I'm still sulking but here is an interesting article.
'Cometh the hour, cometh the Hoos' - The man behind the modern rebirth of [HASHTAG]#QPR[/HASHTAG] Our latest feature looks at QPR CEO Lee Hoos, and the good work he's done over the past 5 years to see QPR come flying out of the pandemic.
‘Cometh the hour, cometh the Hoos’ – The man behind the modern rebirth of QPR
25 mins ago
Champ News Daily
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Queens Park Rangers have emerged from the pandemic in style. Buying players for actual fees, breaking their record sale and looking ahead after years of turmoil – five years on from his appointment as CEO, Lee Hoos is doing exactly what we he brought in to do.
The American previously held the same position at Burnley.
He left in May 2015 to join QPR and Burnley fans were delighted. They were glad to see the back of Hoos – his time at Turf Moor became tarnished in a four year spell which saw the club promoted and immediately relegated from the Premier League, minimal financial backing under Sean Dyche and an unsuccessful season ticket plan dubbed [HASHTAG]#retainergate[/HASHTAG].
Burnley fans waved ‘good riddance to bad rubbish’ in their eyes, but five years on from his QPR appointment, it looks as though the bashful, somewhat cheesy corporate American has done exactly what he was brought in to do. He along with the contested Les Ferdinand and now Mark Warburton are the ‘three amigos’ behind the modern rebirth of QPR – a club finally looking back up the Football League pyramid rather than down.
Given the modern examples of both Sunderland, Portsmouth and now Hull City as well, QPR fans had every right to be fearful of a similar fall. They dropped out of the Premier League
with a 6-0 defeat at Manchester City in May 2015, and little over a week afterwards, Hoos was appointed CEO.
That same month,
QPR became involved in a legal case that would stunt their progression for the next half-decade. Their battle with FFP will be regarded as a historic one in future memoirs of the system. Initially looking at a fine of up to £58 million,
QPR reached an agreement in 2018 to pay £17 million in fines and a further £3 million in ‘EFL costs’, with the club taking on nearly £22 million in outstanding loans.
READ: Sheffield Wednesday hoping to land released PL youngster
It was a long and arduous process for all involved with the club. Fans were fearing undoubtedly the worst, but the boards’ subsequent solution – absolutely minimal spending, a big ‘no’ to players still on Premier League wages, and a focus on youth production and recruitment – is proving to be the foundation on which Warburton’s QPR are being born.
With the pandemic came angst for all clubs in the EFL, and QPR especially given their shoestring budgets in recent seasons. But they’ve emerged from the darkness of 2020 like a phoenix –
they’ve signed Lyndon Dykes from Livingston for an actual fee, said to be nearing £2 million, they’ve today broken their record transfer fee received with
the sale of Ebere Eze and, despite
Warburton stating that there will not be a ‘spending spree’ with the Eze millions,
they’re still looking a bid for Oxford United’s Rob Dickie, with more signings expected to be made.
QPR then are starting to look like the QPR of old. Not spending £10 million on the likes of Chris Samba old, but starting to buy players again but this time with a view to bettering them and eventually selling them on for profit as they build a sustainable bid for a sustained period of Premier League football. All of which is giving fans optimism heading into the 2020/21 Championship season.
READ: Norwich City fans react to Jordan Hugill signing
Hoos, for all the criticism he’s been on the receiving end of, is the man behind all that is now positive at QPR. Undoubtedly, his tenure has overseen some mistakes – Chris Ramsey’s appointment as manager perhaps wasn’t a sustainable move, Ian Holloway may well have been in charge for too long after that, and Steve McLaren? A step in the right direction given his youth pedigree, but the name says it all really.
What’s more is that, since the footballing world knew of QPR’s financial demise following relegation, clubs would ‘lowball’ them for their best assets, doing so in the knowledge that QPR would likely jump at any sort of financial income at that time. But that story is a stark one to what we’ve seen this summer –
Crystal Palace had numerous bids knocked back for Eze, with QPR holding firm on their £20 million valuation and looking as though they’ll receive the best part of that figure.
QPR fans’ well wishing of Eze signifies their contempt at the sale, and the way that QPR are now being run as a club. Hoos continues to make the odd mistake; granting the Kiyan Prince Foundation naming rights of Loftus Road split opinion, before
berating the Championship’s restart date this year, only for his club to lose five of their restarting six fixtures, and
the whole debacle with HoopsRetro. But, as Burnley fans would no doubt disagree, Hoos has done everything he has with QPR in his best interests.
Fans have all seen the financial figures from the past few seasons, and they tell the story of QPR’s fall from grace, a period of financial hibernation in the Championship and subsequent awakening. Those figures are now correlating into actual changes – player sales, a profound emphasis on youth production and a manager who entails that. It’s an exciting time to be a QPR fan, and we know Hoos behind it all.
