.png?width=96&crop=1:1,smart)
It's been an underwhelming start to the Championship season for QPR and Millwall with both London outfits in familiar territory towards the bottom of the second tier.
Both the R's and the Lions were embroiled in a relegation battle last term but there was hope that it would be a different tale this time out. Marti Cifuentes had won over the Loftus Road faithful and had a summer to implement his ideas, while there had been positive signs under Neil Harris at The Den.
QPR sit 22nd after a third defeat in a row to Derby County last time out. Speaking after that game, Cifuentes said: “It’s not been good enough so far. When things are not going well, it’s very easy to point fingers. But the most important thing is how we react. Now we have an international break which is going to be tough for us, because we know we have two weeks of feeling bad about how we’ve done this week - in terms of results and performances.
“It’s a time we need to use properly to look at what is missing and what we are failing at currently. We have to make sure that we come back stronger, because it’s very disappointing - not only for the players and staff who are working hard, but also for the supporters. We had over 2,000 here today and I’m very sad that we couldn’t deliver a better performance and result."
It's not been such a poor run of form over at Millwall but a recent injury crisis hasn't helped the side find consistency. The Lions were held to a 0-0 draw by West Brom last weekend.
Harris said: “If you look at the stats, it shows our expected goals is higher than West Brom’s but we’ve scored the same amount of goals [as them]. The ball’s ended up in our net at times when it shouldn’t do because we’ve made individual errors. We’re the only team outside the top eleven that’s got a plus goal difference and that paints a real picture.
“I think the fans who have travelled home and away have seen us outperform teams most weeks and not always get the reward. This football club has notoriously started slowly. Not saying I like it or accept it, I don’t, but we’ve always grown and gotten better and better as a team, and this group will get better.”
Here's how QPR and Millwall fare in the predicted Championship table as per the Football Web Pages supercomputer.