Sport
Rangers took a gamble that didn’t pay off
Les Ferdinand has shared the process of how Rangers appointed Michael Beale as manager from QPR, and revealed things got “toxic”.
Speaking on the Stick to Football podcast (26 March), former QPR director of football Ferdinand appeared as a guest and spoke a lot about his time in charge of the London club.
And during that chat he revealed that things got a bit toxic after his departure, but admitted that he was “fantastic” during his time at Loftus Road and that he was left disappointed in Beale.
“He had the players eating out of the palm of his hand, then when he left and it got a bit toxic,” he said. “I was so, so disappointed.
“Like I said Michael Beale came from nowhere, nobody was talking about him. People were talking, but he’d never been a number one.
“We looked at him, we looked at the criteria and we thought that’s what we were looking for. He came through the door and he was fantastic.
“Even now people say to me, I know he’s had a couple of dodgy spells at Rangers and Sunderland, but if someone was to ask me today I always said he will be a top manager somewhere. He’s failed in his last two quests.”
“Michael came through the door and there were a lot of clubs who had looked at him but didn’t take the chance because he hadn’t been number one. He came through the door at QPR, and all of a sudden everyone thought oh right, this is what we thought he could be.
“Wolves were the first club to come, and even then, and he’ll tell you this if you speak to him. Wolves came in the day we were playing Hull at home. They came in, spoke to the CEO, and the CEO called and said, ‘can you believe they’ve called on a match day?’.
“After the game I said to Michael, we need to say something to you because it’s going to go in the press tomorrow. Michael said he didn’t know it was going to happen today. I said if you want us to continue being friends don’t lie to me, because I’ve not lied to you the whole time you’ve been at this football club.
“He said I knew they were coming in, but I didn’t know it was today. I said what do you want to do, and I said I’m the director of football at QPR and I don’t want you to leave. Where we are and where we’re going I don’t want you to leave this football club.
“I had my QPR jacket on and I took it off. I turned and said, now I’m Les Ferdinand talking to you and you’ve got to do what is best for you and your family. And he said to me now that you’ve done that and you’ve taken the badge out and spoken to me like a human being, I can’t leave this football club.
“Obviously he was being offered Premier League wages. He asked if we could change the structure at all so I went to the owners and they were willing to change the structure for him.
“And then Rangers came in. To be honest, when he came to the football club and we’ve all done it. When people talk to me about Newcastle it was the best period of my life in football. I have fond, fond memories of Newcastle. Michael Beale had fond memories of Rangers. Whenever he spoke about any of the clubs he’s been at, Rangers was the one he spoke about with most fondness.
“I always said to the owners if we’re going to lose Michael Beale, in a year or two, I think it will be to Rangers. That’s the only club, unbeknown they were going to come as soon as they did. Him thinking this may never happen again.
“When he came to us and said he was interested, you know he’s not interested here anymore.”
Rangers took a gamble that didn’t pay off
Everyone knew that Beale had ties to Ibrox, and everyone knew that he absolutely loved the club with fans wanting someone with ties to the club in charge.
Giovanni van Bronckhorst was someone who struggled to ever really connect with the fans despite his time at the club as a player, and Beale had recent success at the club during his time with Steven Gerrard.
But as Ferdinand says, while it was clear that he had qualities that could transfer over to a manager’s job, he was completely untested as the main man and Rangers essentially just gambled on his first few months at QPR being what they would also get.
Beale’s results at Ibrox weren’t bad for the most part, but the wins were always against teams he was supposed to beat considering the squad he had and he never managed to compete with Celtic really.
The club acted quickly to ensure he didn’t leave too much of a gap at the top, and his spell at Sunderland shows it was the right decision too.
