Having watched the events of the last few days unfold in the media and on this site I feel compelled to highlight how surprisingly ruthless TF has been. TF arrived on the QPR scene with a huge smile and promises of dragging our club out of the dirt and establishing us as a solid prem club. I have to admit i was slow to take to him, prehaps affected by years of dodgy owners, managers and sadly players. He promised to make transfer funds available (a promise he kept), he promised to buy top players for our relatively small club (a promise he kept and is still keeping), he promised to make QPR a world brand (a promise he is working on and the appointment of PB is massive), he promised us openness (he has constantly remained in contact with fans through twitter) and most of all he promised us stability as a club (and prehaps here the appointment of MH can now give us this). The issue of stability is a point that will knaw at most of our fans. "In NW we trust" has been used so often by our fans in recent months that despite all the excitment that we now feel, most fans feel a little shell shocked at NWs sudden departure and it's almost like we have lost a father figure, and prehaps we have. IMO, NW unfortunately was out of his depth at this level. Most of you will remember that i was concerned as far back as last June. A large reason for our success last year was the fact that nobody knows the Championship like NW. He knew exactly what players he needed, hence the likes of Kenny, Derry, Hill etc etc were bought in. But here lies the problem. These players are good championship players but sadly, with the exception of Kenny, they are not Prem quality. Look at the likes of Young and Traore. They were disgarded by Prem clubs as being average or no longer required, yet we can see that they are so much better than what we had. The gulf in class between a good Prem Player and a good Champ player is massive. Anybody who can't see this does not know or understand football. The margin between success or failure in the Prem is very small. Despite all that TF has done since his arrival i still can't but feel slightly uneasy. Thoughts of a portsmouth are floating around in my head. TF is a business man. How can we afford the players we are linked to on crowds of 18,000. Something does not add up. Nobody is asking where is all this money coming from? Are we building up another huge loan in the background that we will be left with when TF decides he does not want to play with us anymore. Surely, a successful businessman is not just prepared to throw his hard earned money at a small club like us? This uneasy feeling just won't go away. I suspect (as many do) that TF is only a frontman, if so, who are the real moneymen? Finally, i am convinced that what TF and the board did was the correct decision. In Mark Hughes, i think we have a smashing young hungry manager. We should not criticize him for having ambition. He is vastly experienced at Prem and international level. Do not forget this. He will bring steel, effort and energy to our team. He will make us harder to beat. Thats for sure. For a small club trying to survive in the Prem these are exactly the attributes we need. IMHO i think that Hughes was lined up ages ago. It can't be a coincidence that the players we were linked with lately are nearly all Hughes Ex players. Zamora, johnson. Samba etc etc. Me thinks that TF and the board were working away with Hughes in the background for the last few months. I think TF now has a manager that best reflects him. Hard working and professional. Do not be fooled by our TF, he is ruthless.
maybe if TF hadnt been working away on a new manager in the past months the team wouldn't have become so demotivated. Also TF has said himself he wants to make money out of QPR, I think he'll do this by any means necessary and give up if he can't. if Hughes can keep us up From where we are now I will be impressed.
i think that the mattels would be making sure that the club is being built up very steadily. i dont think they woud be allowing for the club to be runing up big debts
Good to have you back NUTS, and a cracking post to go with it About him being ruthless you're spot on. If we thought that he was all smiles and no toughness we shouldn't need to look further than his success in aviaton. Success there and ruthlessnes goes hand in hand.
Amit did say quite categorically in answer to a direct question after the takeover that 1. The club's debts had been cleared 2. Any shortfall in funding for transfers and the day-to-day expenditure were not being charged against the club but were coming from the director's personal funds. That seemed fairly plausible at the time what with the relief and euphoria of the takeover but surely with the astronomical sums being mooted for transfers and the current and subsequent wage bill a further clarification would be useful to say the least at this time.
I read somewhere that the goons had taken most of this years sky money with them. On our small crowds, how can we afford to have 6-7-8 players on top money. The transfer fees are one thing but the annual wage bill will be huge. Look at the likes of Everton, Villa, Wolves etc etc. These teams (established clubs and teams) would love to have 6-7-8 top players, but they don't, simply because they can't afford them. They can only afford a few top quality players and surround them with whatever they can afford. And all these clubs have at least twice the crowds that we do. Somebody please explain where the money will come from. I'm thrilled at the thoughts of Defoe (yea right), Bassong, Samba etc etc being linked to our club, but we can't afford them. That's whats leaving this uneasy feeling in the back of my mind. Am i missing something?
My thoughts entirely. This is Mittal/TF's gamble and a very big one at that. That is why he was quick to remove Warnock. TF, personally, doesn't own that much of QPR. The Mittals own more than he does, and even TF's percentage is actually funded by a consortium or which he is the public face. The biggest emerging market is in Asia at the moment. All the owners want a piece of that pie and this is their one chance to get in on the ground floor. In a few years time it will be much more difficult. They have not got the time to drop down to the Championship and come back up again. Between them they have far better contacts in Asia than any other UK football club. Man United have started the pushing with their share sell off, but our owners can see incredible potential which can benefit not only the club but their existing business interests. Nobody will get in the way of the Mittals and TF's consortium as they strive for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Not even Mark Hughes and his imfamous agent. The one thing that I don't want us to be is top of the league, challenging in Europe, playing with the big boys all over the world and turn into a side like Chelsea, who I have always derided for the way Abramovich has tried (and succeeded to some extent) to buy success by throwing hundreds of millions at the club. It is that (together with the Sky money) which has spoilt our game, driving up transfer fees, top players wages, etc, etc. Things are even moving on from the buying of success that likes of Walker did at Blackburn and Ambramovich has done at Chelsea. We are now seeing a change where football is used as a tool to promote other business. That is where the money is to be made ... and the Mittals and TF's consortium want to cash in on that. The reason Briatore and Ecclestone failed was that they had nothing to link the club to. QPR could hardly go hand in glove with the F1 management, although TF can get some value out a link between Caterham and QPR. Briatore brought nothing to the table business wise. As the running of our football club (and others) is a means to an end for this new type of owner decisions will be very much business based .... but not necessarily football business. If it doesn't seem to be working for their other businesses we will be dropped like a stone. Just like they dropped Warnock. Then we will be really in the doo-doo.
Swiss Tony is the frontman, his actual shareholding isn't that great as part of the Malaysian consortium. Mittals are the driving force but they don't want the media spotlight and Tony craves that.
There are a few fans on here who would love nothing more than for us to try and outbid Man City on every transfer, but thankfully most of us want things done in a more realistic fashion and build slowly for a stable future. So how can we afford all these players? Well at the moment we cant, it was always going to be a case of once promoted, whoever was in charge was going to have to bank roll us until a new stadium could be built. Now I'm sure any owner would have preferred that once we were promoted, we would have 2-3 seasons back in the Premiership with no other aim than to establish ourselves. But we are faced with a problem and it is a nice problem for a change. Thankfully our owners want nothing more than to build a new stadium to increase the clubs profitability. The failure to do this in the past is the reason we remain a small club. But what's more exciting is the fact that the owners want any new stadium to be as close to LR as possible. But the problem they have is that all available sites to build the new ground are all available for development right now, which means we don't have the time to wait and establish ourselves in the premiership, we have to move now and buy a site. I feel this is a large reason as to why Warnock had to go now, because while both Tony and Amit said we wanted to avoid relegation, they also said relegation wouldn't matter as they are in it for the long haul. But because now we have to move on securing a site for a stadium, this now means we have to stay in the premiership at all costs. So now I believe they will throw almost as much money as Hughes calls for, far more than would have been available to Warnock. But how the hell can we afford such transfers??? The answer is simple, Phil Beard. Does anyone think that it's coincidence that we appointed Beard, who's previous job was turning the O2 into the worlds premier entertainments venue?? When our new stadium is announced, don't be surprised if it has a roof or at least a retractable one. Beard is on board because we intend to make our new stadium a cash cow to bankroll the club and give us a new source of income. Concerts, other sporting events, exhibitions and anything that can fit inside will be held at the new stadium. In london we have a large collection of venues for such things, primarily Wembley and the O2. But with the capacity at Wembley at 90,000 and the O2 at 20,000, there is very little choice for a venue with a capacity inbetween. So the proposed capacity of our new stadium of between 30-35k would be a perfect inbetween choice. So with this added revenue it will mean the club can punch above it's weight in the transfer market. Hopefully in 10 years time we'll be in a similar position as Tottenham are today. There are going to be some downs in that time, but on the whole the future looks very bright indeed. Some fans need to focus on the long term goal and stop worrying about the slip ups.
That's a really nice analysis Lone. I strongly suspect that there is a bit of Mittal cash being made available (not enough for them to notice, and certainly not on the Scum/City scale), precisely because they see a return on investment in the future. the only thing that confuses me is why they think they can make money at football in England, where everyone else (apart from perhaps Arsenal) has to the best of my knowledge failed. The only answer must be the stadium, as you point out. Anybody else getting mixed messages on the capacity - TF was going on about 40-45k, but in the last few days I've seen 30k a couple of times. For us, the latter sounds good - a ground we could fill and a design to maintain the atmosphere. For other activities and income generation, bigger sounds more likely - to fill the gap between the O2 and Wembley.
'Hopefully in 10 years time we'll be in a similar position as Tottenham are today.' You have no history and no fans, how can you be as big as Spurs?
The answer does not only lie with the stadium. It has more to do with incredible sums of money that would be made by becoming a big player in the Asian market. Some of this would filter back to the club, but a lot would be retained by companies in the Asian countries ... companies that would be owned by, or count among their shareholders, The Mittals, TF and his mates.
Agree with you there. We need to sign a couple of East or South East Asian players even if they don't get to play. Would generate cash, investment and massive interest over there. Checked through the Malaysian and Indonesian national teams and size is a huge problem, most are 5'6" or less. Koreans or Japanese seem the best bet.
Great work there LoneRanger This is turning into a quality thread with many interesting views, eye openers i would say. Agree that a combination of a new stadium and the asian marked is where the truly big earnings lie.
Yes, I think Lone Ranger has a good point over making the new stadium commercially viable, but the real money is in branding, and making QPR one of the major footballing brands in the East. If it works, it could be incredibly exciting - if it fails, the club could be left with a lot of debt like Portsmouth...
As much as i loved Warnock i think the timing was right to let him go,and Tony showing a ruthless streak is fine by me.You have to have one if you are going to take the club in the right direction,as long as he doesn't start turning into Briatore.The vast amount of the money being pumped into transfers and wages i would hope is coming from the Mittal's,who despite prefering to remain in the background would be loathe to see their investment going down the drain.The real problem would arise if we were to be relegated,having players on such wages in the Championship wouldn't be viable and with smaller attendances could mean a catastrophic collapse of Portsmouth proportions.It is absolutely vital we stay in the Premiership this season,so we can build a bigger stadium to generate more funds to continue to bring in the players required to remain in this league.It doesn't matter what line of business people are in,the most successful one's are 99% of the time the most ruthless one's!
Agree with that also Eamon, but that is a given with any team nowadays, but that only comes with success and we're a way off from that yet. But our brand will spread year on year, but it will take time. In the mean time the stadium is what will give us the clout we need to build some success.
