Post by QPR Report on Feb 24, 2010 7:29:12 GMT
Year Flashback: February 24, 2009
David McIntyre/Ealing Gazette - Bhatia hints at season ticket rethink-
QPR are “very close” to announcing their admission prices for next season, according to vice-chairman Amit Bhatia.
Last year’s dramatic increases resulted in uproar among supporters and disappointing attendances throughout this season.
And the economic downturn has further increased the need for a more sensible pricing structure for the 2009-10 campaign.
“There was discontent about the pricing," Bhatia conceded.
“We are very close to making an announcement about next season’s season tickets. We’re actually hoping to do so in the next couple of weeks, if not sooner.
“Hopefully mistakes have been learned from. I think the fans can appreciate what we are trying to achieve with this club and hopefully, going forward, we’ll have a stadium with satisfied fans.
“I can’t say more than that at the moment, because the reason we haven’t announced anything yet is that we are still finalising things.
“I regularly interact with the fans’ groups and they’ve expressed to me certain things that they wanted us to either reconsider or bring back.
“So, in trying to take into account all of those things, we’re hoping to come up with something that will make the fans happy.”
Despite their big spending, Rangers are currently 11th in the Championship table – not what some fans expected after such huge price hikes.
But Bhatia insists this season should still be regarded as a success even if Rangers fail to make the play-offs.
He said: “I measure success by the question ‘are we doing better?’
“When we first got involved with the club we were last and we finished 14th, so that was success. If we finish seventh this season we will again definitely have shown an improvement.
“Are we improving as a club? I think we are. I think we’re heading in the right direction but just like any supporter, I want to do better than seventh and reach those play-offs and feel we can do it with a good run.
“We’re still on the right track. We’ve shown progressive success and as long as we continue to do well, there’s no reason why we won’t play in the Premier League and I hope we will.”
David McIntyre/Ealing Gazette - Bhatia hints at season ticket rethink-
QPR are “very close” to announcing their admission prices for next season, according to vice-chairman Amit Bhatia.
Last year’s dramatic increases resulted in uproar among supporters and disappointing attendances throughout this season.
And the economic downturn has further increased the need for a more sensible pricing structure for the 2009-10 campaign.
“There was discontent about the pricing," Bhatia conceded.
“We are very close to making an announcement about next season’s season tickets. We’re actually hoping to do so in the next couple of weeks, if not sooner.
“Hopefully mistakes have been learned from. I think the fans can appreciate what we are trying to achieve with this club and hopefully, going forward, we’ll have a stadium with satisfied fans.
“I can’t say more than that at the moment, because the reason we haven’t announced anything yet is that we are still finalising things.
“I regularly interact with the fans’ groups and they’ve expressed to me certain things that they wanted us to either reconsider or bring back.
“So, in trying to take into account all of those things, we’re hoping to come up with something that will make the fans happy.”
Despite their big spending, Rangers are currently 11th in the Championship table – not what some fans expected after such huge price hikes.
But Bhatia insists this season should still be regarded as a success even if Rangers fail to make the play-offs.
He said: “I measure success by the question ‘are we doing better?’
“When we first got involved with the club we were last and we finished 14th, so that was success. If we finish seventh this season we will again definitely have shown an improvement.
“Are we improving as a club? I think we are. I think we’re heading in the right direction but just like any supporter, I want to do better than seventh and reach those play-offs and feel we can do it with a good run.
“We’re still on the right track. We’ve shown progressive success and as long as we continue to do well, there’s no reason why we won’t play in the Premier League and I hope we will.”