I trust Marti with all signings. He knows the modern game, he wants to play the modern game and I believe he's bringing in the right players to suit his style. It's the most excited I've been about a forthcoming season in a long long time. Willock and Armstrong leaving is disappointing but for the best, especially if they didn't want to be here anyway. A good squad is what's needed and we are slowly building that.
It all sounds very good and rather optimistic. Almost too good to be true, and I keep pinching myself. Based upon almost 50 years of QPR experience, I am already wondering what can go wrong and when. One can call it „due diligence”. I think we are ready to further progress. It will be interesting to see how far we can go. The bookies have us mid-table, but I believe that we can do better. The key, as always, will be consistency over the season. Let the new season start and let’s see what develops. I hope that it will be entertaining and fun!
Everybody likes a party, we just happen to like a Marti party! What Marti achieved, after the Ainsworth debacle….. we deserve some self serving praise & promotion. Finally, after not many ups & more downs than we care to mention, l, like many on here, have renewed vigour for the upcoming season. There’s no Mole to be seen. No Cowboy riding in. Just Marti building up a team, ready to party on in the Championship. C’om on you, R’rsssss!
Life is funny. Last October I was so desolate about QPR...not so much about continuously losing....although that was bad enough...but the way we were playing, the lack of any real plan in the club. The stale smell of acceptance of mediocrity and decline. I chose not to go to a match...and considered not renewing...and weaning myself of a lifetime habit. Today I am excited for this season...keeping it all inside as I don't want ruin the feeling of anticipation We the fans had really attacked the board before..so if this is as positive as we hope then...let's thank the board. For putting their trust in Nourry...who was involved as an advisor before he became CEO. He helped guide us to Cifuentes. Then came the bloodless coup where so many of the old guard was slowly removed both in the admin, the coaches and in the playing staff. We now have a state of the art training ground...a very inspiring coach, a seemingly consise plan. What could go wrong...being QPR ...everything. But to be really honest. I am so excited for the future
Why did I love Armstrong, or why do we need to score goals? The second answer is obvious...the first is because he was young and gave his all when he played/came on. Perhaps he lacked in some areas but I think he has a lot of potential. Still a good bit of business, and far better than allowing his contract to run out and him go for free.
He was a great cult hero and got the crowd off their seats even if most of the time it came to nothing. A few flashes of what he can do last season but after a strongish start it really petered out and it was pretty clear Cifuentes didn’t rate him. Loved that goal he scored against Bournemouth and if he even did something like that one game in five he’d be a real miss but the bloke played in clown shoes.
Ultimately his pace and strength are something we might miss as it's a bit of 'X Factor' that's hard to replace. But he barely featured during the latter parts of the campaign, arguably when we were playing our best and getting results. I do think he'll kick on a bit now but he'll need more than just his speed to be successful, I think teams were already sussing him out last season. Would really like us to sign someone with genuine pace though.
Another way of looking at it: Pace is overrated sometimes? How many of our goals came through his pace? How many of our successful moments under Cifuentes came from his pace?
Yes, I really liked watching Armstrong too. The most exciting player we've had since Eze and Bos for me. I'm sure he increased attendance numbers and got most of us on our feet. He was a dangerous sub coming on late against tiring defences and I suspect we'll miss that. But if we are close to the numbers rumoured £2.5 M + £1M in potential add-ons + 20% on any sell-on profit, less £ 750K to Shamrock Rovers, and are paying less for Celar, we have done really well financially when there was only this season left on his contract and he probably wasn't signing a new one. I just hope Celar can get us more goals.
