How Michael Beale is leading QPR to the Premier League – tactical analysis

Having taken the Queens Park Rangers job in June of this year, Michael Beale has faired well in what is his first managerial position. Beales experience has come mainly through being an assistant manager and working in the academy at Liverpool. Most notably, Beale worked under Steven Gerrard at Rangers and followed the Englishman to Premier League club Aston Villa.

Beale worked under Gerrard for a number of years but had previously gained experience overseas in Brazil with São Paulo. The new QPR boss has made an impressive start to life in London losing just 4 of his 17 games in charge.

Having recently shown his loyalty to The Rs in turning down the Wolverhampton Wanderers job, Beale is looking to take QPR back to the Premier League. Amid interest in the last few days, Beale says there is no chance of him joining his former club Aston Villa. With his future looking set for the remainder of the season, QPR fans can hopefully see their side competing in Englands top division soon.

This tactical analysis will look at the tactics that Beale has used at QPR throughout the 2022/23 EFL Championship campaign so far. This analysis will delve into the tactics that will be used to guide QPR to a top-of-the-table finish.

The data

The graphic below is QPRs percentile rank amongst other teams in the 2022/23 EFL Championship. It covers three main categories with a range of subcategories. The pink coloured segments represent the attacking data, the yellow is possession and the white is defending data.

Attacking data

QPR rank extremely high for goals per 90, showcasing how their attacking fluidity helps them to score plenty of goals. This is something that Beale has worked on and he wants his team to be attack-minded. Only two teams have scored more goals this season in the Championship than QPR with 25.

Furthermore, their high volume of shots per 90 encourages and enhances the goalscoring ability of the team. Not only this but QPR are able to create chances which enable them to get shots off. One way in which QPR dont attack very prominently is with crosses into the box. Their ranking for crosses per 90 places them relatively low.

Possession data

With