QPR fell flat with £4m Lazio transfer – It promised much more | OneFootball

After a bizarre but bright opening few months at Queens Park Rangers, Djibril Cisse didn't quite kick on at Loftus Road after his move from Lazio.

In January 2012, with Queens Park Rangers in a dog-fight down at the bottom end of the Premier League table, the R’s brought in former Liverpool striker Djibril Cisse to try and avert the danger.

The Frenchman was signed by the Hoops for a fee believed to be in the region of £4 million and, under the management of Mark Hughes, his immediate task was simple: to score the goals that would fire QPR away from the bottom three and the relegation places.

Cisse did indeed go on to score some crucial goals for the west Londoners as they pulled off a dramatic escape from the drop, despite a defeat on the final day of the campaign.

It was a move that eventually would have to be viewed as having failed by the time he departed on loan for Al Gharafa about 12 months’ later, and it was a move that should have provided a lot more for both Cisse and QPR.

Cisse’s up and down start and influence on QPR’s survival

At the age of 30, Cisse had become an experienced head on the continent with his extremely impressive stint at Auxerre to begin his career, earning his move to Liverpool in 2004, before spending time with Lazio, Olympique de Marseille and Panathinaikos, as well as a loan stint at Sunderland, where he hit double figures for goals in the 2008/09 Premier League campaign.

From Lazio is where he arrived at Loftus Road, having earned himself a move to the Italian giants on the back of some impressive seasons at Panathinaikos in the Greek Super League.

When Cisse arrived at QPR on the final day of the January transfer window in 2012, QPR found themselves sitting just outside of the bottom three and the danger zone, having managed to clamber out with a defeat of fellow strugglers Wigan Athletic in their previous outing.

Cisse made an instant impact for QPR on debut, as he scored after just 12 minutes to give Hughes’ side a 1-0 lead against another struggler, Aston Villa, in a game that would go on to finish 2-2, despite QPR being 2-0 up just before half-time.

His home debut, though, showed his fallibility as he was sent off for a reckless challenge on Roger Johnson in a 2-1 defeat to Wolverhampton Wanderers in another six-pointer.

Cisse went on to miss three matches due to suspension as QPR collected just a solitary point from games against Blackburn Rovers, Fulham and Everton.

His return to action came at the Reebok Stadium against another team fighting for their lives, Bolton Wanderers, and Cisse got on the scoresheet to equalise mid-way through the second-half in that encounter, before a late Ivan Klasnic winner seemingly condemned QPR to their fate.

However, QPR then went on to win five of their final ten matches, including victories against Arsenal, Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur, as Loftus Road became a fortress, and Cisse played his part.

Having been 2-0 down to Liverpool with less than 15 minutes to go, QPR managed to overturn the deficit to win by three goals to two, with Cisse scoring the 86th minute equaliser in that game.

Just a few days later, though, Cisse was again shown a straight red card, this time at his former home ground the Stadium of Light when the game was well poised at just 1-0 to Sunderland, before the Black Cats eventually ran out as 3-1 winners.

Cisse would be suspended for the next four matches, and then left on the bench by Hughes as they defeated Tottenham Hotspur to give themselves a real chance of survival.

He scored on his return to the team in a 6-1 loss to Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, but then provided his most important moment yet in a QPR shirt as he notched an 89th minute winner to defeat Stoke City by a goal to nil on the penultimate day of the season, to leave QPR sitting just outside of the bottom three and the danger zone.

Stoke then did QPR a favour by holding Bolton to a 2-2 draw to relegate the Trotters, and allow QPR to somehow avoid the drop, despite a 3-2 defeat to Manchester City in a game in which QPR had been 2-1 up deep into second-half stoppage-time, as City famously won the Premier League for the first time ever. Cisse had scored for QPR just inside the second-half in that match.

Fading into obscurity at QPR

After a ridiculous first few months to his time as a QPR player, from joining so late in the window to scoring a few crucial goals, none more important than the goal that actually effectively kept them up in their final home game, to being shown a straight red card on multiple occasions; things then quietened down far too much for Cisse.

He had begun the season as something of a key man, featuring in 18 of their opening 20 matches of the campaign, starting 12 of those. However, he had never really kicked on.

Despite having already established himself as a fans’ favourite at QPR, Cisse didn’t manage to take it on further and really establish himself back among the better strikers in the Premier League.

In those 18 appearances, he scored just three more goals with Harry Redknapp replacing Hughes in mid-November, and his minutes slowly dwindling down.

By January 2013, Cisse had been loaned out to Qatari side Al Gharafa and then by the summer, following QPR’s dismal 20th placed finish and relegation, he departed via mutual consent, signing a contract at Russian Premier League outfit Kuban Krasnodar.

Perhaps emblematic of his career as a whole, Cisse provided QPR supporters with moments of euphoria and anger in a very short stint, before inertia then took over.

He had been a hero at Loftus Road, and that cannot be taken away despite his own best efforts, but there is a feeling he really could have kicked on to something more at his third club in England, and truly found a home in the Premier League.