Deal or no deal: QPR don’t want to leave it too late
THE SIGHT of Harry Redknapp, car window wound down, describing someone as a ‘‘top, top player’’ might be one of the staples of transfer deadline day, but the Queens Park Rangers manager is adamant he will do his best to ensure there will be no repeat next month.
QPR, Redknapp believes, must act swiftly to add to his squad as early as possible next month if they are to give themselves the best chance of retaining their place in the Premier League. He does not want to be forced to wait until the last minute to secure reinforcements for the club All Whites skip- per Ryan Nelsen plays for; nor does he want to field a phone call from Daniel Levy, his former chairman at Tottenham Hotspur, trying to persuade him into taking up various last-minute bargains.
‘‘Daniel will still no doubt be ringing up on deadline day offering me a three-for-one deal on players he cannot give away,’’ Redknapp said. ‘‘But we will not be waiting until that late hour.
‘‘We are going to have to do our stuff before then. We really need to be doing our business right at the start of January. We can’t wait. The chairman is going to have to bite the bullet and get on with what we have got to do. Otherwise we will be waiting for something that might never happen.’’
Redknapp resents his reputation as a wheeling, dealing barrow boy, an image he believes is deeply unfair. ‘‘I don’t want to buy a lot of people,’’ he said. ‘‘It’s a lovely feeling being at a club where you do not need any players.’’
Sadly, as he admits, QPR’s plight means they are not such a club. Instead, Redknapp is hopeful of bringing in four players. Though there has, he says, been no progress on mooted moves for Joe Cole, of Liverpool, or Robbie Keane, of Los Angeles Galaxy, he admits Nicolas Anelka, now playing for Shanghai Shenhua in China, is ‘‘of interest’’. Tony Fernandes, the QPR chairman, has spoken to the former France striker’s agents to establish what the cost of such a deal would be.
The problem Redknapp and QPR, find themselves in, though, is that their rivals know they need to buy, which tends to drive prices up, and that compromises must be made to get players of sufficient quality to Loftus Road.
‘‘You are not going to get the full package, unless you are going to spend millions. We are not going to put the club in trouble. We have to be clever and careful.’’