Lurking_QPR_ fan

[quote user="BroadstairsR"][quote user="Lurking_QPR_ fan"] Nice sentiment cheering serious injuries!  We''ve been unlucky with Johnson, who hasn''t had a serious injury for a few seasons but that''s that way it goes sometimes. What a load of rubbish about Norwich not signing injury-prone journeymen - you may want to check Michael Turner''s shocking track record at Sunderland before making those statements!   And what about James Vaughan signed just last season! Plus Butterfield missed the majority of last season with a serious injury last time i checked - maybe i''ll come and cheer on here if he suffers a breakdown? [/quote] I agree with that point, very much. However, you failed to answer my enquiry regarding Tamara, Mr. Lurking. I''m an old boy now and when my hormones start playing up I have to make the most of it. [/quote] Ecclestone is long gone (but sadly not forgotten) - Tamara is very attractive but i personally couldn''t ever bring myself to go near anything that sprung from those wizened, wrinkly loins!

[quote user="lake district canary"]Loftus Rd  has all the allure of a multi-storey car park.    A London side with a  "loads-a-money" approach,  has pretentions of being a big club, made more so by their latest money bags owner, with a manager who appears so dour that he must be inspiring nobody,  bringing in  older players in the hope that they will be able to do something due to their "experience".    Not a recipe for getting other clubs/fans to respect them.   From the outside it looks  not a little laughable.   As for Norwich, we at least have a well run club living within its means and even if we have a few fans who have ridiculous expectations, the club is secure for the future and is still on an upward curve - although we need a positive result to kick start our season.    No great animosity to qpr, just nothing for a Norwich fan to get either excited - or concerned about.    [/quote] The amount of money Chelsea and Man Utd have spent on two players each would comfortably cover the transfer fees and a years wages for ALL of our summer signings! Soton have spent almost twice as much as us on transfer fees, Reading are paying similar wages, Swansea are filling their team with foreign imports, Fulham will instantly fold with their £200m of debt if Al Fayed dies/leaves etc etc.  Why are we being held up as all that''s bad with Football today exactly?   Also the average age of our summer signings is 25 BTW.  

I think all QPR fans still have a few reservations about Hughes (he''s not exactly cuddly and charismatic) but he''s been backed to the hilt by the owners, so i think most are happy to give him time and see how we do.   I always think of Norwich and Swansea as rivals (even though you left us for dust last season) because we all got promoted together, have similar short terms goals (consolidation) and all have hugely contrasting approaches.   We''ve shipped out most of our deadwood already (15 players out the door) and the fact that none of them have found clubs any higher than the Championship speaks volumes!

[quote user="Zak Burger"][quote user="Lurking_QPR_ fan"] QPR were in the bottom half of the prem for transfer spending, but i don''t see any threads on here castigating Southampton who spent approx £35m on players? [/quote] It''s not the spending per se it''s more how it''s spent that puzzles us. Southampton like us are clearly building for the future, Hughes and QPR (or more likely fernandes)  seem to be throwing everything into one sh!t or bust effort at winning the 2006-2007 Premier League title....[:S] [/quote] I''m not sure why it''s puzzling though?  Sure we''ve conducted a lot of business in a short space of time, but the focus is on improving our quality of player.   We''ve brought players who will appreciate in value, Hoillet, Granero, Diakite, Mbia, some quality older players Cesar, Bosingwa and then some experienced players to round out the squad like Nelsen and Johnson (which has misfired).   Soton have blown £16m on an exciting, potentially great young south american but he could easily not settle or struggle to adapt to the style of the prem - meanwhile they have a Championship quality defence and a League One quality keeper?  Not exactly building for the future or to a sensible plan.

Coveted by who?  I think you''ll find there is often a reason that players are still in the Championship at 23/24 and you''ve already stated that you pay very low wages, so if they really were ''coveted'' you could have easily been gazumped.   For every Jagielka or Tim Cahill who stepped up from the Championship to become a top player, there is a Dean Whitehead or Matt Kilgallon who turned out to be mediocre at best.   Cisse and Zamora don''t look to be ''declining'' very much to me and i think both are younger than Holt!   You keep mentioning Dyer but he is a backup squad player at best.   And Taarabt, Hoillet, Granero, Faurlin, Mackie, Onouha, Traore, Diakite etc are all 25 or under, so we have plenty of value in the squad.

I actually rate Holt, he''s very effective and cons ref''s better than almost any other forward to get advantages for his team.  I''d still prefer a fit Johnson though, because he has more about his game and the flexibility to play several different roles for the team. Dyer is actually on a pay as you play deal, but you don''t seem interested in facts. QPR were in the bottom half of the prem for transfer spending, but i don''t see any threads on here castigating Southampton who spent approx £35m on players?

The players you mention are 23/24 year olds not 18 - whether they are ''up and coming'' or simply future journeymen remains to be seen. I notice you ignore Michael Turner since he undermines your argument?  I notice Garrido has barely averaged 15 games a season for the past 5 years too. AJ passed a medical when we signed, this injury is not a reoccurance of a past injury either.  We took a gamble when a good player became available on a free and we lost. Luckily what you and the media call crazy spending was actually building a deep squad, so we have good players to come in for injuries.

Here thanks - updated the other thread but nice of you guys to be so sympathetic for a serious injury to a professional... Also from a team who signed James Vaughan last summer, Michael Turner this summer and Jacob Butterfield who is still on the mend from a serious injury it''s a bit rich - let''s hope you have some bad karma coming your way!

Nice sentiment cheering serious injuries!  We''ve been unlucky with Johnson, who hasn''t had a serious injury for a few seasons but that''s that way it goes sometimes. What a load of rubbish about Norwich not signing injury-prone journeymen - you may want to check Michael Turner''s shocking track record at Sunderland before making those statements!   And what about James Vaughan signed just last season! Plus Butterfield missed the majority of last season with a serious injury last time i checked - maybe i''ll come and cheer on here if he suffers a breakdown?

[quote user="PKC"] I thought the following from Football365''s Big Weekend section would add to the debate; but then again QPR fans seem to be in denial. QPR Blimey. With the caveat that this piece is being written on Thursday evening, QPR appear to be buying the world. By Friday evening, they may very well have purchased players from Chelsea, Tottenham, Manchester United, Marseille, Inter Milan and Real Madrid. Given their wage bill last season was a whopping 183% of turnover, and they have only shed the relatively meagre salaries of Fitz Hall, Paddy Kenny, Dan Shittu et al (although Joey Barton''s salary will take a fair chunk off, assuming Marseille complete that deal), one shudders to think what this season''s figures will look like. They''re not a big club, QPR. Lofus Road only holds 18,500. They have competition from quite a few other league clubs in London. They are being propped up by Tony Fernandes, so should something bad happen with regards to their ownership, then they could be in some serious trouble. After all, history has taught us that reckless and unsustainable spending in an attempt to make a mark on the Premier League can lead to catastrophe. This money has been spent with an expectation of success. Indeed, someone must have given Julio Cesar the hard sell - after his arrival in London he quickly declared his intention of wining the Premier League with Rangers, saying that "nobody thought Manchester City could win the league" a few years ago. A little fanciful perhaps, and it could have been a new signing getting carried away on his first day in the country, but Fernandes has not taken these risks and paid this money for a repeat of last season. And this is where Mark Hughes comes in. As Fernandes and the QPR board showed last season, they are not exactly blessed with great patience, shown by Neil Warnock''s dismissal. If Hughes and QPR do not begin the season in a manner befitting a side with such riches lavished upon them, then axes will fall, heads will roll and another manager will have to think of some creative excuses as to why this wasn''t his fault. Still, at least QPR have a relatively straightforward task this weekend - away to Manchester City.   [/quote] That is pretty fair, although the wages of the 13-14 odd players who have left were certainly not meagre and Cesar has takena  well documented pay cut to join us. Not dispute that TF is supporting us financially either, but you can say exactly the same about Fulham, Man City, Liverpool, Aston Villa, Chelsea etc etc It has taken years of financial mismangement and a successtion of dodgy/corrupt owners siphoning money out of Portsmouth and yet they are still only in League One with a team that could even challeng for the play offs - QPR have been there before and if we end up there again so be it, i''ll still be there too!  

Djibril Cisse 89 appearances for Olympiakos, Lazio and QPR over the last 3 seasons. Andy Johnson played 29 times in 10/11 season, only 14 last season but as he wasn''t first choice not through injury. Zamora did have a broken leg over a year ago but he''s not missed a game for us through injury over the last 6 months so i''ll take my chances thanks. I''ll be interested to see which trio of strikers has scored more goals between our lot and Holt, Morison and Jackson by the end of the season...

Any reasoning behind that opinion?  Cisse scored plenty last season and in pre-season, Zamora has scored in his last 2 games and Johnson also looked sharp on Tuesday.  Plus all 3 are younger than Holt, so you can''t be claiming they are over the hill!  

This figure of 180% thrown around by the press is actually based on our Championship promotion season 10/11 - where our wage bill was approx £30m artificially boosted by promotion bonuses and manager termination payments.  But don''t let the facts get in the way eh? Again i''ll stick with Fernandez''s version and wait and see the accounts myself. Why are our attempts to sign better players ''desperate''?  Any fan would have told you in June that we needed better quality at goalie, centre back and centre midfield - Hughes has brought that in within the transfer window.  Last time i checked Norwich have also brought in more than half a dozen new players - how is that team building again? And terrible strike force?  Pull the other one, Cisse, Johnson and Zamora are all proven prem goal scorers and they''d all walk into your team.  Man City are paying people £200k a week, Liverpool are paying Henderson and Downing £80k a week, Fulham have apparently given Berbatov a £5m a year contract but of course QPR are the ones paying extortionate wages...

[quote user="ncfcstar"][quote user="Lurking_QPR_ fan"] Firstly QPR – yes we are spending big money (although not even in top half of the league for spending this summer) and big wages (although again not as much as reported). [/quote] And you know how much you''re spending on wages do you? QPR are not an attractive club, come on be honest.  You have poor training facilities, a terrible ground and much larger neighbours.  We suffer similarly because of our ''cut off'' location (although if you stuck NCFC in the centre of London we would immediately become far more attractive).  You have to be extremely blinkered if you think these players are interested for any other reason apart from inflated wages. [/quote] Tony Fernandez knows how much we are paying on wages and he says the wage bill is slightly down on last year - i think i''ll believe him over you and the press. Why aren''t we an attractive club again?  We are located in London (an big draw for players), we are in the premier league, we are receiving a lot of press coverage, we are signing high profile players (Park, Cesar, Cisse etc) have ambitious but tangible plans (new training ground and stadium) and we have a high profile manager (ex Man Utd, Bayern, Barca player) however much you dislike him. Also we are paying competitive wages which of course is a factor.  But sorry, i forgot that Snodgrass, Turner, Whittaker and Garrido are lifelong Norwich fans playing for love are they? Loftus Road is small but atmospheric stadium and i doubt the players really care about the lack of leg room and long toilet queues, plsu we''ve already upgraded our training ground to suit us until the new one is developed.

I’ve often checked on here in the build up to and post our game last week, so thought I’d another QPR perspective. I think us (QPR), Swansea and Norwich will be constantly looking at each other due to our promotion together and then all of us surviving in the prem (some in style, us not so much). Firstly QPR – yes we are spending big money (although not even in top half of the league for spending this summer) and big wages (although again not as much as reported). Yes this money has come into the club in the form of ‘soft’ loans from rich owners. And yes, if they pull out we’ll have to drastically cut our cost base (unless the replacement owners are also wealthy benefactors). But let’s face it, they are no more likely to pull out than the owners of Fulham (£200m debt to Al Fayed), Man City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Soton etc etc.  And if they do, we have a lot of valuable assets that would be easy to move on (Granero, Cesar, Faurlin etc etc) to cut our cloth accordingly.  It’s not the Portsmouth-style apocalypse people want to believe it is.  Plus stadium size is not hugely relevent because the matchday revenue is such a small part of any prem clubs revenue stream compared to TV and sponsorship deals etc Secondly Norwich – which of the following signings are ‘young and hungry and on an upward curve’ as you claim: 28 year old Turner, 27 year old Garrido, 28 year old Whittaker or 26 year old Bassong??   And they all took a pay cut to join for the love of Norwich did they? Also we have had identical starts to the season, so your team spirit isn’t helping much so far, while our new signings can potentially bed in and transform us…