Men and Women, I haven't posted in a while, but I am currently (stressfully) writing a dissertation on "Football Clubs and their Identity". With our club under-going a bit of an identity restructuring in recent years I thought it would be a good idea to ask your thoughts on a few issues. Before I list the topics, if you are willing to participate in this focus group so to speak, before you post just write 1) How long you have supported QPR and 2) how many games you go to per season (on average). If you wish to put your name you can, but anonymity is completely respected. 1) What role do you think the fans play in creating an Identity for the club? 2) What impact do your clubs foreign owners have on the identity of the club? Do you think it changed, if so why? 3) Do you think the club do enough in the community to promote its identity? For anyone who writes on this, thank you. Kind regards Elnino
Interesting. Late comer to football so supporter since about 1996 (just after we were last good!) and get to most home games and the occasional away game. 1) Fans play a huge role in creating identity. Consider the difference between Millwall and just about any other club. Cardiff are slightyl better than them but just wait til Cardiff v Swansea next season - especially if Swans win as they are likely to. Conversely, consider a well run club with 'proper fans' eg Doncaster. Great Chairman and great family atmosphere I would think (never been there) from obersving them at LR. Can fans change the club identity. You might think the answer is yes but consider WHU v Millwall in that FA cup game - not pretty. Also, the couple of times I've been to Chelsea - pretty ugly too. I think we changed the identity a bit when we made if clear that Flabio was not a welcome chairman. Maybe?? 2) Foreign Owners. Consider Dave Whelan. Suspect loved by Wigan fans and I'm sure a real gent etc. However, no success! Manchesters, Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea. Is anyone going to win the PL outside of those 5 (possibly 3) in the next 10 years? I doubt it somehow. Foreign owners = cash = success. Most fans (including us) were not worrying about the 'losing the soul of the club' thing until it starts to go pear shaped (us!). 3) Not sure how much QPR does but did we not get an award recently for being the best community oriented club etc? I'm always surprised there are not more free tickets for kids since once they are hooked, it is income for years to come. Perhaps with a bigger stadium? Not sure if that's what you are looking for but just a few thoughts. Nothing very profound I fear.
RTID - all your comments are brilliant, and the more opinions on the topics I get, the better. QPR are a great case study for particular parts of my chapters, so all opinions are welcomed and are useful.
42 years following the Rs, about 20 games this season. 1) Identity - I think the fans do help create an identity, largely around atmosphere in the ground and how many we take on away trips. Being a small 'nearly there but not quite' club also creates a special bond between supporters. Our identity is flash, witty and noisy. Its been the same since the 70s. 2) Foreign owners. Where they come from is irrelevant, it how much cash they have and how much they are prepared to spend thats important. Having said that Cardiff obviously were affected by an entirely East Asian marketing driven change of shirt colour. We have been impacted by a pre season tour to Malaysia/Indonesia, again marketing driven, and obviously not good for us (though I didn't know that at the time), buying Park.......?No impact on the identity of the club as yet though from the long term fans' perspective - a few Korean tourists. The identity will change if /when we start doing really well - the plastics will arrive from all over. 3) Community - I don't live in the local community so I can't really comment, though the club does email regularly on its community activities. I think this is good, but not top of my list of priorities. Good luck with the dissertation.
I’ve supported QPR since the early 70s and currently get to half a dozen matches a season. I think that the club probably has 3 different identities. As a supporter I see us as a friendly, family club which is driven by a fantastic, loyal, passionate but realistic, fun loving fan base. If memory serves, last season at Chelsea, although they had scored 6 goals, our supporters were still having more fun; maybe someone who was there can re-tell the story of the countdown that left the Chelsea supporters looking on totally dumfounded. Opposing supporters just see the money that the club has spent and base their image of us on that. They have no idea of the years and years the club struggled for mere survival and the hardship that we’ve endured, the major factors in forming our tight bond with the club. I’m not too sure of what identity the current owners think the club projects. London based, underdog Premier League team? Possibly, but maybe they feel that the club adds to, or is absorbed into, their identity. Previous Italian owners have treated the supporters with nothing short of contempt (more on that next week), and their attitude towards the rule makers and official bodies definitely detrimentally altered the way our club was reported on in the media. I know that I run the risk of being accused of racial stereotyping but both Paladini and Briatore are Italian. The current owners have repaired some of that damage, but the media still seem unable to look beyond the finances. I think that the club are trying to promote themselves everywhere but in the local community. Larger foreign markets are far more lucrative, West London is so much smaller in comparison. From memory there is nothing in the community indicating that there is a football club just around the corner, and my hunch is that school and hospital visits are a long way down the list of priorities. I doubt this helps much mate, but good luck with your dissertation, I'd be fascinated to see the finished product. If I can help in any other way, please just ask.
Supported the R's since the mid 60's when taken to LR by my late father who was a life long R's supporter as was his father.... Apart from a few years of success we have usually filled the middle ground, nearly always in the shaddow of the the glamour London sides, Chelsea, Spurs, Arsenal even though we were a better side than them and finished top London side on numerous occassions. The R's were always a small club and most neutrals had us down as their 2nd side. A lot of todays problems can not be totally levied at the influx of foreign owners but at the football authorities, uefa, fifa, fa, etc as well as Sky TV....the day of every side kicking off the season thining they have a chance of winning the league has long since past....there will now only ever be 4 or 5 sides that will win the PL everyone else is fighting to avoid relegation......uefa have a lot to answer for with the rediculous Champions League format, how can a side that finishes 2nd, 3rd or 4th in the domestic league be entered into the elite european competition, it should be for league champions only....that way the uefa cup would also regain a lot of respect and credability......uefa have basically created a kartel. The overseas owners have so much money that the clubs are little more than play things they have no affiliation with the club, city, community etc, it is no more than a commodity...they may in time begin to understand what is involved but i doubt it.....this is where i believe TF is different, he grew up in the area..ok he became a WHU fan...not sure why...but i think the R's have got under his skin and he does have an affiliation that the Russians, Arabs etc will never get.... Can't really comment about the community aspect as moved away from the Bush nearly 30 years ago...but i suspect that the days of walking into one of the local bars and seeing a player pulling pints has long gone.... Apologies if this is bit of a ramble...hope the dissertation goes well...
Supporter 50+ years Season ticket holder + some away games 1) What role do you think the fans play in creating an Identity for the club? The fans are the club. 2) What impact do your clubs foreign owners have on the identity of the club? Do you think it changed, if so why? Rich owners encourage a different type of fan which in turn adjusts the overall ethos of the club. Ellerslie Road has been like a tourist attraction this season. 3) Do you think the club do enough in the community to promote its identity? The whole notion of 'community' in London is not at all the same as it is in cities such as Liverpool or Newcastle. With regard to community projects the club treat this as meaning 'the local area' but the actual QPR community is now dispersed far and wide of course. With regard to its fan base TF will (quite rightly) continue to try to create an international identity for the club thus bypassing any real notion of local community.
1) How long you have supported QPR – First Game 4 years old- season ticket since I was 6- I’m 26 now, so 22 years. 2) how many games you go to per season (on average). – Average half the away games last two seasons and all home games so 26-28 games plus cup games ---- 1) What role do you think the fans play in creating an Identity for the club? Massive- but not total- Owners shape it long term- eg TF bringing in the tiddly’s who come to watch Park. Fans influence the club but success influences the type of fans you attract. 2) What impact do your clubs foreign owners have on the identity of the club? Do you think it changed, if so why? Rich forign ownwrs are a brilliant thing for the clubs and the premier league although ‘fairl play rules will ruin this and the league eventually’. See Ambraovich, Mansour and our Tone. How else could the premiership have a little club like QPR with a player as good as Remy in it? We’re well past the days of a Jim Gregory London lad come good type of days. People like Dave Whelan put themselves up as the ideal of representing that old tradition of local boy come good buying there local team but now all they do is hold them and the premier league back by only being able to take the club so far then stopping there. In Dave Whelan’s case championing fair play rules to ensure each club stops at its current position so he doesn’t have to invest anymore personal money in moving the club forward. 3) Do you think the club do enough in the community to promote its identity? QPR do as we’re still small enough to be a community club. My family and most my mates and their familys are long term fans from growing up in the area. More recent things like the tiger cubs have brought the community aspect on to the next level
47 years a supporter. Sadly, only get to a handful of matches a season these days 1. What role do you think the fans play in creating an identity for a club? Interesting that RTID uses Millwall as an example. My wife and all her family are Millwall, tomorrow there's eight of them going to Wembley and, as always happens when there is a Wembley visit, all their tickets go in no time and they could've got 60,000 to Wembley if they'd had enough tickets. I would liken us to Millwall in that context, a loyal, vociferous and fanatical following from the 'hardcore'. I've been an R since 1966 and think our fanbase was really created in the successful 10-year period 67-77. The average 5,000 from Division 3 raised to 25,000 in the 75-76 season was where the larger chunk of our present support emanates from, and, as we've seen on here, it's a worldwide support that has passed through generations. The danger to our club will be over the next few years, a new ground? If it happens it will totally change the atmosphere and, therefore, the matchday ambience, it's already seeped in a bit the last two seasons with newer fans from afar and it could create something which we, the long-suffering hardcore, don't really want. That is the warped psyche of the older generation of long-term supporters. 2. What impact do your club's foreign owners have on the identity of the club? Do you think it changed, if so why? You have only to look at Flav and Paladini. We became their plaything and their attitude to the supporters was disgraceful. We became a 'boutique club' and were subject to all the abuse of other clubs who, wrongly, believed we had spent millions. TF has been far better in terms of appearing fan-friendly but the disasters we've been through will wear that relationship very thin if our descent continues next season. So the answer is yes and usually not for the better. 3. Do you think the club do enough in the community to promote it's identity? I always think clubs could do more, especially in terms of targeting the 7-11 year olds who are the right age to really become part of the club for life. Free ticketing as said by others is always a good hook, summer schools and a wider spread of that sort of pro-active involvement has to be beneficial to both the kids and the club. Hope these comments help you Elnino...
