The FA have slapped no fewer than seven charges of misconduct on the club and a points deduction now seems a certainty, despite the protestations of the QPR board who have requested a personal hearing. That is a dangerous move since it's quite clear following the Evening Standard's reporting last night that they not only knew they were in the wrong over the dodgy agent deal to sign Alejandro Faurlin but that they were offered the chance to put it right by the FA but chose not to. Fighting the charge is likely to increase the penalty.
So it seems that Shepherd's Bush may not be hosting premier league action after all - and nobody should be more outraged by that than Neil Warnock who has single handedly masterminded their commanding lead of the Championship from start to finish. His work appears to have been undone by the loons who for so long ran the club into the ground and almost into bankruptcy, and whose ghosts now have come back to haunt us.
And to think we dared to dream.
I'm afraid that's absolute rubbish.
ReplyDeleteThe FA always have a range of punishments for any offence, and points deduction is one of those possible punishments. The papers, who love to stir up trouble (and the Evening Standard are among the worst at this), will always state the most dramatic of possibilities, cover themselves by using language that means they never declare it as more than just a possibility, but highlight it in a way to imply it's a realistic one, stirring people to expect it. They can do this to put pressure on those who make the decisions at times to make their sensationalist prophecies self-fulfilling at times, but in this case they won't succeed at that. All they'll get is some excitement that'll sell a few more papers.
Faurlin was always eligible. He was declared eligible by the league when we signed him, and resigned him. He played against Palace even after the charges were announced so is still eligible. There was no rule about third party ownership in the football league when we signed him. So there were no rules to break in that respect. The agent is registered with FIFA, well-known, and Italian, therefore in the EU and entitled to work in the UK.
The only remaining issue is to do with contract information and paperwork. Since we haven't done anything dodgy in terms of signing a player who shouldn't have been allowed to play for us, (if we had, it'd have been dealt with far more quickly, and probably last season), we haven't gained an unfair advantage on the pitch, and so a points deduction is not an appropriate punishment. If we do get punished, it'll be a fine.
Furthermore, if it was going to be a points deduction, the case would have been processed nearer the start of the season. The investigation apparently began in September. If it was serious enough to lead to a points deduction, it'd have been carried out quickly enough for the points deduction not to impact promotion and playoffs and lead to all sts of scenarios where one team or another sues the FA for a fortune.
Lastly, Warnock has gone on record saying he is completely reassured by what the club's lawyers have told him, so we have nothing to worry about. Don't buy the crap the papers write. They don't report news as non-interfering observers, as they try to suggest. They instead attempt to create stories with what they write, with no care for whom they hurt or how badly. Stirring up panic among fans, leading to blogs auch as yours is the aim of the media and we're all much better off ignoring it. QPR will only fail to go up if they fall apart on the pitch over the remaining games. Stop panicking and get behind the team. You Rs!