"It's not his fault" - Claim made on QPR star Paul Nardi amid 5.7/10 Leeds United display | OneFootball

FLW has been speaking with our QPR fan pundit to discuss the performances of goalkeeper Paul Nardi, and whether he's an improvement on Asmir Begovic.

This article is part of Football League World's 'Terrace Talk' series, which provides personal opinions from our FLW Fan Pundits regarding the latest breaking news, teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…

Queens Park Rangers are still searching for their first Championship victory since 30 August, after suffering a 2-0 defeat to Leeds United at Elland Road in their last game before the international break.

The Hoops must use this two-week pause in proceedings wisely, as Marti Cifuentes' side sit rock-bottom of the Championship table, five points adrift from safety, and with just one win and 10 points from their opening 15 league fixtures.

QPR have been dancing with danger in the second tier over the last couple of seasons, but through a combination of new signings failing to make the desired impact so far, paired with problems at both ends of the pitch, the R's second tier status appears to be under serious threat.

One of those new additions over the summer was goalkeeper Paul Nardi, who was signed to be the replacement for Asmir Begovic.

But after being rated as QPR's worst player in their defeat to Leeds (per FotMob), we asked our R's fan pundit, Louis Moir, for his thoughts on Nardi's performance, and whether he's better than Begovic or not?

"Much more confident with him than Begovic"

According to FotMob's player rating system, Nardi scored a 5.7/10 for his performance at Elland Road, which was the worst of any QPR player.

Speaking on the keeper, Moir said: "I think, with Nardi, Leeds' set up on Saturday was hard for our players, but I wouldn't say in particular that he was at fault or did anything worthy of criticism.

"To be quite honest, for a new goalkeeper to come in to a brand new league, brand new country, brand new team, despite only having two clean sheets all season so far, you wouldn't think it, but he's actually has been quite good.

"The goals have obviously been solely defensive errors, and mistakes that have led to goals that have just not been his fault. He's not to blame for anything really.

"You feel much more confident with him in goal than you did with Begovic last season. He's definitely better than him with his feet, shot stopping; everything really, a massive improvement from the keeper-side of things.

"Like I say, it's crazy because we've only had two clean sheets, but he has been good. He's actually been one of the best summer signings that we've brought in to the club.

"So, I can't really criticise him at all. It's not his fault that he's currently playing behind a defense, and team, that are totally out of it in terms of concentration and mistakes that happen.

"I've been more than happy with Paul Nardi since he joined the club, and we have got a very good goalkeeper there, and fair play to him because actually in some games, it could've been a worse scoreline without him."

Nardi has shown signs of being an upgrade over Begovic

Whenever a team is struggling at the foot of the table, or finding it a challenge to keep clean sheets, the goalkeeper is a natural place to look when searching for where to lie the blame.

However, that's not always fair, and that appears to be the case with Nardi and QPR so far this season.

According to FotMob, the 30-year-old keeper's 44 saves rank him in the top 83.8 percentile of Championship goalkeepers so far this season, whilst his zero errors leading to a goal is, obviously, as good as any of his positional peers in the second tier.

His 74 accurate long balls also rank him in the top 75.7 percentile, which is yet another sign that there are some real positives in his game that point towards him being a good player.

With only Plymouth, Luton and Portsmouth respectively conceding more league goals than QPR's 25 so far this term, it's fair to say that the Frenchman hasn't been receiving the best of help from his defenders in front.

Therefore, it would be unfair to judge him too harshly during his opening 15-game sample size as a Hoops player, as when the defence has played better in games, Nardi has been able to register highly impressive clean sheets against Sunderland and Burnley respectively.