‘Training ground is priority, not stadium’: QPR chief Lee Hoos reveals club’s No1 aim is player development

BY YANN TEAR
yann@slpmedia.co.uk­

QPR’s need for a new stadium is not as pressing as the need to get a new training ground sorted, according to the club’s chief executive.

The club sees its long-term future away from Loftus Road – or the Kiyan Prince Foundation Stadium, as it is now called.

The club is keen to pursue the possibility of redeveloping the Linford Christie Stadium at Wormwood Scrubs – which is subject to a local council consultation exercise over its future.

But whether or not a move becomes feasible – and it could be the only hope for Rangers of remaining in the borough – the priority now is to create the sort of training ground facility that will entice new signings and speed up player development.

Rangers have secured planning permission to redevelop Warren Farm at Windmill Lane, Southall, which would enable them to upgrade from the tired and aged training ground they share with Imperial Sports College at Harlington.

Work was expected to start in the spring, but there were technical delays.

A community facility, there will include up to 11 grass pitches, three cricket squares, changing rooms and access to an indoor 3G pitch.

QPR will operate and maintain the new site, paying all operating costs relating to the community facilities.

Chief executive Lee Hoos outlined the importance of getting the new £30million facility sorted above and beyond thoughts of a new stadium.

“There’s good news because the last pre-commencement conditions [have been] okayed by the council, and we’re on the verge of where we want to be,” said Rangers’ chief executive at a fans’ forum.

“The training ground is the number one strategic priority.

“Of course we’d love to get a better stadium, but our whole model is about player development, and player development starts with the pitch and the facilities. So the sooner I can get a new training ground over the line, the better we will be.

“You just have to look at the players we have had coming up through the system, and for me that’s what QPR is all about. We’re bringing these players up through the ranks.

The better the facilities we can get for these guys, the more of these kind of players we can get through the ranks.”

It is a view wholly endorsed by manager Mark Warburton, who said: “Everyone talks about a stadium, but the stadium is used once or twice every two weeks, but every day they come to work at the training ground, so we have to make that environment the best that we possibly can to aid their development.

“The quality of the pitches, the baths, the menus, the analysis rooms allow these young players to develop at the best possible speed. Some come along very quickly and some take longer, but we have to put a structure in place that allows these players to develop at the right rate. It’s so vitally important.

“And it does aid player acquisition. You look at Spurs, Chelsea, Arsenal and their magnificent training grounds. It attracts the player talent. The player pool is getting ever smaller, and there’s a bigger fight to get them through the door, and the facilities play a huge part in their decision.”

Hoos sees the Linford Christie Stadium as the club’s best and maybe only chance of staying close to their current home, but knows it is not just up to Rangers.

“It’s a council project. They’re running it,” he said. “They had the first round of consultation where a vast majority of people said: ‘Yeah, we’d like to see a major development there’ including a professional football club,’ so they are now looking at business plans and what that would actually mean, and they think they will probably have something ready for the next round [of consultations], probably sometime in June.

“What we’ve always said is we want to remain in this borough and stay as close to our spiritual home as we possibly can, so we will absolutely run this one until the end, before we do anything to make sure we’ve done everything we possibly can to make sure we’re staying in the borough.

“In terms of secondary plans, there’s not a lot of property out there that would be conducive to developing into a modern stadium that’s fit for what we need to do, going forward.

We’re always on the look out, but at the moment we’ve got nothing in front of us to make us say: ‘Wow, that’s the place we need to be,’ so I think we need to stick with what we are trying to do here with the Linford Christie Stadium.

“It’s always a possibility that we move out of the borough. The club needs to move on if we are going to survive.”

He pointed out that only one year in the past 25 years has seen the club return a profit.