Below is a copy of a letter sent to the Football League today
Dear Mr Burns,
I note with interest your organisation’s press release today, which complains that FIFA’s proposed restrictions on transfer dealing constitute an illegal restriction on trade.
Whilst I sympathise with this view, are you not applying double standards, given your embargo on transfer dealing by Queens Park Rangers FC. Under both UK and European competition law, and by your own definitions of unconstrained trade, your organisation is clearly restricting QPR’s trade.
QPR is a subsidiary of a company which is in administration and consequently enjoys protection from its creditors, primarily the holding company’s owner Chris Wright. This is in accordance with company law on administrative receivership, which is designed to help companies trade their way out of problems. It is not, nor should it be, up to organisations like the Football League, to involve itself in such difficult periods in any company’s life.
Please lift this ill-advised embargo, which was clearly prompted by the complaints of a man who had been behind a bid to buy QPR and who clearly has a substantial interest in seeing QPR fail in its objectives, immediately.
Yours faithfully
David Price – QPR 1st football supporters trust