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 closing in on the appointment of Neil Critchley as Michael Beale's successor.

The R's were left in an awkward position after the 42-year-old, who was only appointed in the summer, decided to leave for Rangers and a host of names have been linked with the vacancy since.

However, as exclusively revealed by FLW, Critchley is the frontrunner and his arrival is thought to be imminent.

The former Blackpool boss is without a club after leaving his previous role as Aston Villa assistant following Steven Gerrard's dismissal, so there won't be many issues preventing this from happening.

Whilst he is highly regarded as a coach, QPR fan pundit Louis Moir explained how even though this is a safe appointment, it's not the most exciting one for the Londoners.

"I wouldn't say I'm overly excited but I'm happy as it's not the worst appointment in the world. There are other options out there that I would have personally preferred, in terms of Chris Wilder or paying the compensation fee for Mark Robins, or even taking a risk on Marti Cifuentes.

"Those are probably the three I would've had ahead of Critchley but at the end of the day you have to back him and I suppose he does have experience of managing in the Championship, working on a lower budget, developing players and he's got contacts from his time at Liverpool and I'm sure he's got contacts at Aston Villa too.

"Hopefully that's a positive in us retaining Tim Iroegbunam on loan and you never know, it could mean it gives us a chance of getting Cameron Archer in January.

"If you're looking at the bigger picture, he was probably the most realistic option for us at the moment - and probably the cheapest too, which I'm not surprised about. But yeah, I'm happy with him but I wouldn't be overly excited.

"We have to hope he can do what he did at Blackpool with us but hopefully with better players he can progress the club and getting the likes of Ilias Chair and Chris Willock playing to the levels they were showing prior to the World Cup break.

"All in all, a good appointment and hopefully the board back him in January with a bit of money."

The verdict

It's hard to argue with the comments here as Critchley isn't the sort of appointment that will really please the fan base because he simply doesn't have the CV that some others do.

But, that shouldn't take away from the fact that he is well regarded in terms of his methods and his work with Blackpool was impressive.

Now, we wait for official confirmation, and it will then be down to Critchley to show what he can do with what is a great opportunity for him.

Thoughts? Let us know in the comments below.