QPR to reject any Austin bids Last Updated: December 22 2014, 7:16 GMT Harry Redknapp insists QPR will rebuff any January bids for Charlie Austin after the striker scored a hat-trick to seal victory over West Brom on Saturday. Charlie Austin: QPR insist he will not be sold in January Charlie Austin: QPR insist he will not be sold in January With his side trailing 2-0 and being outplayed in every position, Redknapp again relied on the goalscoring prowess of the 25-year-old Austin - who did not disappoint as he moved onto 11 goals for the season to secure a 3-2 win and drag Rangers out of the bottom three at the same time. All 17 of QPR's points this season have been accrued at Loftus Road but it was the visitors who started well and looked on course to pick up their second successive win as Joleon Lescott and Silvestre Varela took advantage of lax Rangers defending to put the Baggies deservedly ahead. But Austin pulled one back midway through the first half as he thrashed home a penalty after referee Craig Pawson deemed that James Morrison had pulled back Leroy Fer. Two more goals followed in the second half for Austin and, although reports last week suggested he had turned down a new deal at the club, Redknapp was adamant there was no chance of the England hopeful being sold in the transfer window. "If we sold Charlie Austin we might as well go home, you know what I mean," said the Hoops boss. "He's here. We need Charlie to keep doing what he's doing and he can't afford to take his foot off the gas. I'm not saying he will do it but there's nothing to top him going on and having a fantastic season. His target would be around 20 goals now with the way he's going at the moment. It's not impossible. "He's a goalscorer. He wants to score. He works hard, he's got a great attitude. He isn't a minute's problem. There is no side to him - he ain't lairy and gets on with it. He's a lovely boy who's been to work for a living and is now playing Premier League football. "Goalscorers find a yard of space. It's a knack - he's in the right place at the right time. If you score 20 goals in the Championship this year you'll score in the Premier League. It's not rocket science, it's that knack that people have got - they've been scoring goals since they were kids." Austin was one of four changes made by Redknapp from the 3-1 defeat at Everton having sat out the almost inevitable loss at Goodison Park through suspension. Strike partner Bobby Zamora was also recalled and once again linked well with Austin - before warning the club that they need to tie the former Burnley man down to a new contract sooner rather than later. "He's got 18 months on his deal," Zamora said. "I think the club should be offering him something now because with the form he's in, I don't think it'll be long before some big clubs make an offer and he may want to take that chance. For us, we need to keep hold of him. "Chaz is a great asset for us and, fingers crossed, he can continue his form. He's a great finisher with a great work ethic." West Brom boss Alan Irvine again went without his own top goalscorer Saido Berahino in west London, with club-record singing Brown Ideye selected as the lone frontman. The Nigerian is yet to score a league goal for the Baggies but Irvine is hopeful his blossoming relationship with Varela and Stephane Sessegnon can soon produce results for his side. "I think he's progressing," Irvine said of Ideye. "He did a lot of good things. He had a good chance to score and probably should have done. But he is getting sharper and sharper, and better with each passing week. And I feel it's only a matter of time before he gets his first Premier League goal. "It's a front three we've only been able to put together recently. Silvestre is similar to Brown, in that he missed pre-season and then got injured. But that three up front look like a handful, and we are quite pleased with how it's developing."
I believe we should offer him £100,000 a week to sign a new 4-5 year contract with a buy out clause of at least £25 million, because as sure as eggs is eggs the likes of Spuds,Newcastle,Liverpool etc are gonna come in, in January and turn his head with contracts around the same ££££ a week and as we all know there is no loyalty in the game anymore and as in every walk of life these days money talks. Some on here will laugh at my suggestion, but he is and will be our saviour this season and with a possible £50 million+ FFP fine looming can we really afford to lose him and drop back down to the championship and possibly beyond.
I would guess that next summer is the crunch time. Only a year to go on his contract, new one on the table, if he doesn't jump on it we have to cash in.
I hear what you are saying....imperative that we keep him. But he is not going to get 100k a week. 60k perhaps.
The reason i come up with £100,000 a week is that he has already turned down £64,000 and the clubs that come sniffing know this and will offer in excess of that to tempt him, Charlie i believe would like to stay but his agent is probably already testing the water at other clubs and remember the more Charlie goes for, the more he earns, the more the parasite that is his agent gets his mucky little paws on. We need to tie him down to a long term contract now before we lose him for peanuts and if it is to be a hundred grand a week then so be it, Charlie is in effect our only real asset with sell on value. In effect if you had a Van Gogh painting and some paint by numbers pictures on your wall would you give the Van Gogh away knowing that the rest of your collection does'nt even amount to a value of zero, but is and will cost thousands to maintain while your prized picture finishes up on display somewhere else because the new owner had the balls to tempt you to part with it for nothing !!!!!
Turkish is spot-on, pay Charlie top money with a buy-out and relegation clause, it protects our biggest asset and gives us a windfall if it does go tits-up...
And how the hell does anyone know that? We do know that any figures bandied about are usually total b/s.
When he goes ... and he will go ... it won't just be fore the money. He will go somewhere that he can almost guarantee European football and therefore strengthen a claim for an England place. He won't go in January to Spurs, Liverpool or Newcastle as they cannot guarantee that yet. Arsenal and Man U might get him thinking, but only Chelsea and Man City would have a chance ... but he is not guaranteed matches with them. Could easily do what Sturridge did at Chelsea. He might even fancy a stint at a club in the sunnier climbs of Spain or the like. He will wait until the end of the season and see who offers what then. Even if we do offer him a new contract and he signs up for a few more years that will not stop him from leaving. Bet your bottom dollar there would be a minimum release clause in the new contract. (Which might be why he didn't sign one for £64k a week - if you believe that rubbish - because the min release clause was too high or non-existent. )
I think that's the long and the short of it. Because of his background (i.e. he's done a days work in his time) I think Charlie has a touch of maturity about him as well as being a very personable chap. He'll move for a challenge as well as cash/security. As Eamon says, if he continues like he is now, there is no doubt he will go, but Redknapp reckons that anyone who scores 20 in the championship will score in the premiership, so I look forward to seeing Charlie Mk II at some time. Plus of course either of his shoulders could pop at any time, I think he knows his career may not be that long.
Thank you eamon, was about to say who the hell knows what has or hasn't happened so far. I think it's in austin's interest in signing a contract extension for the simple reason it pushes his price up if someone does want him in the summer as he gets a percentage of the signing fee. If he doesn't sign then he knows we will probably hold on to him till his contract runs out cause he's worth more to us for one season in the form he's in than accepting a few that's not worth it to us. But then you just don't know nowadays how stupid and desperate a club might be and offer silly money, but either way we are quids in, he only cost is £4 million, his goals got us promoted last year, his goals are likely to keep us up this year, so even if he ends up going on a free he's more than paid back his fee already. Obviously we would all like to see him stay for a while, alas we're just not in a position to hold on to him.
It wont be in January, but the summer, Charlie wont sign a multi year contract with us, we are a stepping stone to a bigger club and his ambition to play for England, he's not being dis-loyal if we stay up he will have done his job and we move on, if were relegated he will be sold off anyway.
That's the kind of contract that will keep him here. Probably get shot down, but I honestly don't think he's all about the money - he gives the impression that he stays loyal to anyone that gives him a chance and backs him (and he seems very settled). If he can maintain his form (or set a level of consistency that is minimum of 15 goals per season) then there will be suitors and he might have stronger aspirations by then. The major problem is the talk of England. He is miles ahead of anyone in goalscoring terms at this current time but he is still learning IMO and may get overlooked (at whichever club he's at) in favour of the Wellbecks and Rooneys whose overall contribution to the team play is more. He could think that his limited chances are due to being with us and that unsettle him. I do hope we get a few more years from him because he is already a cult hero and could become a legend if he does stay.
What Turkish is saying is complete madness. Haven't we learned anything? That is not how to run a small Club properly. Its the complete opposite. We need to become a selling Club again and Austin is the first of hopefully many that we bring in for a modest price and sell on at a large profit. Sure, offer him an improved contract during the Summer but make sure it doesn't exceed a maximum wage cap for the Club. 100k is simply out of the question for a Club of our size. If he wants to move on, we take the best price and reinvest in other decent young players with potential. If/when any of them make it good with us, we sell on, reinvest and so on. The Swans and the Saints are the current template we've got to try and emulate.
Fully agree with all of that. What we need is a proper scouting network. There are plenty of Charlie Austins out there if clubs would bother looking rather than throwing money at a quick fix, Southampton have proven that this season
Harry Kane has 14 goals this season, a lot in Europe. Charlie's getting the attention because he's scoring at a basket case club. You are of course right. Bribing players to stay is the short route to the asylum and bankruptcy. But sadly we don't seem to have the infrastructure to go out and find the Sintons, Impeys and Sinclairs any more, and we certainly don't have a set up to develop young players or the willingness to put them in the shop window. We are years away from the Southampton business model of 'grow your own, flog 'em on and buy foreign quality'. And whoever Swansea's chairman is (Jones? Williams? Davies?) can certainly pick the right manager for his club.
We are years away from the Southampton business model of 'grow your own, flog 'em on and buy foreign quality' ___________________________-- That most certainly is not our business plan. The summer forced us into a situation where we simply had too.
So what is your business model? Surely selling on home grown talent is part of it, because that's what you have done since you started producing these players. I am very jealous of it by the way.
The point is we will get peanuts for him if he doesn't sign a new bigger contract. If he's on the same deal at the end of the season and we go down we'll be lucky to get £7-8 million even if he bangs in 20+. If he signs a 4 year £100k a week deal he'll be worth £25 million +. If we lost him in the same way we lost Remy it would be scandalous. That investment in the one player who is single-handedly keeping us afloat will payback 20 times that outlay if we stay up and give us a decent fee if we don't. It's all very well talking about adopting a Swansea/Saints structure, our team is light years away from that and preservation at all costs is sadly where we're at...
MAY get overlooked in favour of Rooney? The one who is closing in on the all time scoring record for England? Yes I think he may be overlooked in favour of Rooney. Bloody hell people.........feet on the ground please!
