Manchester City just need three points to guarantee the Premier League trophy this weekend.
Their former employees couldn’t possibly ruin it for them, could they?
Here are four men who will be fighting with their lives for QPR who have a special affinity with City…
Joey Barton
Barton spent five eventful seasons with Manchester City after coming through their youth ranks. It was at City that Barton earned his ‘badboy’ image, through a series of unsavoury incidents. These included an attack on a youth team player, and fight with teammate Ousmane Dabo, which saw him prosecuted in court. Barton did have some positive moments on the pitch with City, earning plaudits for his midfield game, making 130 appearances for the club. He toiled hard with City during a relatively unsuccessful time in their history, and will find the club’s success now bittersweet. After a series of disagreements with then manager Stuart Pearce, he was allowed to leave the club in 2007 and join Newcastle.
Shaun Wright-Phillips
Wright-Phillips has had two spells with City, one more successful than the other. He started off with the club, winning rave reviews for his speedy wing play and eye for goal and earned an England call up. He elected to sign for Chelsea for £22.5 million in 2005, but failed to hold down a regular starting spot. He returned to City in 2008 for first team football, only to see the club taken over by Sheikh Mansour days later. This led to increased signings and more competition, and despite early promise in his first season back, chances become more and more limited. He was still a City player when the season kicked off, and will be more than happy for his former teammates if they win the league, if QPR avoid relegation.
Nedum Onohua
While Wright-Phillips’ departure from City was without controversy, Onohua’s grabbed all the headlines, and a high-profile scalp in City’s boardroom. He had hoped to leave the club last summer, and an e-mail between Onohua’s cancer stricken mother and City Chief Executive Garry Cook was accidentally send to her, mocking her health struggle. While obviously making Onohua’s position at the club highly difficult, especially as he was out of favour, when this went public it caused a real storm, forcing Cook to resign. The full-back was allowed to join QPR in January for £3 million, and while it was the right move at the right time, the City youth graduate will be disappointed at how his exit unfolded. He will want to prove a point that he was good enough to compete for a full-back position and the club were wrong to not give him a chance this season.
Mark Hughes
Manager Mark Hughes was the man who had the City reins before Roberto Mancini, and Sir Alex Ferguson has attempted to fire him up to prove a point. Hughes would have dreamed that when City win the league, he would be the one leading the team to success. Hughes’ signings for City who are among the squad aiming to lift the trophy, included Gareth Barry, Carlos Tevez, Kolo Toure, Pablo Zabaleta, Nigel de Jong, and the centre-back axis of Joleon Lescott and Vincent Kompany. Mancini has helped the players improve and become what they are now, but Hughes’ role in the construction of this team should not be forgotten either. Of course Hughes bought some duds too, including Jo, and Ben-Haim, and he will hope his motley crew of QPR players thrown together improve upon their dismal away record which saw them thrashed 6-1 by Chelsea on their last trip.
Can QPR spring a huge surprise this weekend?
image: © Mafue
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