Redknapp rejects drink reports

QPR manager Harry Redknapp has rejected allegations that several of his players indulged in late-night drinking sessions during a training camp in Dubai last month.

Rangers took advantage of a break in their fixtures to travel to the United Arab Emirates on February 12.

However a report in the Daily Mirror quoted three unnamed players as saying the warm-weather training camp descended into farce with one saying it was more like a "stag party".

Redknapp, whose side are seven points adrift at the bottom of the Premier League, confirmed he had stayed in a different hotel to the squad but was incredulous about the allegations.

"If it happened they must have done something I didn't see. I don't believe what you're saying. I can't see it," Redknapp told the newspaper.

The club said in a statement: "The club is aware of the article in today's Daily Mirror but the club's entire focus is on today's fixture against Southampton."

"We will be making no further comment at this time."

One unnamed player told the Daily Mirror: "Dubai was a week when we had the chance to sort out the problems. Everybody wanted to do that. But we ended up going there for a holiday. It would have been better if we'd stayed here in London.

"In the evening some players were out, until 3am, 4am, 5am - and then went to training at 8am. It was like a stag party."

Another unnamed player was quoted as saying: "Some of the bar bills were enormous, huge, in the tens of thousands of pounds for one night. Two or three players couldn't train the next day. It was that bad.

"We have to take the blame for what we did. We know that. But some of us think that if the manager had been in the same hotel he could have controlled what was going on.

"What sort of club allows a team with 17 points and only two wins all season go and do this? It's impossible to survive like that and so this club isn't going to survive."