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Ask a
football fan to name a Queens Park Rangers legend and they will
likely say one of three names, Rodney Marsh, Stan Bowles or Les
Ferdinand, but Les’ story is a little bit different to that of
his famous predecessors. Rodney Marsh was the star that the 60’s
team was built around, Stan Bowles was his wayward replacement,
and a star in the making. Les Ferdinand was almost nothing, a
decent non league signing who was nearly bombed out of the club
before he’d made an impact.
Ferdinand
joined from Hayes in April 1987 and made his debut two weeks
later as a substitute in away game at Coventry, it ended in a
4-1 defeat. He was given another run out in our next away game,
a 7-1 mauling at Sheffield Wednesday. Life at QPR was not
getting off to a good start for the twenty year old and by his
own admission he had gotten in with a bad crowd, the Rangers
brat pack as he calls them.
“These were
guys who wanted to leave the club and were a bit rebellious” Les
told me in an interview two years ago. “Somehow I found myself
in with them and we got into a few scrapes. I was the rebel
without a cause for a while." Luckily for Les he had a manager
in Jim Smith who believed in him but, at the same time, could
see where he was headed. Jim packed him off on loan to the
Turkish league side Besiktas and it saved his career.
“It was the
making of me, it was the apprenticeship I never had” said Les.
“I couldn’t speak the language that well so all I could do was
play and concentrate on football. The coaching was great too,
the manager Gordon Milne took me under his wing over there and
was fantastic to me. He played a big part in making me what I am
today.”
But things
were changing at Rangers, while Les was in Turkey Jim Smith left
Loftus Road for Newcastle and was replaced by Trevor Francis.
Milne wanted to extend Ferdinand’s loan but Trevor Francis was
happy to make the move permanent. Had that happened it would
have cost Rangers nearly 100 goals, several top half, top flight
finishes and the best part of six million quid. Still I guess
Francis wasn’t a fortune teller!
As it
happened Besiktas couldn’t afford the half a million Francis was
demanding so Les returned to Shepherds Bush to resume his
Rangers career for the start of the 1989-90 season. He made his
Loftus Road debut in a nil nil draw against Millwall in November
1989 wearing the number ten shirt, but it was the home match two
weeks later against Chelsea that saw the start of his legend
status. Les lined up against the old enemy and scored twice in a
4-2 win, the significance of which was totally lost on him at
the time.
“It wasn’t
until that day that I realised how important beating Chelsea was
to Queens Park Rangers fans” he said. “Being a black kid from
Ladbroke Grove, I didn’t really go to football because of the
racist problems so I wasn’t aware of the importance of the
fixture really. But those goals almost made me a hero over
night, it was fantastic.”
Just as his
career looked like it might take off, he hit problems again when
Trevor Francis was sacked less than a year later. His
replacement, Don Howe, paid a million pounds to bring Roy
Wegerle to Loftus Road and with Mark Falco also at the club, Les
was the odd one out.
“Don Howe
had let it be known that Mark Falco and Roy Wegerle were going
to be his main strike partnership because he felt Mark and I
couldn’t play together so I went through the rest of the season
stuck on the sub’s bench. I also remember that I took a bit of
stick from the supporters at the time too, I got the impression
that they felt I wasn’t living up to my potential and were
disappointed with my performances. So it wasn’t always rosy at
QPR for me.”
Things would
change for Les very quickly, towards the end of the 1990-91
season Rangers found themselves short of strikers and Howe was
forced into partnering Les with Bradley Allen for the visit of
Luton. Ferdinand scored both goals in a 2-1 win and went on to
hit five more goals in his next six games. That summer Don Howe
was sacked by Chairman Richard Thompson and replaced by Gerry
Francis, who immediately set about motivating a raw Ferdinand.
“After Gerry
joined told me that he’d tried to sign me a couple of times
while he was at Bristol Rovers and how much he admired me as a
player” said Les. “He also told me that he would not only get me
playing in the Rangers first team, but he thought he could get
me into the England team too.” It must have sounded like utter
madness to Les at the time but Francis was good to his word.
Ferdinand became the talisman of Gerry’s side, powerful and
quick, agile and graceful. He spearheaded the Rangers attack for
the next four seasons.
Francis
built his sides around him and Rangers finished in the top half
of the table every year. That includes the great fifth placed
finish of 92-93, in the first season of the Premier League. It
was no small achievement to finish above the likes of Liverpool,
Arsenal and Chelsea and these days it would have been good
enough to see us qualify for the UEFA Cup.
Ferdinand
scored an amazing 78 goals during those last four seasons, 26 of
them came in his last with the club and led to his multi million
pound move to Newcastle in June 1995. It’s not fair to say we
were a one man team but Rangers never recovered from losing him
and you might say that all our recent problems can be traced
back to that day in June when we found ourselves overflowing
with cash but lacking goals.
Ferdinand
carved out a brilliant career at Newcastle, before moving onto
Spurs and then winding down his career with various Premiership
clubs. He scored on his debut for England as well and won
seventeen international caps. Now he arrives back at Loftus Road
for his swansong season with Reading.
It wasn’t
meant to be this way, this wasn’t in the script. Surely Les was
always going to return to Rangers for a glorious, emotional
final season, the kind of send off a legend of his status
deserves?
Unfortunately it wasn’t to be and now he’ll make his last
appearance in front of the Loft under something of a cloud. When
he returned for his first game with Newcastle in October 1995 he
was treated like a God, and despite scoring for his new side,
it’s something Ferdinand still remembers. “It was so fantastic,
I was really choked. QPR will always have a place in my heart,
I’ll always have an affinity with Rangers.” He said.
I’ve been
watching Rangers for the best part of twenty years, I was never
lucky enough to see Marsh or Bowles do anything other than take
half time penalties. I’m sure anyone who’d watched both these
greats would have Les third on their all time players list but
for me he’s number one and one game for Reading wont change that
no matter how much it rankles.
ron@qprnet.com |
