QPR aren't just coming to terms with the cost of relegation – there are stories behind the scenes too. Anthony Hobbs reveals all

The last time Queens Park Rangers were rel­egated, from the Premiership five years ago, things were very simple. We had a rich chairman with no real interest in football, who was completely unwilling to spend his own money, but content to realise the capital of our most liquid assets (ie sell our best players). In the five years leading up to our latest 40-point season, things have been bit a little less clear cut. This season in particular, it’s felt a little like being on a boat that hasn’t been properly tied up. We’ve just been gradually drifting away and nobody quite knows what to do about it.

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After 22 years of sponsoring the top division in English football, Barclays is as big a part of the football fraternity as the clubs themselves

When Barclays first sponsored the Football League (as it then was) in 1987, the angry young men (as we then were) at WSC wrote: “What the deal says about the League is this: they believe that Barclays Bank enjoys more warmth and respect in society than football itself.” It was a fair point, particularly as the sum involved was only £4.55 million over three years, which might just be enough to attach your company’s name to Pat­rick Vieira’s socks these days. It seemed that it wasn’t so much the money the League needed, but reassurance from the corporate world that football had not sunk irredeemably beneath its notice.

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Sunday 1 Blackburn move into the second promotion spot in the First Division with a 5-0 thrashing of Burnley, prompting Graeme Souness to issue a warning: “We’ll be treating every fixture like it’s the last game of our lives.” After a 1-0 home defeat by Wolves, Birmingham’s sights are now set no higher the play-offs, where they could yet be joined by Sheffield United, who win their local derby, 2-1 at Hillsborough. Leicester’s European hopes fade with a 2-0 defeat at Charlton, but Peter Taylor has identified the problem: “We are missing a footballer.”

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Ian Plenderleith takes a look at the diverse range of football websites

Welcome in to my exciting life, declares Crystal Palace’s Finn Aki Riihilahti at the start of his official homepage. As player websites go it’s a treat, and you can follow the ups and downs of Aki’s existential mood swings that correspond to his fluctuations in form.

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Mike Woitalla explains why the NASL wasn't an elephants' graveyard

The depiction of the North America Soccer League as a circus of geriatric home escapees lives on – especially in the British press, which can’t mention the NASL without ridiculing it. Alas, even WSC has bought into this one. A recent review of the biography of Giorgio Chinaglia, the Welsh-raised Italian World Cup striker who came to New York at 29 and scored 193 goals in eight years, said: “The world’s stars descended on the US to play on astroturf, wear garish strips and generally make fools of themselves while topping up their retirement funds.”

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