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Reply | (No subject)
at 09:59 18 Mar 2025
Two other things I would add to what wasn’t intended as a novel but became one:
1. I understand why they signed Frey - we were desperate, he was available and willing to play out of his own pocket for 6 months. But this summer they had to make a decision, is he the style you want in a forward or not. In the signing of Celar clearly he wasn’t what we wanted, so in retrospect we would’ve been better off spending the Madsen money on paying up Frey and getting a cheap version of Celar as a backup. Having a 6’2 striker who can do the agricultural stuff but can’t move, and a striker who has great movement but can’t do the agricultural stuff as your two options is madness.
2. Nourry pressuring the Kolli family to take a move to Saudi Arabia was poor. Obviously I understand it, for whatever reason Kolli wasn’t in consideration for the first team (and no I don’t know why) and it was a good move financially for the club, but again in retrospect it has been shown to be a bad decision. It pissed off the family enough that his dad took the nuclear option to air it in public and it’s been shown that for a club as light as we are with forwards, Kolli had a role to play here. |
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Reply | (No subject)
at 09:33 18 Mar 2025
For what it’s worth Ned, I don’t believe I have an agenda against Nourry, I like to think I’m more nuanced than that.
As a QPR fan first and foremost, I thought Nourry was spot on this summer in expecting Cifuentes to commit to the club and protect us with a new deal, and I thought Cifuentes should’ve really gone away last summer fully focused on this season after we took a punt on him.
I don’t blame Nourry per se for the recruitment - ultimately Belk and his team provide the list of targets and Nourry just does the best deal possible for the club. This setup is what many clubs use - manager says where he thinks the squad needs improving and the recruitment team go to work. However as he has made himself CEO & DOF, the bloated recruitment setup which is all under him ultimately falls on his head. The signing of Madsen for a chunky fee without ever seeing him in person should’ve seen heads roll and him pulling an Odemwingie on Isaac Hayden and switching late in the day to Ashby was not only poor on a personal level but entirely caused by bad prior recruitment of Santos.
I think his paranoia about communications is ill conceived, but i give him props for taking criticism onboard and changing tact at least on the injury front. The shutout of North is pathetic obviously but I understand why he doesn’t want the very popular Cifuentes in an open forum where he can go off-script.
His edict of one playing style from u8 to first team is nothing controversial and what many of us asked for for years - decide what you want to be and then plug and play the pieces around that. My only issue is Nourry himself with no football background being the one to make the sporting plan over more qualified candidates at the club.
I don’t think him being around the training ground a lot is an issue per se, he is DOF and Ferdinand was about a lot too. As above my issue is him being DOF with no experience or knowledge for the role.
I think him using the Gen Z startup ‘social media hustler’ strategy of disrupt and break things was daft - the club has been broken enough for 20 years now, and it just pissed off a lot of experienced people at the club.
I think the Ben Williams situation is poor and has been handled badly by him.
Ultimately he is just a young guy who was in the right place at the right time with an immaculate education CV and enough patter to take advantage of Hoos being desperate to move upstairs. It’s the owners’ fault he is here, not his. I think it would be better for all parties if he were more introspective and hired a dedicated DOF under him, but he’s a 26 year old who grew up with the best money could buy, these profiles don’t tend to be humble and introspective. He will mature or he will flame out of football, nothing we can do about it, as QPR fans we can only hope for the former.
Equally I don’t agree with everything Cifuentes has done. As above I think he was better served and honestly owed it to us to have been fully focused on this season and plotting a move *this* summer after 18 months of solid improvement.
I thought the Sheppard thing at Burnley while inconsequential was poor. When ‘Arry did it I thought it was poor and it would be hypocritical to not call out Marti for it.
I think his thinly veiled criticism of Paal last season and open discussion of moving him on this summer was naive and has in retrospect bitten us as he’s been understandably checked out all season.
I think he’s made questionable choices in lineups and in-game management and have said so ‘live’ on here over the last 12 months. I did say when he joined though that I expected this to happen. In defence I think he’s been admirably pragmatic in dealing with the cards he has and being willing to sacrifice on his ideology for the better of the team with Dunne at full back to assist in the pissing away of set piece goals for example.
So yeah, I like to think I have a pretty balanced outlook, you’re free to disagree and see an agenda against Nourry if you wish. I certainly hope that Nourry gets it right though as a QPR fan as Cifuentes won’t be around forever and I naturally want him to get it right with his replacement and future signings. |
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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 10:28 17 Mar 2025
I was told around the end of the Girona training camp he would likely sign the new contract and I told North as such as we were discussing how tense things were behind the scenes at that time. He signed the deal because his stock ultimately wasn’t as high as he thought it would be..
On recruitment, there was nothing to negotiate, Cifuentes signed as a head coach. He knew from day 1 he wouldn’t be involved in recruitment - Frey and Andersen were found by Belk on a scouting database, as the database themselves loudly celebrated on twitter at the time. |
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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 10:01 17 Mar 2025
All managers have agents. Cifuentes wasn’t negotiating with Nourry directly, and let’s be honest a nice payrise and a better buyout fee for the club doesn’t take much negotiating anyway…
People are human. When people are unhappy they vent to friends. This doesn’t apply just to players and management. QPR employs hundreds of people, many have decades of experience at QPR and/or in professional football clubs. To have a 25 year old public schoolboy parachuted in above them and then in a heavy handed way start micro managing their departments put *a lot* of noses out of joint. Why do you think QPR has been leaning like a sieve since Nourry turned up and ironically tried to personally handle all communications? |
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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 08:34 17 Mar 2025
The ‘new contract’ was signed back end of July. It ultimately just protected QPR with a much higher buyout fee.
For the pre season out in Catalonia it was far from certain Cifuentes would still be at the club to start the season and we were making signings during that time because obviously the club had to as we couldn’t wait around and see what the manager would do.. |
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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 08:30 17 Mar 2025
Not sure what you mean by ‘verify’, if you mean how I get to hear about goings on at the club, I’ve been transparent from the start that my wife was ultimately Cifuentes’ boss at Hammarby. Obviously I won’t tell you exactly who I hear from but Swedish sports clubs are extremely open, social clubs and Marti and his partner were a very active part of that.
If you mean verify what I’m saying is true, then without meaning to throw North under the bus, he is diplomatically and politely trying to lead people to connect the dots because me and him have been comparing matching notes for the past 12 months from (presumably) very different sources.
Once Cifuentes leaves I’ll happily post fully transparently as it won’t matter anymore - if North wants to do a podcast debrief then sure, but he already knows everything I do as he gets to hear it from his side anyway. |
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Reply | (No subject)
at 17:07 16 Mar 2025
Obviously I know it’s preaching to the choir to you as our learned Dear Leader, and it makes me sound like a know it all cnt by repeating it, but I’ve spent the past 12+ months trying to tell people how seriously unhappy Cifuentes is with things behind the scenes…
By this point, Cifuentes could celebrate every goal by turning and making a w@nker sign at Nourry in the directors box and certain people would tell you he was shouting ‘boo-urns’ |
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Reply | The Ginger ninja.
at 16:56 16 Mar 2025
100%. He’s got two ‘full backs’ who cannot play the way he wants his full backs to play and cannot/will not complete the basics of being a full back, being stop the cross at source, therefore he is pragmatically accepting that a lot of balls are going to come in and it’s better to tightly defend the box than have them both out wide making token efforts.
Not that it works out of course when we still concede goals so incredibly cheaply. |
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Reply | Dixon-Bonner loaned out for the rest of the season
at 16:24 13 Mar 2025
I said last summer that it would be a bit pointless to give him a new contract as Cifuentes wouldn’t use him.
That said, having experienced second division Swedish football, this move is as passive aggressive a statement as it’s possible to make. |
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Reply | Rest of the Championship thread
at 09:26 13 Mar 2025
Coming back to an old topic but it truly is mental that Burnley who came down with a squad full of young kids from the continent, appointed Mr Brexit, Scott Parker, allowed him to spend a fortune Brexiting up the squad with ‘good honest professionals’ from Blighty and then have a squad that should be 15/20 points clear by now not even in the automatic places..
Sarmiento, Koleosho, Foster, Benson would be the best players in any other squad in the division and they don’t get a look in behind ‘salt of the earth’ like Ashley Barnes, Jaidon Anthony, Marcus Edwards… |
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Reply | The Boro Match thread.
at 12:54 12 Mar 2025
Not really much to say that hasn’t been said.
Frey trying to press their defence, fair play to him for trying but it’s like trying to win an F1 race in a Reliant Robin.
Morgan has been a credit to himself this season but he’s gone from playing 20 games a season in PL2 to 3 game weeks - the kid is knackered and would surely be rested if we could.
Colback and Cook pathetic as the supposed experienced spine - have to hope that they’ve both had enough and don’t want to hang around next year.
Dunne at his best a serviceable stopgap at RB now a complete liability and Paal on the other side repeating the understandable phoning in of a season that neither side wanted to be stuck with.
The saving grace at least is that we aren’t going down but it obviously makes the rest of the season a frustrating throw away |
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Reply | The Boro Match thread.
at 20:12 11 Mar 2025
Meh, not going up, not going down and half those on the pitch won’t be here next year.
Standard dead rubber for us |
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Reply | The Boro Match thread.
at 15:23 11 Mar 2025
His agent Mikkel Beck (yes, that Mikkel Beck) naively discussed it with Danish news back then that they had hoped for a short terms expenses deal and so were ecstatic when Ferdinand came back with a longer term deal on professional money. |
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Reply | The Boro Match thread.
at 10:31 11 Mar 2025
Lord Ramkilde actually went back to Denmark and played some games in the top league after leaving us. Now in the danish 2nd division and scoring goals.
Him and JET two of Ferdinand’s best deals. |
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Reply | Alfie Lloyd
at 15:52 9 Mar 2025
As said in the match thread.
The finishing and decision making of Armstrong without the pace and power. Long term a National league player imo. |
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Reply | Time wasting
at 15:51 9 Mar 2025
The ref could card in the first minute for time wasting and it’s completely irrelevant as no ref is ever going to be brave enough to send a keeper off for persistent time wasting.
We know it, they know it, the players know it. It’s most more offensive that the refs insult our intelligence by bothering with a token booking rather than just stop bothering and publicly accept what we all know by now. |
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