I was disappointed with the result against Cardiff City. I don’t normally hang around too long after the match, but for some reason I just stood there staring at the pitch as everybody left.

I was there for a good 5 minutes or so after the game, feeling glum and a bit flat about the result and performance, but something did manage to cheer me up.

The players who weren’t involved on the day came out and started doing some stretches and exercises. I’m not sure if you could call it a warm down because they weren’t involved.

I was surprised to see Ray Jones out there. I thought to myself “Oh good”, because it meant that his foot was on the mend and I was really keen to see how he got on this season.

I watched him closely during the session. He was smiling and laughing and generally mucking around with Shabazz Baidoo. He was playfully pushing him about and being twice the size of Shabazz, there wasn’t much he could do about it! The pair of them giggled like innocent kids and there seemed to be a lot of love and happiness in the air. The mood was good.

It made me smile. There had been rumours Ray might be sold on, especially after the club had publicly turned down bids from him from Colchester this summer and we almost lost him in the January transfer window to Fulham.

I really hoped he wouldn’t leave and was concerned he might want to move onto bigger and better things. His body language however told a completely different story. He looked like a cheerful young man who was full of life and ready to break back into our first-team. He was relaxed and looked happy to be out there.

I left the ground feeling good about his impending return to the first-team squad and I was sure he was going to be a real handful partnering Dexter Blackstock up front this season. I really enjoyed how those two kids bullied opposition defenders around, but in such an honest fashion and so QPR.

It would be my last living memory of him and it’s sort of fitting and humbling in some way that for those few short moments, I felt like I caught everything that was good about his life and the very essence of his personality. I felt like I knew him and wanted to know him.

Ray was a marvellous prospect and one of the few players that we had any serious hope of receiving big money for. In many ways, he was our secret weapon in our fight for financial survival and against the ABC loan.

He was the one player who would have turned QPR’s fortunes around. We were in a no-lose situation. Either he would have stayed with us and blasted us to glory or we wouldn’t have been able to resist a massive money offer at some point from a Premiership team. He was destined for the top.

Forget your takeover bids; Ray Jones was our best bet out of financial ruin.

His untimely death over the weekend has taken just about everything out of me and I’ve done nothing but sit around the house or work for the past couple of days and think or sulk about it. My heart feels heavy and my insides sore and raw. I feel so grumpy and helpless and there is a surreal feeling about the air that just won’t go away.

I will forever rue not getting the opportunity to see him grow as a player and a person. Words cannot express the sympathy I feel for his parents, family, friends, loved ones and to all those who knew him on a personal level to the fans who all shared the same feeling of hope that he gave our club. Likewise, the same sentiments are felt for Ray’s friends who were also involved in the accident.

It’s always difficult to know what to say in situations like these or to find positives from such an unfortunate death, but I’ll give it a go…

I hope that this tragedy can help bring QPR together again and allow strained relationships to mend or heal, or to start over as we unite as one. It’s a chance for a clean slate and a new beginning. A chance for us to work together and turn QPR into the proud the club we have always dreamed that it should be.

We owe it to Ray. He would have tried to do it by himself. Now let’s do it for him.

RIP Ray.

After all the excitement at the beginning of the season, it’s all suddenly looking a little bit grim as we succumbed to our first league defeat of the season.

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Our terrible record in Cup competitions continued this evening after a disastrous exit at the hands of lower league opposition, yet again!

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Our last pre-season friendly of the season ended with an encouraging and pleasing performance as well as a win against a strong Fulham outfit.

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It’s been a while since me and Sam have been in South Africa Road. We were pleasantly surprised at how civilised it looked on this side of the stadium. There seemed to be more toilets for a start and it just felt friendlier for some reason, but perhaps this was just an illusion?

We happened to be sitting fairly close to Stuart Pearce, which came as something of a surprise to me. What a cracking player he was and an absolute legend for England.

I looked over at him a couple of times and the memories of him playing when I was a kid came flooding back. I still remember his tears from Italia ‘90 and in many ways, feel like I lived through his nightmare until that memorable penalty he scored in the shoot-out against Spain in Euro ‘96.

I don’t think I’m alone when I say I feared for his safety when he stepped up to take that penalty. It was the third of the five and the courage and bottle he showed was above anything I can remember in football. You could feel just about every English fan pausing collectively for a moment and hoping everything would be okay. For a split second, I didn’t care if we lost that shoot-out, I just wanted him to score and bury the ghosts that haunted him for so long.

Of course, he did score that penalty and wow, the way he celebrated is still one of the best and most passionate memories I have of supporting England or football, ever. I’ll never taste that type of euphoria again for England and in fact, I can’t stand the national set-up anymore.

I wanted to go up to him and shake his hand and tell him how much joy he’s brought to peoples lives over the years and how much I respected him as a player. I wanted to ask him what the hell was going through his mind and what it was like when he took that penalty?

In the end, I just sat there, kind of in awe, but also wondering why the rest of the fans were not flocking around him wanting to do the same. Perhaps we’ve all forgotten just how much good he has done, or maybe they were all in awe too! He seemed humble and approachable though and just a regular guy that I probably wouldn’t have noticed in the street, but that’s what makes him what he is I suppose.

Of course, as he’s the England Under 21 Manager, he was probably here to watch some of the youngsters. Dexter Blackstock and Michael Mancienne would be featuring for us - so I was really hoping they’d put in a good shift and get on his radar.

That got me thinking… I wonder what he makes of the modern day players? There’s not many around these days that were like he was or your David Seaman’s, Tony Adams, Paul Gascoigne’s or Alan Shearer’s of this world and it must get up his nose somewhat, it definitely gets up mine!

I bought the new home and away shirt before the Fulham match, enthusiastically believing the £68 or so I spent would go some way in helping the clubs financial problems. It’s paltry compared to the estimated figures being bandied around about our debt though, but still, every little counts!

It was around 7:15pm when I came out of the Club Shop and I noticed Stefan Bailey walking into the Players Entrance as I headed towards the Box Office to change my seat for the Leyton Orient game.

I had to change my seat because I had forgotten to select the automatic cup season ticket option when I renewed my season ticket. I sit with my friend Sam, and he’d renewed his and had been sent his cup ticket already. So, by the time I sorted mine out, I got a ticket in a random seat no-where near his. Doh!

Anyway - I wondered whether it’s normal for the players to arrive as late as Bailey did, and that got me thinking whether this was acceptable or not? I remember when I was around 12-13 years old, I knew of Sunday League teams and managers who would insist the players got together at least 3 hours before kick-off. If you were late, you got fined 50p, which doesn’t sound like a lot but it was for kids in those days!

I suppose it helped build discipline, team spirit and togetherness as well as allowing you to prepare properly and focus on the match ahead. Still, for some reason, this pissed me off slightly. I would imagine though that this would be different for away games as well as the real competitive fixtures, at least I hope so!

Gareth Ainsworth was also outside and looked like he was chatting to fans. It was good to see him walking around without any crutches after breaking his leg last season, so at least he had an excuse!