It’s not hard going back down to the Championship... I love football and will get on with it

Posted Monday, April 22, 2013 by The Sun

FROM Milan to Millwall, the Champions League to the Championship — Harry Redknapp must wonder how it has all gone so wrong so quickly.

It was little more than two years ago that he was masterminding Spurs’ unforgettable win in the San Siro.

Just over a year ago, he was the bookies’ odds-on favourite to become England manager.

But now he is facing possible visits to such football cathedrals as Huddersfield’s Galpharm Stadium and Blackpool’s Bloomfield Road.

And for a man used to fine dining at the game’s top table, a diet of McSoccer will be pretty unpalatable.

Yet the pugnacious pensioner has no intention of walking away from a QPR team all but condemned to relegation by this lacklustre home defeat.

Stoke arrived in London with their own relegation fears but Peter Crouch’s strike just before the break settled their nerves.

And when Clint Hill fouled Crouch in the 77th minute, Jon Walters scored the spot-kick to move the visitors six points clear of the bottom three and leave the Hoops stood on the trap door.

Redknapp, though, feels it is his duty to QPR owners Tony Fernandes and Lakshmi Mittal to stay.

He said: “I would rather build another team in the Premier League but this is where we are and we have to deal with it.

“Taking a team to the San Siro was great. Winning in Milan was fantastic.

“But I spent my first 10 years at Bournemouth and I loved that, so it’s not hard for me to go back to the Championship. That’s life. I love football and I’ll get on with the job.

“I’m not uncertain about staying. It’s up to the owners. Whatever they do is good with me.

“I sound like a broken record but these are the nicest people you could work for. And I mean that, whatever they decide to do.”

Yet Redknapp, 66, acknowledges it will be a huge job at Loftus Road to overhaul an overpaid but under-performing squad.

He admitted: “I’ve tried my best with what we’ve had and it’s not been good enough.

“If I’d been in charge at the start of the season and we’d ended up where we are now I’d put my hand up and say: ‘Sorry, I’ve put a bad team together’.

“It’s obvious we need a lot of changes if we go down but it’s not easy when players have long contracts on good money.

“They’re not going to move unless someone else offers the same money.

“I don’t think any of them have release clauses in their deals but it all depends on who we want to keep.

“I want to change things in the summer and find the players to build my own team. But I don’t know if I’ll be able to do that.

“It makes me laugh when people say: ‘They won’t fancy playing in the Championship’. Well, who put them in the Championship?

“So when I hear that c**p about them being too good for the Championship, the fact is they are there because they weren’t good enough in the Premier League.”

Redknapp believes there was not much more he could have done after taking over a team in mid-November with just four points from their first 13 games.

He added: “Maybe I could have tried harder to get Peter Odemwingie from West Brom.

“He might have given another four or five goals to make the difference but relegation’s been coming for a while.

“It became more difficult when Bobby Zamora got himself sent off against Wigan.

“It’s left us a bit lop-sided and we’re just a little short of that bit of quality we need.”