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Great blog, thanks. It's good to get a bit of perspective from an outsider about what is going on at our club.

As a fan since 1977, all I can say is that it's much better to have uncertainty with a lot of money behind it than uncertainty due to ever-impending bankruptcy!

I for one am very grateful for Briatore and the other investors for saving the club, although I do understand that this means the club will fundamentally change.

Change is not always welcome, but in QPR's case, it was essential.

I'm surprised that you did not mention at all the role that Gianni Paladini has played in all this transformation. He was (allegedly), after all, at the business end of that gun in the boardroom that you referred to!

Your observations about Sousa are excellent. It's early, but the indications are there that he may be a terrific up-and-coming manager. It's not east arriving from another country with little experience and quickly finding your feet in the cut-and-thrust of the Championship, but Sousa seems to have managed the transition with ease.

I predicted at the start of the season a 9th place finish for QPR -- almost exactly where we are, at the moment. As with most other clubs, what happens in January will go a long way to deciding if we move up or stand still.

Good blog.

Not sure what on earth valedictory is piping on about - i think he was trying to be clever and witty. Seems strange to be criticising the media on a bbc blog page...

Is the Westfield Centre any good?

Good write up. The age make up of the Rangers crowd is typically 40 to 60 year olds but probably less so than it was around 10 years ago. A lot of younger supporters started following the Rs around 5 years ago with the play off final in 2003 and promotion in 2004 but many have been priced out by the comparatively high ticket prices being charged nowadays.

A nice unbiased blog. As a ranger for 20 years, Ive seen quite a lot go down at the bush. The arrival of Briatore has received mixed reviews with some fans forgetting where we were last year and demanding money be spent!

The ticket price hike is a joke, but as long as they stay the same for the next couple of seasons I'll keep my season ticket going...

Superhoops! Roll on Wembley in may!

Paulo Sousa looks like a good appointment, but what is with these businessmmen when they come into football - they lose all sense. He wouldnt dream of tinkering with the engine of a F1 car, but somehow thinks he's qualified to be coach as well as front man for the owners' consortium.
As for transforming the club as a business; in what other business sector do you whack the prices up before improving the product? He can't even get the basics right. Halfway through a season and the superstore still doesnt have kids' shorts and socks in the new kit! Maybe he means he's going to run a boutique when the money men get tired of the football club?

This is a really good and balanced article. It is pretty much rooted in reality. I'm impressed that it avoids using the lazy "moneybags QPR" label without proper analysis of the facts.

The only thing I would note is that QPR continue to offer very positive ongoing prices for children in the family stand - this is a permanent arrangement and separate from the family for Β£20 offer that featured this weekend.

There are a lot of people who (rightly) criticise the price rises, but it is also fair to point out that the club is doing good stuff for younger fans. On Tuesday season ticket holder and members can watch the players train at Loftus Road, meet the players, get autographs etc and all for free! That's a great opportunity and something I would loved to have done as a kid.

Finally, well done again for a decent piece of journalism.

From the outside looking in i would throw this theory into the mix about the average age of your fans.

It wasn't that long ago that QPR were the biggest team in West London (yes Chelsea fans even bigger than you!). Then came the early Chelsea revolution with Ken Bates followed by the major impact of Abramovich. Between these two stages of revolution at Chelsea, there was the Fulham revival under the guidance of Al Fayed. During this time QPR were overshadowed by the glamour and style of the Marketing campaigns, that both Chelsea and Fulham undertook.

Then came what i thought to be the killer blow to QPR which was the ground share with Fulham. I suppose at the time the board couldn't image the impact it would have, but allowing a team that are more prestigious than yourselves (at that moment in time), with a great history, to share your ground, you open up yourselves to lose support.

I used to get free tickets to go watch Fulham play when they played at Loftus Road. The one thing that stuck out the most to me was that there was not too much advertising or signage around the place that would have pointed to a ground share situation, it looked more like Fulham's ground. In fact, the only thing that gave any indication that QPR played there was the blue and white colours scattered around the place. I think the only successful ground share agreement in football has been that of Milan and Inter.

Now what i have noticed in the past 5 years in the west london and surrey areas is the youth involvement schemes run by Fulham and Chelsea. Now i'm sure we all remember as children we all wanted the latest and shiniest toys. This is what Fulham and Chelsea currently represent to the youth in QPR's catchment area.

However, with Fulham now gone and ultimately cutting back in their previous extravagant activities, QPR have the opportunity to claw back some ground. It seems that they now have a manager who can guide the team to the top tier similar to Tigana at Fulham.

Until QPR start to take back 'their Manor' (for want of a better phrase), from Chelsea and Fulham, they can forget about this new branding enterprise. Everything seems to be in place for this to happen its just a case of whether they can push on.

I would be interested to know just how many young fans, that go to Chelsea and Fulham matches and wear the club colours, have older family members that are QPR supporters.

Very nice article, addressing all the important points fairly and intelligently.

Id like to point out to the user above that i am a young chelsea fan from a QPR family and this is purely because they are not a premier league team but if they do get back to the premier league they will have my full support.

I am beyond middle age, well into my 60s. My father took me to my first QPR match in 1948, depositing me in the long-defunct boys' enclosure behind the goal at the Loftus Road end.
Beware the men with supposed mega money! Sometimes it works (Mohammed Al Fayed and Fulham), more often it doesn't. Older fans may remember John Bloom of Rolls Razor fame who with his forthcoming pile from a new washing machine was going to take over the R's, buy George Eastham from Newcastle and get us into the First Division in two seasons. It all, including Rolls Razor, spectacularly crashed (Eastham sensibly moved to Arsenal instead).

'Boutique football'

Is modern football speak for 'deliberately pricing out your most loyal customers'

Its all very well having top class dining and comfy seats but when you have completely priced out your traditional support who is going to create the atmosphere that football as entertainment thrives on and is reliant on?

Look at QPRs neighbours Chelsea who have to pipe crowd noise in and arrange flag displays to create some sort of atmosphere.

And then theres the credit crunch....I hope this tacky commercialism blows up in the faces of the marketing clowns who came up with it.
....but then they can fall back on the yuppies Nuremburg defence:

'Its just like any other business'

Really good analysis Paul - thanks very much!

I think you've summed up the views of the majority of season-ticket holders (mine anyway!) regarding the Flavio effect.

Personally, I was happy with him to come in, install flash seating and dining for him and his chums, and spend however much of his own cash as he wanted on his 'boutique' football club - just as long as it didn't have an adverse effect on the traditional QPR supporter.

But the massive ticket price rises enforced as soon as possible drove a wedge between owner and fans (comments such as 'I don't care what someone who only pays Β£20 thinks' didn't help either) and the club will have to win promotion for Briatore to win many back I feel.

But it looks like he has a good man in charge now - he just has to let him be in charge.

Very nice blog. As a Palace fan I see what has happened at QPR as a good thing for the club and good on them. However, the ticket price issue is something that is neverending unfortunately. We have seen it at Palace as well. However, I do believe that tickets will continue to increase, although what SJ did at Palace some years ago was great (reduced season tickets by a lot) and helped to generate an athmosphere. That said, everywhere now seems to turning for the worse?!
Whatever happened? Not sure but the REAL fans seems to find the money always and as that trend continues then no wonder these big guns keeps adding and adding?
Good Luck to QPR and we will see you at the play-off final I hope??? :-)

10.
Jerod Mayo, nice honesty mate admitting that you follow Chelsea despite your family being Rangers fans. However, i fear you are not alone in your defection to a more glamourous Premiership option.

In regards to ticket pricing here is a link to an interesting article in on the Mail website



This would suggest that the League itself is not happy about the price increases. However the final paragraph is significant in my opinion, because it states that the money made from the increases is to be ploughed into the club. It says 'club' and not 'team' so make of that what you will, but it suggests that the extra revenue will help the future of QPR.

I think that consideration has to be given to the location of QPR as a club in London. West London is considered the most expensive part of the capital and if you were to look at the average house prices around all 24 clubs in the Championship then i'm sure QPR would come out top. Some times we forget that football clubs are not community funded projects but businesses that need to be self sustainable. The costs of running Loftus Road will be higher than most (if not all) other Championship clubs. Also according to government stats the earnings of people from that area are significantly higher.

QPR's poor financial history has been well documented in the past and maybe this has been caused because tickets were vastly under priced, under the previous ownership. I just see don't see it as a suprise that QPR should be the most expensive ticket in the Championship. Location is everything in my opinion, and so long that Briatore is not using the extra cash to refurnish the board room then i don't see the major problem.

I know PS from Juve, he should be a good asset for QPR, while he was playing , he seemed to be a good reader of the game.
Maybe ManCity should rope him in if they sack MH.

To poster number 9:

Over the past few years Chelsea's involvement with the community has generally been pretty far away from Stamford Bridge. They still do a lot of work in the local area, don't get me wrong, especially with the schools around there, but they used to do a huge amount outside of London in Surrey and South Bucks, traditional catchment areas for their fans. Fulham also have made a big effort with local schools and football clubs.

I've been impressed by a lot of what I've seen of QPR's community work in the past five years. Since following in Chelsea's footsteps at their Harlington training ground, the coaching staff seem to have built good links with community coaching projects, including school and girls teams. I know they do a fair amount of work across the north of London in trying to support community sports schemes to give young people outlets and activities (although trying to get a housing estate to be named after the club was probably a bit much). They're not yet up there with Charlton, but I think that they are probably trying to emulate that level of community support.

And yes, I'm sure as someone else pointed out, the housing prices around the club are probably pretty high compared to others in the championship. But most of their fans don't live in Notting Hill, that's for sure!

I'm a fan in my mid 30's and the thing that keeps me away is ticket prices.
There may well be high earners in Notting Hill but not everyone from West London is a high earner (some parts of the surrounding areas of W9, W10 are in the top 5% of deprivation in the country) and you don't have to travel far from the ground to the White City Estate to see that not everyone in W12 is as rich as Bernie and Flavio.
After the unsettling times of a couple of years ago its good to see a bit of financial stability. However I'm a bit worried about the future of the club. I want us to be successful of course but I don't want us to be another Chelsea!

Interesting read However in a recent AKUTRS fanzine it stated Rangers were the 7th highest for adult season ticket holders Top price for the Championship and more than Everton Portsmouth Man City Villa and Blackburn

how can that be justified ? Ok weve got some slightly better players since they took over but certainly not Premiership quality Is it any wonder we are in the bottom third of Championship attendances

Briatore once said when speaking about moving to a new ground .. if you run a restaurant you need to fill all the tables before moving to a larger premises. I agree but charging silly prices for an average meal wont attract more diners.

He also needs to stop talking about the "project" ..we are a Football Club

I went to secondary school in the Shepard Bush Notting Hill gate area, and remember when QPR was the glamour club and Rodney Marsh the coolest thing this side of George Best. I think the Italians have the right idea, make it glamourous again, they have a great name... Queens Park Rangers
its up there with Tottenham Hotspurs, Queen of The South, Raith Rovers, Bristol Rovers, Sheffield Wednesday and Aston Villa. Chelsea and Arsenal are dull sounding like stops on the Tube, or what you would call a pet

I must admit the only time I have been to QPR was when I saw Yes play there in 1975.

To me there are two types of owners these days. Local man who loves the area and team made good, and somebody coming in from outside with loads of money and using the club as a play-thing/status symbol ala Chelsea, or somebody coming in needing to use the club for their own means ala Liverpool, Man City etc.

As a Reading fan I remember Robert Maxwell trying to merge us with Oxford Utd to create a Thames Valley team of some sort. It was opposed successfully. Thankfully. Madjeski, the current owner is in the first group.

I know bankruptcy is no option, yet when people like oil sheiks, and Ecclestone get involved, the things that make a club, its fans, players, history have very little currency. You only have to look at the way Ecclestone runs Formula One to see what you are in for.

I wish you all the best, and I can only hope that you can still see some connection between yourselves and the club in the future.

I've enjoyed the article, as it seems a fair assessment of the state of play at Loftus Road. I was born near the ground and watched my early games at White City. I still have a 1961-62 supporters club membership badge. It was division 3 in those days. When I was 18 I bought 2 season tickets and took my new girlfriend to home games. We live near Bondi now. I'm optimistic about QPR's future. They seem to have bought too many players and lack finishing power, but they're improving and the team with the greatest momentum entering the play offs generally goes up. I hope this tendency to hike the ticket prices up is restrained. I've a friend who paid 299 pounds for a season ticket in a good position at Fulham. I can't see why real supporters should be penalised for loyalty and, as was correctly pointed out by others, to cultivate real, enduring support you have to have young people attending games. The new manager is looking good and I wish all the fans and players the best of luck. Next time I'm in town I'll hope to buy a ticket - hopefully to see QPR beat Chelsea.

Interesting insight. Can't wait to see them play against Man City next season as I don't see them getting promoted. Wonder what it would do for the premiership if the Championship started being richer?

Over the years I have been amused by football supporters who accept the incredible draws that have been achieved in FA Cup, (or whatever it is now). Is it a complete coincidence that the lowly team then go back to the Premier team's ground for another well paid gate where they get thrashed! This is not a sport - it is business.

Happy New Year Mugs.