QPR Under-18's suffered their first defeat of the season on Saturday morning, succumbing to a 2-0 loss to Brentford on a wet and windy morning at the Bees' Osterley training ground.
Steve Brown's side were forced into making two changes to their defensive line-up. Ed Harris and Femi Ilesanmi were both rested after their exploits for the Reserves against Charlton last week, so in came Daniel Bailey, to partner Michael Wright in the centre of the defence, and Aaron Waters at left back.
In attack, there was a welcome return for Josh Parker, making his first appearance since early March.
The match was a tough test for Brown's (pictured) side. The Bees rarely allowed his team to settle into their expansive passing game and the strong wind in the home sides' favour in the first period hampered many of the visitors' attacking moves.
Parker had Rangers best chance of the first half. Picking the ball up 30 yards from goal, he advanced to the edge of the penalty area before flashing a speculative drive wide.
With a half-time stalemate on the cards, Brentford launched a final attack down Rangers left flank on 44 minutes. Niki-Lee Bulmer was on hand to save the first effort, but could only parry the ball into the path of another Bees striker who fired home with aplomb.
A change of tactics was required from the visitors in the second half - the wind was in their favour and a less direct approach was required.
Parker was fouled to win a free kick early on, but the Bees keeper was on hand to punch away Terry Smith's delivery.
Another Smith cross soon afterwards found Christian Nanetti in space at the far post, but before he could strike at goal the referee blew for handball, adjudging him to have used his arm in controlling the ball.
As Rangers continued to press for an equaliser the home side caught Brown's team on the counter attack after 58 minutes and doubled their advantage.
Brown reacted with a triple substitution - Joe Brittain replaced Michael Harriman at right back; Andrew Perring came on in midfield for Max Ehmer; and Cyrus Sylvan-Vanterpool was handed a striking role, giving Parker a rest after the hour mark in his comeback game.
Brentford continued to press though and on 65 minutes Bulmer produced an excellent save, clawing the ball back from a seemingly impossible angle behind him to prevent a third Brentford goal.
That save proved to be the spark for Rangers to go on the offensive. Nanetti thought he should have had a penalty when he was tripped on 69 minutes, but the free-kick was given right on the edge of the box. Danny Davenport took the resultant set-piece, but could only curl his shot into the keepers' hands.
Five minutes later Nanetti's clever reverse pass found Antonio German. His first touch took him past his marker, but he failed to connect properly with his shot and the ball bobbled away. Rangers regained possession, however, and with the very next attack, Smith's stinging drive struck the outside of the post.
The next chance fell to Nanetti, who - after being upended again just outside the penalty area - smashed the resulting free kick low and hard round the defensive wall, only to see the home keeper get his fingertips to it and push it round for a corner.
Rangers continued to push for a consolation, but German's last minute effort was well saved by the Bees custodian.
Brown was understandably disappointed with the result afterwards, telling www.qpr.co.uk: "In the first half we didn't get the ball to the players who could do the damage on enough occasions.
"When Christian, Antonio and Josh got it they caused problems, but we only had one worthwhile effort and that is not good enough.
"The conditions should have been more in our favour in the second half, but we conceded a second and gave ourselves a mountain to climb to get back in it.
"I thought we gave it a real go in the last 15 minutes though and had we taken one of the chances there could have been a really exciting finish. Having said that, overall we didn't play well and not enough players took responsibility."
