The Toronto connection - podcast
QPR youth team graduate and former striker Danny Dichio is the special guest on this week’s Open All R’s Podcast.
Dichio scored 25 times in 97 appearances for Rangers having signed pro terms in May 1993. He left for Serie A side Sampdoria in summer 1997 and more recently scored the first ever goal for Toronto’s MLS franchise. He is now a technical director and coach at Toronto and covers Premier League football for Canadian television.
Dichio said: "Either Harry or Fernandes has spent money, but they haven’t spent it in the right areas or on the right personnel. There’s a lack of confidence on the road, you could see at Everton where they started well and were unlucky to concede a couple of deflected goals, there’s a different sense of their play and commitment when playing away from home. That’s hard for me to see as an ex-player and as a fan as well, I can’t grasp it, I don’t know if it’s tactics or the players’ mentality.
"Another thing that pisses me off with the club, is I was at the club from the age of nine, I was a local boy it was my local club, I had offers to go to Arsenal but I’d grown up supporting QPR standing in the Loft and following it to away games. It was my dream to play for my club. I don’t see that at QPR any more. The last youth player to come through to the first team was probably Richard Langley. There’s something going wrong there. In my day we had good youngsters coming through, but also a good scouting network with players coming through from Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland who would come and try out and get offered YTS contracts. It was a good core group with excellent training, I just don’t see it at QPR and a number of other clubs who just want to buy the best youngsters and don’t feel the need to develop players any more.”
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