After the drought, a deluge of goals has brought relief for Nahki Wells. The striker scored a vital winner as QPR got back to winning ways against Middlesbrough, his fifth in nine games, writes Harry Slavin from the Daily Mail.
It followed his midweek strike against Leeds, and is the first time he has scored in back-to-back matches in two years since achieving the feat for Huddersfield.
For a forward who failed to score in any of his first nine appearances this season, confidence has been well and truly restored.
‘Goalscoring is a habit and I went through a spell of not scoring at QPR even though throughout that time I felt I was playing well and contributing,’ said Wells.
‘I just had to slightly re-analyse what I needed to do in order to get those goals. You get patches where you don’t score and patches where you do, and I am back scoring.’
It is perhaps understandable that he has taken a while to find his feet. A move to Burnley at the beginning of the previous campaign was supposed to bring him his Premier League shot. Instead he was dogged by an ankle injury and made just 10 appearances under Sean Dyche, seeing just 66 minutes of action.
But although his loan move to Loftus Road has provided an escape, he hasn’t attempted to forget his parent club altogether.
‘Of course I keep an eye out for what Burnley are doing, they are my parent club and after us it is the first result I look for,’ said the Bermuda striker.
‘There is a relationship still between me and Burnley. I am contracted to have a future there but right now I am loving my time at QPR.’
He may have been loving it even more had he taken every chance that came his way on Saturday. His manager, Steve McClaren, certainly wasn’t grateful for his first-half profligacy but had to admit that his frontman is rediscovering the form that saw him climb up the divisions with Bradford and Huddersfield.
Asked if Wells could have been taking home the matchball, McClaren countered: ‘He could have done and should have done — we’re cursing him for that. But his movement, it’s the Nahki Wells we know. He’s a constant threat, a constant menace.’
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