Nedum Onuoha believes his former club Queens Park Rangers should look to appoint a younger manager who will help develop the club's promising players.
The R's announced at the end of last month that head coach Mark Warburton will be leaving the club after three years in charge at the Kiyan Prince Foundation Stadium when his contract expires this summer.
At the beginning of January, QPR were firmly in the running for at least a Championship playoff spot, but a dramatic decline in form in the second half of the campaign – losing 11 and winning only five of their last 20 league games – saw them plummet down the table to 11th place.
MK Dons boss Liam Manning is currently the bookmakers' favourite to take the reins at the West London club next season, with the 36-year-old already making a name for himself in developing younger players during his first 12 months in charge of the League One outfit.
Speaking to Sports Mole ahead of the release of his autobiography 'Kicking Back' on May 17, Onuoha believes that QPR will build a younger squad and will not look to splash the cash this summer, as they have done in previous transfer windows, but he admits that this strategy may hinder their chances of an immediate push for promotion.
"I think [QPR] need a younger coach who is going to turn some of these younger players into something closer towards the finished article, to make them better, to make them better long term and to be building.
"I think it's going to be tough for them (next season), but it depends on their strategy. I think within the last 10 years at QPR, their strategy has changed. There have been times when they have thrown a lot money at it, other times when they've pulled it away and have gone a bit younger.
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"If they were close to the Championship playoffs, they'd invest that bit more in senior talent, people who could maybe take them over the line, but I'm hearing that going forward that's not going to be their strategy.
"I think they are going to [target younger players] and I think they are looking for the longer term version of QPR. If that's going to be one that pushes for promotion, fair enough, but I don't think [promotion is] going to be seen as a priority anymore going forward."
Promotion may prove challenging for the R's, but Onuoha believes that 'a level of expectation still exists' in West London and seeing them in and around the automatic promotion places earlier this season will not have come as a surprise to some supporters and will give them hope for the new campaign.
"With QPR, they've tasted it, with the squad that they have and the manager they had, there was one point when they were third in the Championship and you were wondering if they're going to finish second. They were rolling, but people weren't saying 'oh we shouldn't be here' they were like 'this is where we should be' because of the way they play and the people that they have in the team."
Onuoha, who spent six-and-a-half years at QPR between 2012 and 2018, is familiar with a number of the club's current first-team players, and has picked out three who he still keeps an eye on.
"I have been following [QPR]. When I was there, there were a few players who were in the side that are still there, like goalkeeper Seny Dieng, Osman Kakay, who plays at right-back, there was Ilias Chair who plays as a number 10.
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"When I was captain there for the last three years, these were good guys, these are people trying to find a way for themselves, get to the first team and have a career. I remember the excitement that they had when they were in squads when they'd be getting the chance to play and I really enjoyed being with those guys. So now that they're still there, I do keep an eye on them. Charlie Austin as well."
Onuoha was disappointed to see QPR slip out of the playoffs this term, highlighting their lack of consistency as a key factor for their decline in the second half of the campaign, and he hopes that the younger players in their squad can learn from this experience heading into next season.
"[This season] they were doing so so well up until Christmas and January time, but that's the nature of football and the nature of the Championship. It's not just about doing well in small pockets. You have to be consistently good. I think the teams that ended up going up in that top two (Fulham and Bournemouth) and the ones who are in the playoffs, that's what they did.
"Once you start losing form, there's nothing you can do that guarantees you'll just get it back, especially in a division where there isn't that much that separates each team, and sometimes it's just a case of belief. When it's Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday, a month might pass and you've lost six games in a row in a blink of an eye.
"It was a shame that they fell off like that, but at the end of the day, that is the nature of football, and I'm hoping that for some of those young players it's a lesson."
QPR were relegated from the Premier League in 2014-15 with Onuoha in the side, and they have since failed to return to the top flight, finishing outside the Championship playoffs in each of the last seven seasons and in the top half on only three occasions.
Oliver Thomas
