Bidding War for QPR's Raheem Sterling?...Gorman Backs Magilton...QPR and Football Snippets...Paul Hart for Spurs?

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People/Alan Nixon- 13 December 2009 -GUNNERS IN STERLING EFFORT
- Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger is offering £1million PLUS striker Jay Simpson to push QPR into selling wonderkid Raheem Sterling.
- Wenger is desperate to beat off competition from MANCHESTER CITY and FULHAM for the teenager who has told Rangers he wants a move - despite their bid to put him in the first team at just 15. The Gunners chief has outbid Fulham, who put in a straightcash offer, and he hopes his offer to make on-loan Simpson's time at Rangers permanent will swing the deal.
- However, Manchester City are also offering cash plus players on loan and want to speak to Sterling to make their pitch to him too. The youngster is set for a round of talks with bidders in the next few weeks once crisis club QPR - who suspended manager Jim Magilton last week after Monday night's dressing room bust-up with Akos Buzsaky - accept the bids that are coming in." People


People/Ian Gibb; Dave Kidd 13 December 2009
INNOCENT - Gorman backs gaffer over player bust-up
-Exclusive Qpr will face the threat of an unfair dismissal tribunal if they try to sack suspended manager Jim Magilton on the strength of Monday's dressing-room bust-up at Watford.
- Not only has Magilton stressed he did nothing wrong, though accused of headbutting by QPR midfielder Akos Buzsaky, but the manager's No.2 John Gorman and reserve team boss Keith Ryan are set to back him.
- That is why Gorman and Ryan refused to take over after Magilton's suspension, before tomorrow night's tough trip to West Brom.
A source close to Gorman and Ryan said last night: "Jim has done absolutely nothing wrong. Not only did he refrain from making physical contact with Buzsaky, it was Buzsaky who then stormed out of the dressing room. Jim wanted Akos back in there so it could be sorted out amicably."
- Magilton seems likely to be axed, though, and does not have much support among Rangers players - many of whom have claimed to have witnessed him butt Buzsaky.
- It is believed that Gorman asked Rangers players to go on strike in support of Magilton after the manager's suspension - but the players refused.
- Co-owner Flavio Briatore held a meeting with senior players in London on Wednesday night, when the players were full square behind Buzsaky.
- There were claims that Magilton had 'picked on' the Hungarian in the past.
- Darren Ferguson and Paul Hart are in the frame to replace him as agents believed to be acting on QPR's behalf made a round of phone calls within 48 hours of the Magilton bust-up.
- Yet former Middlesbrough boss Gareth Southgate is not in the running, especially as he still has to thrash out a compensation deal with the Riverside club.
- It was Buzsaky's bizarre walkabout around and behind a Vicarage Road stand, still dripping wet in his QPR kit, after the 3-1 defeat that first prompted questions about what had happened.
- The source close to Gorman and Ryan explained how the dressing-room incident built up.
- He said: "The manager did have a go at Buzsaky over bad use of the ball when he came on as a sub. Buzsaky had a go back and then Jim went up to him.
- "Jim has got a very distinctive Northern Ireland accent and a powerful voice and they were head to head.
- "But again there was no physical contact. If there had been, there is no way John Gorman or Keith Ryan would have supported him. Another player Patrick Agyemang did step between them but again there was nothing untoward.
- "Jim Magilton does not deserve to lose his job over this."
- But Buzsaky is threatening legal action unless Magilton is sacked. People


Irish Independent - Magilton's fit of pique unlikely to receive ringing endorsement
- In the golden age of the Flavio Briatore reign at Queen's Park Rangers, the owner sent a text message from Kuala Lumpur, where he was attending the Grand Prix, demanding the substitution of Liam Miller -- understandable, perhaps, at any distance -- and it was implemented at Loftus Road.

Jim Magilton was probably acting independently last week when he allegedly headbutted Akos Buzsaky but when he is eventually dismissed for this alleged misdemeanour or for something else that earns him the displeasure of the men running QPR, he may be able to point to the harassment of his owners as contributing factors in driving a manager mad.

If there was a regret last week, apart from the scale of the violence that had erupted in dressing rooms, it was that Roy Keane had not become QPR manager this season, choosing instead to bring fear to the Fens.

Keane, by his own admission, is not a great fan of the mobile phone and the advances in communication that have resulted. We all know his reaction to the journalist who let his mobile ring out at his press conference a few weeks ago and, at the same audience, he contemptuously spat "drop them an email" when discussing whether FIFA would introduce video technology. The ease and swiftness of email as a form of communication goes against everything he believes in.

Keane's reaction would have been interesting to observe if, like another of Briatore's managers, Gareth Ainsworth, he had returned to the dressing room after a game to find 72 missed calls on his phone from the owner. Presumably, they weren't all about Liam Miller.

Clearly something had driven Magilton demented, beyond just the downturn in QPR's results which, if you are managing QPR, is something you accept as coming with the territory.

Magilton may have also been enraged -- although of course he denies that he was -- by Buzsaky's response when he asked the player if he thought he was being bullied. He is said to have shrugged his shoulders and mumbled "whatever" before Magilton's alleged assault. Buzsaky didn't go as far as to make the internationally recognised and internationally infuriating sign for "whatever" but Magilton clearly wasn't in the mood to be grateful. Briatore and the other billionaire owners are clearly in no mood to give thanks either.

As he was denying the allegations, Magilton couldn't even point out that he was, at least, not naked when he confronted Buzsaky, unlike Tony Pulis, who had plenty of skin in the game when he supposedly butted James Beattie.

In this frenzy of headbutting last week, it was only surprising that Sky were not conducting a vox pop among managers to ask if there were circumstances in which butting a player was justified or, at the very least, a good way of getting your message across. It certainly beats pinning the newspaper cutting on the dressing room wall.

It may be no coincidence that it was also the week in which the race to succeed George Burley as Scotland manager became a bit more intense. They yearn for a return to traditional values in Scotland at the moment but seeking out a manager because of his expertise in the Glasgow kiss is probably not part of their mission statement right now.

Instead, they are confused, pulling back from an interview with Dan Petrescu because the experience with Bertie Vogts has scarred them. Very little has happened to the Scottish football psyche in recent times that hasn't scarred them, so why Bertie Vogts should be singled out is not entirely clear.

During the last campaign, Barry Ferguson led a campaign for a return to traditional values by drinking at the team hotel on the shores of Loch Lomond beyond the dawn in the wake of a Scottish defeat which, in itself, is another traditional value.

The fall-out from this binge led ultimately to the downfall of Burley, even if defeats in friendlies to Japan and Wales were said to be the decisive factors.

Now the Scottish people and, most tragically, the Scottish press face a Christmas of managerial speculation.

We are too familiar with this season ourselves and can only sympathise as the Scots get excited at the breaking news that Petrescu is about to be appointed as he impressed when his side Unirea Urziceni defeated Rangers in the Champions League.

In the long winters when Ireland were managerless, there were many stories like this to chase down. Who can forget Arie Haan (I can, I had to look him up) who seemed almost certain to be given the Ireland job for about 72 hours one December.

So Petrescu was installed as favourite and, almost as quickly, became a long-shot when the SFA made it clear that beating Rangers comprehensively did not automatically lead to a man's appointment as Scotland manager. That would have opened the floodgates.

Instead, they will take their time and sift through the applications as QPR are also doing, before they have even taken a final decision on Magilton's future. Buzsaky is threatening to take legal action if QPR's investigation does not find in his favour. This may seem like a player having too much power but in the emasculation of the manager that QPR believe in, it is only the next logical step.

If Magilton goes, Briatore will be busy on the phone, looking for his new man. But the calls won't stop once he gets him.

theweek@me.com Irish Independent