“You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t get emotional about it,” says Mark Warburton, as the frustration and regret momentarily interrupt his pragmatic response to leaving Queens Park Rangers. It is at times like these when the 59-year-old likes to lean on the lessons of his old life as a currency trader in the City, a similarly ruthless, results-driven industry where a failure to hit targets would end in a swift dismissal. But back then, when Warburton was turning over billions of pounds on a daily basis, it was all black and white, a simple matter of profit and loss. The grey area in which football exists can often leave grievances that are open to debate and make a departure feel even more cutthroat.
“I’ve been quite clear that I thought the job was far from finished,” he says of his three seasons in charge. “The club came 19th in the season before we arrived. We came 13th in our first season, then ninth, and we were in the top-six for the vast majority of this season. We’ve got a young squad, the players are getting better and you only learn from your mistakes. The expectations and demands rise at a club [when you get closer to promotion] because of the prize, but time is a valuable commodity to achieve those goals and that opportunity has not been afforded.”
