In the past Iâve described Paladini as a self serving parasite but will now admit to being slightly confused about him. I will never forgive him for shafting Ollie, stabbing Bill Powers in the back or lining the pockets of his agent mates with Q.P.R.âs money. He mismanaged the club to the verge of re-entering administration, but then did set the wheels in motion that ultimately led to our return to the Premier League although through no direct result of any positive act of his own. Under Briatore I think his actions were more designed to keep his job rather than in the best interests of the club. His mindless boasting led directly to the âFaurlin Affairâ. His duplicity was highlighted in the film by the sacking of Sousa, where he told Briatore that Sousa had told the press about Blackstock being loaned out without his knowledge but then told Sousa that Briatore has told him about it. On the other hand he clearly was ecstatic when we scored and frustrated when we didnât. He did try to temper the excesses of Briatore, but without endangering himself. The big question is were his tears, on the announcement of the no points deduction, tears of joy or relief? Mine were a combination of both emotions, but my relief was born from being a lifelong Q.P.R. supporter, I was still expecting it all to go wrong. Paladini doesnât have that history with the club. His relief would be because he got off the hook and didnât have Briatore and Ecclestone to answer to, suddenly his skies were blue again. This does return us to the original question about whether Briatore, and by association Paladini, have been bad for the club, but feel sorry for him? I donât think so, but Iâm willing to be shown that Iâm wrong.
Briatore appeared to come across as someone who only trust himself and was perhaps unhelped by surrounding himself with too many ''yes'' men. However his football knowledge was next to nothing and it is no surprise that once he was removed, we started doing well. Paladini genuinely cared however I still have no respect for him as he was nothing more than a glorified lap dog (or St Bernard as he liked to put it). At one point I did finally start feeling less hate towards Paladini (when he finally stood up to Flavio after the watford game last year), however this all instantly dissapeared once he tried to blame the office for his ****-ups with the Faurlin transfer. As for Agag, I never knew quite how involved he was behind the scenes. And as for Bernie, his brief cameo did nothing more than to once more bring up the 'poison dwarf' sentiment. However the 4 of them did save us, and without them we may not have a football club anymore. Warnock, Mittal and Saksena deserve statues outside Loftus Road as their work was nothing short of a miracle.
Trouble is if you arent a yes man, you get sacked. Im sure thats what happened to the secretary that was there for 20 years, she probably queried the Faurlin deal only to be shown the door.
Sheila Marsden was Mrs QPR, what a wonderful woman. I had the pleasure of meeting her, she was QPR through and through.
