Joey Barton: QPR are the 'worst team' in the Premier League

...but club captain says the club have the spirit to stay up

Queens Park Rangers captain Joey Barton believes that his side are the "worst team" in the Premier League.

Chris Ramsey's team are 19th in the table with five games to go, ahead of bottom side Burnley on goal difference.

QPR have won just two of their last 16 matches and face London rivals West Ham in a must-win game at Loftus Road.

"On paper we are the worst team in the league - nothing changes that," Barton told Sky Sports.

Chris Ramsey's team face West Ham (Getty Images)

"We came up via the play-offs in the Championship, we finished fourth, we stuttered to fourth in that campaign, we rode our luck at times and it was character and the spirit within the group that got us through. Not talent, not skill or an abundance of attacking intent, it was grit and character that got us in the Premier League and it is going to be grit and character that keeps us in the Premier League.

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"For me you have to look at it rationally and rationally we are the worst team in the Premier League before a ball is kicked. Leicester finished at least 15 points ahead of us last year, Burnley weren’t far off that, then you had Derby in third and us stuttering home in fourth.

"No one expected us to go up, but we found a way to do that.

"People always look at this squad and say there is lots of talent there, Harry Redknapp here, and they expect the club to go on and do well, but the reality of the situation is we had a mountain to climb in August. You have to ask the question: has everything done since then helped or hindered us?

"But to keep ourselves in the Premier League being the worst team before a ball is kicked in August, you have to do everything to the maximum.

"It is our responsibility to keep this club in the league by hook or by crook. We’ve got 26 points, five games to go, I still feel our destiny is in our own hands. If we win enough games to deserve to stay in the Premier League then we will stay up, if we don’t then we will go down. This league doesn’t feel sorry for anyone."