As supporting morale threatens to reach a new low of the season and rife rumours are resurrected from the back of beyond, movement within the bowels of the club today brings us news of a six week loan signing of Welshman Carl Fletcher from Crystal Palace as he flies home from International duties in Germany.

As the hangover wore off on May 4^th 2008, looking up at the League at this point in the season was something noone imagined feasible, nevermind probable. As our pointless tally increases and our goal difference sets us further apart from the race leaders, desperation, frustration and nagging doubts are slowly replacing the hope, the joy and the faith that we felt such a short time ago. Seven league games yielding little more than a single point is simply not proportional with our expectation and aspiration!

We’ve all psychoanalysed the reasons for our current plight and many have offered simplistic solutions to remedy the negativity flooding the stands. The consensus lies in all areas of our game…..our inability to create opportunity, our inability to finish and our inability to defend. More predictably, it seems, the inability of our Manager to manage.

Well, we now face our first League game for two weeks against Q.P.R at Loftus Road and the mounting anticipation is fuelled further with news not only of a strengthening addition to our midfield but the potential first team debuts of our key new signings Garner and Anderson and also the return to match fitness of McGugan and Earnshaw.

Our squad begins to take on a new and promising shape and, for the first time, we have sufficient pegs to put into their retrospective holes and the means to launch ourselves back into the running for a credible and well overdue return to form.

‘Fletch’ is a defensive midfielder having made 185 league starts for Bournemouth. He then moved to Premiership West Ham in 2004 for a meagre £275,000 and played in the 2006 FA Cup Final v. Liverpool before leaving to join the Eagles as Captain. Injury and a rumoured altercation with manager Neil Warnock has left him hungry for first team football.

Fletcher brings with him an assertive and powerful leadership quality combined with experience and a great work ethic. Some may argue that the crucial element missing from our game is confidence, and this guy has bags of it.

So, Carl Fletcher – A Ray of Hope? I certainly think so.