RAMSEY TO STAY BOSS AT QPR
Exodus of relegated players They face huge fine for overspending No money to sign any replacements
QUEENS PARK RANGERS are set to appoint Chris Ramsey as manager despite their relegation from the Barclays Premier League. Ramsey has been in charge on a short-term contract at Loftus Road since Harry Redknapp quit in February and he will be offered an extension before the end of the season. QPR owner Tony Fernandes and his director of football Les Ferdinand have identified the 53-year-old Londoner as the coach they want in charge as they try to rebuild the club on a more self-sufficient structure. Ramsey is not being held responsible for the demise which culminated in the 6-0 humiliation at Manchester City on Sunday that confirmed the drop to the Championship. He is seen as a talented coach with faith in youth development, which is a route QPR are keen to take as 13 senior players come to the end of their contracts. Ramsey was given the QPR job for the rest of this season on February 12, having stepped up from the role of academy manager when Redknapp resigned citing an imminent knee operation as central to his decision.
THEY were unable to summon any resistance at Manchester City but Queens Park Rangers are finally going down fighting — in the law courts.
Having been relegated after a 6-0 defeat at City on Sunday, QPR vowed to keep challenging the Football League’s Financial Fair Play rules and avoid a huge fine for overspending when last in the Championship.
No one dares put a timescale on the dispute. It could drag on for months, possibly years, one of many uncertainties clouding the London club as they slide from the top tier of English football.
Even without the threat of the fine, a frantic summer of downsizing looms as QPR adjust to cope with the anticipated loss of £50million in revenue which goes with relegation.
The squad will be decimated by 13 players out of contract and Chris Ramsey is set to be the man tasked with reforming the club’s structure, in tandem with director of football Les Ferdinand.
Nine senior players are out of contract, including big earners like Joey Barton, Rio Ferdinand and Shaun Wright-Phillips, and four more will end loan spells, including Mauro Zarate, who has barely played since signing from West Ham.
Newcastle, if they stay up, will lead the chase to sign 17-goal striker Charlie Austin while others like Rob Green and Nedum Onuoha, Matt Phillips, Leroy Fer and Steven Caulker will command interest from Barclays Premier League clubs.
Some will have relegation clauses but expect plenty of wrangling about wages from clubs unwilling to match what QPR pay.
The positive aspect is that this is the chance for a clean break from an unwanted reputation for over-paying fading stars, but it also promises to devastate the squad without the funds to rebuild, and without quite weeding out all the problems.
Ultimately, they were low on quality but Barton criticised the club’s poor dressing-room spirit in recent weeks and referred to ‘ bad eggs’ after the defeat at City.
Manager Ramsey and respected senior professional Clint Hill alluded to some who had not been pulling in the right direction.
Thoughts turned immediately to Adel Taarabt, the 25-year-old Moroccan winger on a salary of £4m a year, which translates into roughly £10,000 for each minute spent on the pitch since the end of last season.
Another under scrutiny was former Arsenal full back Armand Traore, who has not started a game since February, shortly after Ramsey took over from Harry Redknapp.
Then there was the farce of Sandro, unable to play on Sunday and also the last two games of the season after a problem with his visa.
Over the next two weeks director of football Les Ferdinand will meet those players who are out of contract in the summer to determine their futures.
The hammering at City triggered warnings that the club will plunge straight into League One.
Energy and skill in the transfer and loan market will be needed from Ferdinand, Ramsey and owner Tony Fernandes, who has been understandably preoccupied by other matters since one of his Air Asia planes crashed in March.
Inside the club, there is faith in Ramsey. ‘We’d like him to stay,’ said midfielder Fer. ‘He has made us play better football, even if we didn’t get the results. It was a hard job for him to help us stay up and he’s been unlucky, too. He has done a great job and knows what this club is all about. I hope he stays, makes us a better team and gets us back up.’
QPR are pursuing plans for a new training ground and they want to move to a new stadium, but this is another uncertainty.
Then there is the Financial Fair Play threat from the Football League because QPR overspent on players to the tune of nearly £70m in 2013-14, and then covered £60m of it in the accounts as loans from the owners.
Had they not been promoted, they would have been hit with a transfer embargo, akin to those which Nottingham Forest, Blackburn and Leeds are operating under, but this was beyond the Football League’s remit when they went up.
No fine has been issued but the rules — which have since changed — state fines will relate to the size of the overspend. QPR have challenged the process, which prompted the Football League to remind the club they could always play in the Conference if they did not want to accept their rules. This is not likely to happen.