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There is a lot of anti owner sentiments on the various QPR message boards. As much as I think Briatore is a *****, I think fans continue to a bit unfair towards Bernie.
We were crying to get an owner the calibre of Bernie when we were skint. We were well aware that Bernie was a shrewd businessman, tight with his money and completely unsentimental. He is doing nothing to gain popularity, he just goes about his business quitely, where making money is the only thing that matters. I think we have got nothing else that what we could expect. Like most investors he is here for the money, and that is a legitimate reason for an investor. It should come as no surprise that he sets ticket prices in order to maximize revenues, even though we strongly dislike it.
If I understand the figures correctly the owners had lent the club £33m by end of the 2009/2010 season. Add another £10-15m cash deficit financed by the owners last season, plus £10m promotion bonuses and it probably adds up to a cash injection of £55-60 by now, plus the £14m initial investment, totally £70-75m. To me this is speaking volumes of owners with ambitions and willingness to invest and back the manager. They don't do it to be nice of course, but to earn money, but it is completely unfair to claim they don't back Warnock or show lack of commitment to QPR. The vast amount is funded by Bernie as Mittal has been reluctant to provide financing as I understand it (which is logical, given the dispute over ownership). Briatore has provided his part (50% of the £10m loan linked to the stadium I understand), but because of his small ownership share probaby much less than Bernie.
I think there is little perspective for the owners to get much back from the first season in the Premiership - maximum £5-10m at best. Yes, we get TV money of close to £40m and probably another £10m in increased revenue due to higher ticket prices and better sponsorship deals, but wages are also going up astronomically. I suppose the present squad will earn at least £10m more now we are in the Premiership (salary increases linked to existing contracts), we will probably spend £10m on signing new players and new players are supposed to cost £1.5-2m per year in salary, so with five-six of these it's another £10m. All in all break-even or a tiny profit.
I don't think we can ask for much more from Bernie and the owners than to keep providing reasonable funds for signing a handfull of new players for transfer fees and salary levels matching the size of our club. I have no problem to accept that a club should operate within its own means, and having owners that have provided solid funding over three years I will not blame them if they now expect us to operate inside the revenues we generate from being in the Premier League. Clubs like WBA, Stoke etc have done so.
Blackpool had a wage cap of only 10k a week last year (and did very well despite being relegated), and if we have offered Bothroyd 25k a week plus 2.5k per match plus 250k on top per season, this equals more than 30k a week on average, telling we we are quite ambitious, given our size.
So lets give Bernie a break and remind ourselves he has done nothing more or nothing less than we could expect when he came. Most importantly his money has given us Premier League football. I think the coming season will give us plenty to cheer for, even though it will be bloody hard to avoid relegation, I have no illusions about that.
We were crying to get an owner the calibre of Bernie when we were skint. We were well aware that Bernie was a shrewd businessman, tight with his money and completely unsentimental. He is doing nothing to gain popularity, he just goes about his business quitely, where making money is the only thing that matters. I think we have got nothing else that what we could expect. Like most investors he is here for the money, and that is a legitimate reason for an investor. It should come as no surprise that he sets ticket prices in order to maximize revenues, even though we strongly dislike it.
If I understand the figures correctly the owners had lent the club £33m by end of the 2009/2010 season. Add another £10-15m cash deficit financed by the owners last season, plus £10m promotion bonuses and it probably adds up to a cash injection of £55-60 by now, plus the £14m initial investment, totally £70-75m. To me this is speaking volumes of owners with ambitions and willingness to invest and back the manager. They don't do it to be nice of course, but to earn money, but it is completely unfair to claim they don't back Warnock or show lack of commitment to QPR. The vast amount is funded by Bernie as Mittal has been reluctant to provide financing as I understand it (which is logical, given the dispute over ownership). Briatore has provided his part (50% of the £10m loan linked to the stadium I understand), but because of his small ownership share probaby much less than Bernie.
I think there is little perspective for the owners to get much back from the first season in the Premiership - maximum £5-10m at best. Yes, we get TV money of close to £40m and probably another £10m in increased revenue due to higher ticket prices and better sponsorship deals, but wages are also going up astronomically. I suppose the present squad will earn at least £10m more now we are in the Premiership (salary increases linked to existing contracts), we will probably spend £10m on signing new players and new players are supposed to cost £1.5-2m per year in salary, so with five-six of these it's another £10m. All in all break-even or a tiny profit.
I don't think we can ask for much more from Bernie and the owners than to keep providing reasonable funds for signing a handfull of new players for transfer fees and salary levels matching the size of our club. I have no problem to accept that a club should operate within its own means, and having owners that have provided solid funding over three years I will not blame them if they now expect us to operate inside the revenues we generate from being in the Premier League. Clubs like WBA, Stoke etc have done so.
Blackpool had a wage cap of only 10k a week last year (and did very well despite being relegated), and if we have offered Bothroyd 25k a week plus 2.5k per match plus 250k on top per season, this equals more than 30k a week on average, telling we we are quite ambitious, given our size.
So lets give Bernie a break and remind ourselves he has done nothing more or nothing less than we could expect when he came. Most importantly his money has given us Premier League football. I think the coming season will give us plenty to cheer for, even though it will be bloody hard to avoid relegation, I have no illusions about that.
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