Analysis: Why Ecclestone Sold Stake In QPR Share Comments (0) Tadhg Enright August 18, 2011 2:42 PM Recommend post (0) Having restored Queen's Park Rangers to the Premier League after a painful 15 year absence, you might wonder why Bernie Ecclestone has sold up. The Loftus Road club is Ecclestone's only sporting interest outside of Formula 1 but now it is being taken on by another F1 team owner and fan of rival West Ham, Tony Fernandes; Chief Executive of the Malaysian low-cost airline, Air Asia. "I can't work it out", Professor Chris Brady, Dean of BPP Business School told Sky News. "Considering they've reached the promised land, suddenly he wants to sell. "I guess he thinks he can get out having made some money." Banking a profit from a four year stewardship of QPR will not go down well with many fans unhappy with sharp hikes in season ticket prices that have been part of the current owners' strategy. Professor Brady, himself an avowed football fan, sees things a little more pragmatically: "It's an inevitable consequence of rescuing a club's finances. "Fans should cast their minds back three years ago and ask if they'd have been happy to be back in the Premier League." QPR was facing financial ruin when Ecclestone and his partner Flavio Briatore - once Renault's F1 Team boss - took over in 2007. They, along with Indian steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal who later bought into the consortium, brought the club back from the abyss but losses have grown as they tried to spend their way back into the Premier League. "What they've done is take a loss-making company that was loss-making club on the field and turned it into a loss-making company that's successful on the field," according to Seán Hamil, Sports Management lecturer at Birkbeck College. "A degree of rigour has been applied. "In trying to qualify they've made a loss in the short run with a view to selling once they achieve promotion." Its 21st century Premier League debut was a fixture at home to Bolton Wanderers. A 0-4 defeat does not inspire confidence for the rest of the season. Mittal will retain his 33% stake in the club and his son-in-law Amit Bhatia will resume his post of Vice Chairman. They join the former Thai PM Thakin Shinawatra (Manchester City) and Hong Kong's Carson Yeung (Birmingham City) in a growing list of Asian businessmen with English football clubs in their toy-boxes. "There are only three possible reasons for a businessman to buy QPR", concluded Seán Hamil. "The first is to have a trophy asset which they can indulge and subsidise. "The second is to try to turn it around and run it as a proper business but with a stadium that only holds 20,000 people the only way they'll do that is to build a new stadium with a capacity for at least 40,000. "The third reason could be that it's a property play. "A new owner might try to get away with selling Loftus Road and moving QPR out of town." Fernandes has already given his backing to manager, Neil Warnock. "I think Neil is a super guy and he's done extremely well to have got QPR to where they are." Warnock is hopeful Fernandes will invest in new players. He told Sky Sports: "He's very supportive [Fernandes].... "If everything is sorted, the club can take a giant step like we've been trying to plan from the word go." Birkbeck College's Seán Hamil is wary of the motives of rich investors: "If Fernandes wants QPR to break even, he's got a big challenge. "If it's a trophy asset, he'll keep it until he gets bored and sells it onto the next man. "What you want is a high quality owner like Delia Smith at Norwich; people who are successful in all walks of life but are uncontroversial. "They will build up those institutions as sustainable businesses and that's what's good for the clubs."
What a dry pseudo-academic read. It's certainly not what it says on the tin, and why I bothered to read it. Where's the analysis on Ecclestone selling up? It's simply based around two or three reasons why people buy into football. There are loads more of course. Why did Ecclestone sell up? Simply because he'd realised football club ownership is a bigger beast than he can cope with. Having Briatore and Paladini advising him and directing matters can't have helped matters either!
Agreed, Brix. Ecclestone wins the award for the most unenthusiastic club owner in English Football History!
He had enough people hating him for everything he did in F1. Having people hating him for whathe did in football was probably an annoyance he decided he didn't need.
