A NEW ERA FOR QPR
By Dave Evans
QPR may have entered a new era of transfer bids close to £1million, but chairman Bill Power is making sure that any player purchases do not break the bank at Loftus Road.
Despite Middlesbrough youngster Andrew Davies turning down a move to Rangers last week, the fact that QPR were able to make such a substantial bid is testament to the turn around in the club's fortunes.
"We now have a lot of people around us who are prepared to back us in a substantial financial way," confirmed Power this week. "I think it shows just how far this club has come forward and is a fair measure of the stability we now have here that we can make that sort of bid for a player.
"We are not going to break the bank though. The manager has a list of players he wants as long as your arm and we endeavour to bring in who we can, but we are not going to be stupid about it - my God I sound like an accountant now!"
Power has confessed that the whole Davies saga last week left him completely perplexed as a deal which seemed to be done and dusted suddenly became out of the question.
"I have to confess I was utterly amazed at what went on," revealed the chairman.
"We certainly thought we had an agreement and then from one night to next morning, the player's wage demands went through the roof and made it impossible."
He continued: "He's a good player and one day he may well be worth that sort of wage, but we are not a Premiership side and he was asking for a wage which was substantially more than any other player at the club.
"What we offered him would have put him alongside the top wage earners here, and in a couple of years time who knows, but it saddened me to see those sorts of demands.
"I don't think it was other clubs tapping him up, I just think his Middlesbrough team-mates and his advisors must have had a word in his ear, but it was a totally unrealistic demand - I don't think any team in the Championship would have been able to match it."
With the Davies deal now dead and buried, Rangers still have money to spend before the end of the season, and Power confirmed that it is still available.
"I believe that the manager and the players here still have the ability to get into the play-offs this season and if they need a player or two to help them to achieve that then we will do what we can to accommodate that - there is always room for improvement in every position."
Two players who may well play a part before the end of the season are former Bristol City midfielder Aaron Brown, who is now slowly coming back to fitness, and 18-year-old left back Matthew Hislop, who signed from Arsenal in a two-year deal this week.
Brown has now made two reserve-team appearances as he continues his rehabilitation from a badly broken leg which has kept him out for a whole year but is seen as a player for next season, while England schoolboy Hislop is also a long-term signing.
Neither are expected to feature this Saturday when Watford are the visitors for a local derby and QPR will be looking for revenge after their dismal 3-0 defeat at Vicarage Road in the first week of the season.
Meanwhile, QPR's search for a new training ground continues after a series of disappointments over a suitable location.
Power commented: "We've tried and failed to get the BAA site in Hayes, one at Uxbridge, one in South West London and another to the west of London so if anyone knows of a site along the M25 that we could use, I wish they would let us know.
"What we need is to get everybody under the same roof and though that is going to cost us a lot of money initially, in the long term it has to be beneficial to the club."
QPR currently share training facilities with London Wasps rugby union club at the Twyford Avenue site in Acton.
Wasps owner and former QPR chairman Chris Wright is still stalling over a final decision on his club's scheduled return to Loftus Road next season with the deadline for the announcement of March 29 growing ever closer.
"We would have liked to have known six months ago," said Power.
"That way we could have planned what our next move will be, but as of this week we still haven't heard a word."
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A ROYAL BORE
QPR 0 Reading 0
By Dave Evans
QPR boss Ian Holloway may still harbour hopes of forcing his way into the play-offs this season, but this dour, lacklustre performance against an equally inept Reading suggests otherwise.
Mind you, it was just last week that Rangers won at Ipswich, while the Royals' draw was enough to push them back into the play-off positions despite the fact that they haven't won in 10 games, so maybe Holloway has got a point.
What that emphasises though is the mediocrity of the so-called Championship this season.
The best chance of the match came and went for Reading's Paul Brooker as early as the second minute and for the other 88 it was all perspiration and no inspiration.
Even Rangers legend Les Ferdinand didn't stay long at this damp squib of a party - the Reading man hobbling after 34 minutes of what will surely be his swansong at Loftus Road.
Holloway was quick to condemn the game as a spectacle: "I can hardly remember an incident throughout the whole game to be perfectly blunt which is very unlike us," he said.
"As for goalmouth action I have to say that I just managed to keep one eye open because the other one actually fell asleep."
Much like the crowd and many of the players then as this game felt like an end of season meaningless mid-table match rather than a battle between two sides harbouring hopes of playing in the Premiership next season.
There was no passion, no class and inevitably no goals for only the second time this season at Loftus Road.
"In games like these which are stalemates, you need a little bit of magic and unfortunately for us nobody could produce that today."
That of course was not helped by the fact that once more QPR had no creative flair in the middle of the park. While the likes of Adam Miller sat in the stands and Martin Rowlands waited on the wing, Marc Bircham and centre half
Georges Santos filled the central midfield berths and played a very similar ball-winning, spoiling game which is fine away from home, but sadly lacking in excitement at Loftus Road.
Not until he was moved back into defence did Santos look comfortable on the field and by that time the rot had been set and despite bringing on a host of forwards as Holloway did, it was never going to make a difference.
So a 0-0 draw, but in the end Holloway was fairly happy with the result.
"I've got to say that this was a very important point if you look at the other results. We are only five points off the play-offs with a game in hand on Reading who have just crept in there, so the season is still alive."
Alive it may be, but the medics and their crash cart have already tried a couple of times to revive it and the outlook is bleak.
"Unfortunately me and Steve Coppell are about the only people who will have to watch that game again," said the manager.
Maybe on cold, dark nights when we're having trouble sleeping, we can picture this game as well - slumber will surely quickly follow.
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FANS PAY HOMAGE TO SIR LES
By Dave Evans
VETERAN striker Les Ferdinand was given a rapturous reception by the QPR faithful before Saturday's match and that came as no surprise to Rangers boss Ian Holloway, who was one of his teammates during his QPR heyday.
It wasn't the first time the 38-year-old has been back to Shepherd's Bush since his £6m move to Newcastle United, but it was almost certainly be his last with his retirement scheduled for the end of the season.
Holloway was full of praise for his old mate: "He was always going to get a great reception, he was about as much of a superhero at any club as anyone could be," he said.
"I played with him and I thought he was fantastic I have to say. Some of the things he did I still remember now.
"There was one goal against Norwich where he beat half of their team and smashed it into the corner and there was a goal at Wimbledon where I just couldn't believe what I saw.
"I rolled the ball a few yards to him and he turned, beat four players and drilled it into the bottom corner."
He continued: "For me, he is a legend, but not in his own mind like most of us are.
"He got a great reception and for me I was very pleased to see him come off because I felt they were a big threat up front with him."
With seconds gone, Ferdinand nicked the ball off the boot of Marc Bircham, moved forward and then thumped a shot goalwards from 30 yards.
Ten years ago it may have arrowed into the top corner, this time the shot was scuffed and the ball flew harmlessly over.
The game has a way of kicking you when you are on the way down and when Ferdinand limped off after just over half an hour perhaps it was doing just that.
But to most QPR fans and to Holloway himself this was not the Les Ferdinand of their dreams, the Ferdinand who scored 90 Rangers goals in 184 appearances, that one can never be replaced - that one was a real superhero, Saturday's was merely Clark Kent.
It wasn't the first time the 38-year-old has been back to Shepherd's Bush since his £6m move to Newcastle United, but it was almost certainly be his last with his retirement scheduled for the end of the season.
Holloway was full of praise for his old mate: "He was always going to get a great reception, he was about as much of a superhero at any club as anyone could be," he said.
"I played with him and I thought he was fantastic I have to say. Some of the things he did I still remember now.
"There was one goal against Norwich where he beat half of their team and smashed it into the corner and there was a goal at Wimbledon where I just couldn't believe what I saw.
"I rolled the ball a few yards to him and he turned, beat four players and drilled it into the bottom corner."
He continued: "For me, he is a legend, but not in his own mind like most of us are.
"He got a great reception and for me I was very pleased to see him come off because I felt they were a big threat up front with him."
With seconds gone, Ferdinand nicked the ball off the boot of Marc Bircham, moved forward and then thumped a shot goalwards from 30 yards.
Ten years ago it may have arrowed into the top corner, this time the shot was scuffed and the ball flew harmlessly over.
The game has a way of kicking you when you are on the way down and when Ferdinand limped off after just over half an hour perhaps it was doing just that.
But to most QPR fans and to Holloway himself this was not the Les Ferdinand of their dreams, the Ferdinand who scored 90 Rangers goals in 184 appearances, that one can never be replaced - that one was a real superhero, Saturday's was merely Clark Kent.