down the M1 for Sheffield United.
He is not an elegant player but he does bring a real sense of spirit and determination. Something which, in our admirable bid to play attractive football too often gets lost.
In the end my hunch is that this season will be pretty much a repeat of last season. Some highs, some lows. Hopefully we will end up in the comfort zone of mid-table. Nothing special. Nothing too bad. Yes, that's QPR for you.
The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and unless specifically stated are not necessarily those of Hammersmith & Fulham Council.
