The QPR midfielder who almost quit — Now a Loftus Road icon | OneFootball

Alejandro Faurlin's 2009 transfer to QPR was controversial in several different ways, but the Argentine midfielder won over the Loftus Road faithful.

Alejandro Faurlin's 2009 transfer to Queens Park Rangers was controversial in several different respects, but the midfielder ended up staying with the club for seven years despite horrific bad luck with injuries.

Queens Park Rangers are a relatively stable Championship club these days, but there was a time when their name was a byword for chaotic football club ownership.

When the club had a spell in administration in 2001, a merger with Wimbledon was proposed, while the documentary The Four Year Plan would later expose just how chaotically-run the club was under the later ownership of a consortium led by Bernie Ecclestone and Flavio Briatore.

This feeling of shadiness extended into their dealings in the transfer market. When Argentine midfielder Alejandro Faurlin joined the club in 2009, it came about as the result of a breach of third-party ownership rules which almost cost Rangers a place in the Premier League in 2011; the club escaped with a fine, when a points deduction may have resulted in them not getting promoted.

Faurlin, however, would go on to be a hit at Loftus Road, despite injuries that almost saw him quit the game altogether. For all the question marks that hung over his arrival at the club, he ended up staying with them for seven years and was part of two promotion-winning Queens Park Rangers teams, despite appallingly bad luck with injuries.

Alejandro Faurlin's determination to recover became very clear in a 2012 interview

Faurlin made his debut for QPR in August 2009, and by the end of his first season it was clear just how successful he could be for the club when he was voted their player of the year at the end of 2009-10. In his second season with QPR, they won the Championship title, returning to the Premier League for the first time since 1996.

But his Rangers career was then badly disrupted by a succession of serious injuries. He ruptured his ACL in an FA Cup match against MK Dons in January 2012, and his recovery would turn out to be extremely lengthy. Rangers stayed up by a point at the end of the 2011-12 season, and that summer Faurlin spoke to West London Sport about his recovery from his injury.

Speaking of those who'd doubted that he'd be suitable for the English game, he said: "It’s funny because in football people have opinions and as a professional you accept that. I am used to it because at the beginning there were people who didn’t think I would be a player. Then they said I wouldn’t play in the first team and I did."

And his determination to get back to playing regularly again was extremely evident: "I don’t care about holidays. I just want to stay here and make sure I do everything I need to do to get back. All I care about is the games - being in the dressing room, being with the other guys. I really look forward to it because I miss it. I really, really miss it."

Persistent injury bad luck would tarnish Faurlin's Loftus Road career

Faurlin made his return to the QPR team in a League Cup game against Walsall at the end of August 2012, but the 2012-13 season was a calamity for the club, who failed to register a Premier League win until they beat Fulham 2-1 in the middle of December, with Faurlin providing the assist for Adel Taarabt's opening goal.

The club spent heavily in the January transfer window, bringing in five new players, including Loic Remy, who cost them a club-record £8 million from Marseille, and Christopher Samba, for whom they paid the Russian side Anzhi Makhachkala another club-record fee of £12.5 million. And at the very end of that window they loaned Faurlin out to Serie A club Palermo for the second half of the season, but the move was not a success and the player returned to the club at the end of the season, having played just six times for the Sicilian club.

Rangers had been relegated from the Premier League in bottom place in Faurlin's absence, and he returned to their first team for the start of the 2013-14 season, but bad luck struck again for him early in the season when he was stretchered off during a 2-1 win against Derby County which turned out to be more ACL damage.

The club returned to the Premier League at the end of that season via the play-offs. That summer, Faurlin told the London Evening Standard: "I want to be out there on the pitch and I never had injuries to my knees before. I hate to be out. I feel stronger than ever now. This kind of injury makes you realise the reality of things and makes you stronger in so many different ways. I’ve never been a sad player who needs confidence."

He started their first game of the 2014-15 season against Hull City and their next match at Spurs, but just a couple of weeks later, in a League Cup match away to Burton Albion, he tore his ACL for a third time, leaving him out for the remainder of the season. Rangers finished the season in bottom place in the Premier League for the second time in three years.

That summer, despite his injury issues, Faurlin signed a contract extension for a further year at Loftus Road, and he admitted at that time that he'd come close to quitting the game altogether over his persistent injury problems

The 2015-16 season turned out to be his last for the club. Queens Park Rangers finished the season in 12th place in the Championship, and Faurlin made 30 appearances for them, registering six assists. He was released by club in the summer of 2016 and joined the Spanish side Getafe. He'd also go on to play for Marbella in Spain before returning to Argentina, before retiring from playing in 2022.

Queens Park Rangers fans are fully aware that their club's difficulties throughout this period were institutional, but it's tempting to wonder how their fortunes may have been improved, had they had Faurlin at their disposal. Over three Premier League seasons with the club, he made just 33 appearances for them. Given that they were relegated by 14 points in 2012-13 and by eight points two years later, his availability alone may not have been enough.

His injury record was terrible, so severe that it almost pushed him out of the game altogether. But Faurlin became a favourite at Loftus Road regardless, and remains one of the club's cult heroes to this day.