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QPR Official Statement - CLUB STATEMENT: TAARABT IS STAYING
Posted on: Sat 23 Jul 2011
Club Statement on behalf of majority shareholders Bernie Ecclestone and Flavio Briatore:
'We are pleased to confirm that Adel Taarabt will be staying at QPR this summer.
Despite receiving a substantial bid for our Moroccan international, we rebuffed all approaches and indeed, we are keen to build for the future in the Barclays Premier League, and not sell one of our prized assets.
Should we have decided to sell Taarabt this summer, we made it clear to Neil Warnock that we would reinvest funds into the squad.
Taarabt is fully committed to the Club and is looking forward to proving his undoubted star quality for QPR in the Barclays Premier League.
Our decision not to sell him only serves to reiterate the ambition and commitment we have both shown to QPR since we arrived here.
We saved the Club when it was close to relegation from the Championship and just one week from liquidation.
At this time, Flavio Briatore outlined a four year plan to reach the Premier League, which was achieved.
We have always owned approximately 70 per-cent of the shareholding at the Club and have been the major benefactors since our arrival.
We have backed Neil Warnock in bringing in his two top targets, Jay Bothroyd and Kieron Dyer, and we are working hard to try and pursue a couple of other targets the coach has identified.
Welsh international Danny Gabbidon has impressed the coach whilst on trial and we are aiming to add him, as well as at least one or two other players to our squad in the near future.
Neil Warnock is our coach and we are working closely with him in a professional and confidential manner to try to achieve our aims and objectives.
The coach's job is to coach the squad and identify players he believes will improve the squad. As a Board, we deal with all the negotiations and we have been successful in completing deals for Bothroyd and Dyer so far.
We are aware of some issues that have been raised in the press by the coach, but we have discussed these with him internally and he has agreed to be more reserved in terms of what he discusses in the future.
We are fully committed to strengthening our status as a Premier League Club next season and in due course, build for the future.
Now we are in the Premier League, we intend to stay here. We believe this Club can achieve great things and we are looking forward to the Barclays Premier League season.
We are very encouraged by the 10,000 plus Season Tickets we have sold to date and we look forward to welcoming our fans back to Loftus Road on the first day of the season against Bolton Wanderers on August 13th.' QPR
- QPR Youth Exit in Irish Tournament
- For Sale: QPR Championship Medal
- Taarabt Transfer Deal Hitch
- Six Year Flashback: Nygaard Joins QPR and QPR Friendly vs Iran
- VANISHED WITHOUT NOTICE! The Club's Official Messageboard
- Home Ticket Price Information
- Year Flashback: Alberti Goes Out on Year Loan
- Flashback: Some Past Flavio Briatore/QPR Statements
- UPDATE: Telegraph "Formula One chief executive Bernie Ecclestone admits paying Gerhard Gribkowsky £27 million"
- Still No QPR Offical Site Update re the Status of the Official Supporters Club (OSC). Despite Committee Resignations.
- QPR Reportedly Offering Trial to Thai Forward
- New Football League Rules re Number of "Home Growns" in the Squad and Increased Youth Spending
- Flashback: Foreign Fans The Way To Go!
- Video Flashback: Leeds vs QPR 1973/74
- Play "Spot The Ball"
QPR Pre-Season Fixtures 2011/12
Wednesday 27th July - Cesena (a) 8.30pm
Saturday 30th July - Trofeo Bortolotti Tournament (a) 8.00pm onwards
Tuesday 2nd August - Crawley Town (a) 7.45pm QPR
INDEPENDENT - By Glenn Moore, Football Editor - Party's over for QPR as Ecclestone keeps it tight Saturday, 23 July 2011
The Premier League is an unforgiving arena for newly promoted clubs, but with the campaign still three weeks away fans should be able to look forward with optimism as well as trepidation.
That is certainly the mood around Carrow Road and the Liberty Stadium. Norwich City and Swansea City will be among the favourites for relegation, but both have promising managers who are strengthening their teams.
Paul Lambert made Kyle Naughton his seventh summer signing on Thursday with the fee for his season-long loan taking the Norwich manager's spending past £9m. Swansea's Brendan Rodgers is on the brink of capturing Wayne Routledge for £2m, pushing the Welsh club's outlay towards £7m. Both clubs look as if they will be giving it a go, without risking their futures.
Then there's Queen's Park Rangers. The celebratory air that infected Loftus Road in May has dissipated. The Championship winners are owned by some of the richest men in football, but Bernie Ecclestone and Lakshmi Mittal are not just reluctant to spend their billions, they have not even touched the £40m TV boon QPR will bank this season.
Rangers have been linked with everyone from Fabio Cannavaro and Marco Materazzi, to Peter Crouch and, more feasibly, DJ Campbell, but the only players they have signed are Jay Bothroyd, Kieron Dyer, Danny Gabbidon and Danny Webber, all on free transfers. While Bothroyd had several suitors it is hard to imagine too many Premier League clubs were chasing the others. To compound this, Rangers are about to sell Adel Taarabt, the creator and taker of most of their goals last season, to Paris St-Germain.
A third of his £15m fee will go to Tottenham, due to a canny sell-on clause inserted by Spurs chairman Daniel Levy when Taarabt left White Hart Lane. The rest, indicated Warnock this week, will not be re-invested in the team. "I've just got to look for Bosmans and shrewd acquisitions, loan players etc." He added: "We'll be trying to survive on the smallest transfer budget ever."
Most galling of all, for QPR, is that they are being outbid by their fellow promotees. Routledge was on loan to Rangers last season, and Warnock wanted to sign him permanently. Naughton, who was under Warnock at Sheffield United, had been a target for months. As with Watford striker Danny Graham, another Swansea recruit, QPR were not prepared to pay the asking price, not even Naughton's loan fee.
It is not just the approach to recruitment that is prompting fans' ire. QPR have increased season ticket prices by 40 per cent (for four fewer games), but they are yet to release this season's kit, announce a sponsor, or reveal individual match-day prices. None of this dispels the impression that Ecclestone is only interested in making a fat profit on the club he bought four years ago. Though the dominant shareholder, he admits he has little interest in the team. It is Flavio Briatore – who owns no shares but has Ecclestone's ear – who dictates transfer policy. Since Mittal's son-in-law Amit Bhatia resigned as vice-chairman in May the Mittal family have been silent partners.
Many Rangers fans hope they will launch a takeover but Mittal has no intention of meeting Ecclestone's £100m asking price, more than twice what Venky's paid for Blackburn last year. Instead there are reports of Russian interest with speculation centreing on Alexei Mordashov, owner of Severstal, a steel and mining conglomerate. Severstal sponsors several sports teams in Russia and the 45-year-old Mordashov – worth $18bn according to Forbes – has business connections with Mittal and lived in England a decade ago.
Any takeover needs, however, to be swift as the transfer window closes in six weeks and two-thirds of QPR fans, according to a poll on one website, believe the club need at least four to five players to survive. Warnock hailed Rangers' promotion – his seventh in management – as his finest achievement in football. Keeping QPR up would top even that.
Spending to survive
How promoted clubs have fared:
2010-11
Blackpool (spent £2.5m, relegated)
Newcastle United (£3m, survived)
West Bromwich (£5.3m, survived)
2009-10
Wolves (spent £16.5m, survived)
Birmingham City (£17.6m, survived)
Burnley (£6.6m, relegated)
Comings and goings at the Premier League newcomers
QPR
In: Jay Bothroyd (Cardiff, free), Kieron Dyer (West Ham, free), Danny Gabbidon (West Ham, free), Danny Webber (Portsmouth, free).
Out: Mikele Leigertwood (Reading, free), Pascal Chimbonda (released)
Norwich City
In: James Vaughan (Everton, £2m), Steve Morison (Millwall, £2.5m), Elliot Bennett (Brighton, £1.5m), Anthony Pilkington (Huddersfield, £2m), Bradley Johnson (Leeds, free), Richie de Laet (Manchester United, season loan), Kyle Naughton (Tottenham, season loan)
Out: Matt Gill (Bristol Rovers, free)
Swansea City
In: Danny Graham (Watford, £3.5m), Jose Moreira (Benfica, £750,000), Steven Caulker (Tottenham, season loan), Wayne Routledge (Newcastle, £2m, tbc)
Out: Darren Pratley (Bolton, free), Dorus de Vries (Wolves, free) Independent
Mirror - POOR OLD QPR FEELING DOWN By Kevin Price; John Curle 23/07/2011
That person with his head in his hands? No, not David Cameron or Rupert Murdoch. The one who looks truly suicidal. He's a QPR fan - you can bet on it.
Can there have ever been so many negative noises coming out of a promoted club as those coming from Loftus Road?
After romping to the Championship, QPR are likely to sell their Player of the Year Adel Taarabt to Paris Saint-Germain. Amazing. But not as amazing as these words by beleaguered boss Neil Warnock. He said: "I don't think I'll be getting any of the money. I think we have just got to look for Bosmans and look for shrewd acquisitions, loan players etc."
Now, we don't subscribe to the spend-money-at-allcosts football culture. But a new team in the Premier League needs some investment - if only as a statement of intent. To show the fans and rest of the league that they mean business. Selling your best player and looking for loan signings spell only one thing. Relegation.
Qpr are still 7/4 (Victor Chandler, Betfred, totesport, Paddy Power, Boylesports) to finish in the bottom three and we will be helping ourselves. They are also 13/2 to finish bottom (totesport, Boylesports, Betfred) and we wouldn't put you off that either. Mirror
Norwich' The Pink 'Un - Norwich leading the way for the new boys
Paddy Davitt, EDP Sports Writer Saturday, July 23
Norwich City have left their fellow Premier League new boys trailing in the transfer market this summer.
City may have followed QPR out of the Championship but the west Londoners show little sign of matching their proactive recruitment drive with the new season three weeks away.
Neil Warnock has spent most of the close season locked in a wearisome dance with his player-of-the-year Adel Taarabt. First the Moroccan and/or his advisors (delete as applicable) fancy the lure of a top four club in this country. Presumably after the phone never rang, Taarabt is happy to settle for foreign fields.
Paris-St-Germain have shown concerted interest in recent days but Warnock was claiming only yesterday he will see none of the cash from the proposed departure of his talisman. A strange state of affairs all round that, from afar, suggests all is not well amongst the high rollers at Loftus Road.
The Championship champions have recruited Jay Bothroyd and Kieron Dyer both on free transfers. Dyer has been ravaged by injuries. A once blossoming career now already entering its twilight.
Bothroyd catapulted himself into the England senior squad briefly during a purple patch at Cardiff. The former Arsenal trainee tailed off along with the rest of the Bluebirds’ squad towards the end of last season. Neither come with a reliability tag.
Impressive Swansea boss Brendan Rodgers adopts the same measured approach to his transfer dealings as he did in plotting the Swans’ eventual play-off success at Wembley. Steven Caulker – a regular in Canaries’ rumour mill offerings during the early part of this summer – agreed a season-long loan switch from Tottenham. Experienced Portuguese international goal keeper Jose Moreira arrived from Benfica, presumably to help fill the void left by Dorus de Vries’ switch to Wolves. Whilst Championship top scorer Danny Graham could be one of the most shrewd investments of this summer. Norwich’s defence last season would testify to the 25-year-old’s penalty box prowess.
Rodgers went on record in recent days saying he wants another four recruits. The Swansea boss has only a month left of the transfer window to deliver. Paul Lambert has already put the chequebook away. Seven fresh faces in the building. And time to drill them on the training pitch and in pre-season friendlies before City’s Premier League adventure begins at Wigan.
Nor is it just the raw numbers that stack up alongside the Canaries’ one-time Championship bedfellows. Look at the extra options. Ritchie de Laet is a defender comfortable anywhere along the back four. Kyle Naughton will provide some much-needed competition for the workaholic Russell Martin.
Bradley Johnson is extra midfield muscle to share the workload with the likes of Andrew Crofts. Anthony Pilkington and Elliott Bennett offer pace and threat from wide areas. James Vaughan and Steve Morison bolster a frontline that for periods during Norwich’s glorious march through the Football League has been too heavily reliant on Grant Holt.
Critics label Lambert’s signings Premier League-lite. The Scot and his squad will get their collective chance to prove the doubters wrong on the pitch. Right now, no-one can criticise that off it City have done the business this summer. The Pink 'Un
BODMIN TOWN 0, QPR 7
- Derry shrugs off knee problem -23 July, 2011 by David McIntyre/West London Sport
Shaun Derry was left nursing a knock after QPR’s friendly against Bodmin but expects to recover within days.
Derry received a heavy kick to his knee before being substituted during Friday’s match, which the R’s won 7-0.
Rangers will assess the injury when they arrive in Italy for the next stage of their pre-season campaign, which the midfielder expects to play a full part in.
“I got a kick, unfortunately, but it should soon settle down,” Derry told West London Sport.
“I would expect to be okay for the first game in Italy. That’s next week, so it gives me a few days to let it calm down.
“You get these knocks in pre-season. It’s all about trying to recover properly and getting ice on it at the right time.
“Obviously the flight there won’t help, but soon after that I’ll be able to deal with the swelling.”
The predictably one-sided game against Bodmin concluded Rangers’ second successive summer trip to Devon and Cornwall, where manager Neil Warnock is well known following a spell as Plymouth boss.
Warnock’s former club Argyle were tough opponents, but Tavistock and Bodmin were both easily thrashed.
Derry said: “It was quite similar to last year really. We’ve played the same type of opponents and scored the right amount of goals. I think it went how the gaffer would have expected.
“We’re down here for a reason – to take the pressure off the boys and work in a relaxing environment – and it works for us. It’s been a good trip.” David McIntyre/West London Sport
QPR Official Site - WARNOCK: 'TOUR WORKED WELL'
Sat 23 Jul 2011
QPR boss Neil Warnock reflected on a worthwhile trip to the West Country, after seeing his side record a 7-0 win over Bodmin Town to round off their tour of Devon and Cornwall.
Matt Connolly, Danny Webber (2), Petter Vaagan Moen, Tommy Smith (2) and Heidar Helguson were all on target for Rangers, who brushed aside their hosts with little fuss.
Speaking exclusively to www.qpr.co.uk shortly after the final whistle, Warnock said: "We've had some good work-outs this week.
"The weather has been difficult but it's not stopped us doing what we want to do.
"We've used some excellent training facilities and we've had some good sessions in addition to the games.
"Now the players are going to get a bit of sun on their backs in Italy.
"The training and games will step up a little bit now.
"We've got a good set of lads, who get on well with each other.
"I think that's why these trips work so well.
"That's why I do it. I know the place inside out."
Warnock added: "It's a low tempo environment down here.
"The kids don't see many top teams. I think it's great for the kids to come and get autographs and see the players in the flesh - because they'll remember that forever.
"The people are great. We've also seen a lot of people that live in Cornwall and Devon who have been QPR fans for a long time.
"It's nice for them to have a home fixture!" QPR
QPR OFFICIAL SITE MATCH REPORT - Posted on: Sat 23 Jul 2011
The R's rounded off their tour of Devon and Cornwall with a 7-0 victory over Bodmin Town at Priory Park.
Goals from Matt Connolly, Danny Webber (2), Petter Vaagan Moen, Tommy Smith (2) and Heidar Helguson eased QPR to victory in the South West.
R's gaffer Neil Warnock will be pleased with his side's latest work-out, as Rangers continue to move ever-closer to that opening match of the Barclays Premier League season at home to Bolton.
QPR even had to play the last 20 or so minutes with 10 men, after trialist Danny Webber limped off after taking a knock.
The team will now return home from the West Country before flying out to Italy for the second tour of their pre-season campaign on Monday afternoon.
Both Jay Bothroyd and Kieron Dyer were rested for the trip to Bodmin.
Paddy Kenny started in goal for the R's, behind Connolly, a trialist, Danny Gabbidon and Clint Hill.
Alejandro Faurlin and Shaun Derry were in defensive midfield, behind attacking threesome Smith, Vaagan Moen and Webber.
Helguson led the line for Warnock's charges up front.
The R's didn't take long to get into their stride and were ahead after just five minutes.
Webber picked out Connolly on the edge of the Bodmin area, who bent a shot into the top right-hand corner of the net with his weaker left foot.
Soon after, a Smith shot just missed the target, before Vaagan Moen miscued when gifted a golden opportunity to double the R's advantage on 12 minutes, following Derry's pass that put the Norwegian international through on goal.
Two minutes later, Vaagan Moen forced a magnificent one-handed save from Town custodian Kevin Miller, who palmed wide the midfield man's header from a Smith cross.
On 22 minutes Helguson forced another smart stop from Miller, before the R's doubled their advantage.
When Helguson found Webber in the box, the striker evaded two challenges and rounded Miller before slotting home into an empty net.
Faurlin forced another respectable save from Miller in the 26th minute, before the Hoops made it three five minutes later.
Smith found space down the right and dug out a cross that fell perfectly on to the head of Vaagan Moen, whose bullet header from close range gave Miller no chance.
A Helguson header from Smith's teasing cross hit the foot of the left-hand post on 35 minutes, before Ollie Brokenshire sent an effort just wide of the target from 16 yards for the home side.
It was 4-0 to the R's come the 38th minute. Smith picked up possession around 25 yards from goal and let fly with an outstanding effort that flew past the hapless Bodmin keeper and into the back of net.
Bodmin had a chance to pull one back on 42 minutes, with Jack Bartlett's effort crashing into the side netting.
Rangers took just four minutes to add a fifth goal in the second half.
Substitute Hogan Ephraim's pass eventually deflected into the path of Webber from six yards, and he simply couldn't miss to slot home his second goal of the evening.
Adam Carter fired an effort just over the bar from 12 yards for the hosts on 54 minutes, before six minutes later Bradley Orr's snap-shot at an acute angle following a Smith pass down the left forced a fine parry from Miller.
Webber almost got his hat-trick three minutes later when he was gifted space 16-yards out, but the former Watford front-man could only drag his effort wide of the right-hand post.
Ben Smallridge went close with an effort soon after, with his curling shot going inches over the target.
Smith made it 6-0 to Rangers in the 69th minute.
The intelligent attacker spotted Miller off his line from 30-yards out and what followed was a spectacular effort, with Smith executing a beautiful lob which looped over Miller and into the net.
Orr could have made it seven shortly after, but the Liverpudlian full-back could only direct Helguson's low cross wide from 10 yards - albeit with the angle acute.
The R's completed the scoring in the 86th minute. Fitz Hall slid Helguson through on goal and the Icelandic front-man made no mistake thereafter, slotting the ball past Miller with little trouble.
Bodmin Town: Miller, Morgan, Rundle, Chambers, Simmonds, Reed, Brokenshire, Matthews, Carter, Luxton, Bartlett.
Subs: O'Hagan, Campbell, Swiggs, Smallridge, Hodge, Gilbert.
QPR: Kenny (Trialist 46), Connolly (Ramage 46), Hill (Orr 46), Derry (Hall 72), Trialist (Shittu 46), Gabbidon (Gorkss 46), Webber, Vaagan Moen, Helguson, Smith, Faurlin (Ephraim 46).
Subs not used: Cerny.
Goals: Connolly (5), Webber (22 & 49), Vaagan Moen (31), Smith (38 & 69), Helguson (86).
http://www.qpr.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10373~2399703,00.html
TWO NEW FOOTBALL LEAGUE RULES (WHICH A YEAR FROM NOW MAY IMPACT ON QPR!)
- Football League's New "Salary Cost Management Protocol (SCMP)....Limits spending on player wages to 75% of the Club's turnover and comes into immediate effect for the 2011/12 season. It will further reduce to 65% and 60% in seasons 2012/13 and 2013/14.
- Football League Clubs Change of Rules: Reverting to FIVE Subs
- Premiership Rules