Flavio Briatore was at the centre of an optimistic feature on QPR on the BBC's Inside Sport programme on Monday.

It seems so long ago that I was sitting here at this very same computer spending my summer writing transcripts and summaries of increasingly desperate interviews given to the BBC by then Chairman Gianni Paladini. Having said that, in a way, it seems like only yesterday.

How different things are now as we squabble over whether Iain Dowie is a good enough manager to support our billionaire backed ambition when a year ago we'd have fallen over ourselves to get hold of him.

Instead of Gianni on BBC Radio LDN tonight we had Flavio Briatore on BBC1's Inside Sport - again a sign of how times have changed - and rather than talking about transfer embargoes and struggling to pay St Johns Ambulance bills like we were 12 months ago he was talking about his lofty ambitions for our little football club.

I had to laugh at Steve Bunce's presence on the panel, he was the LDN presenter for many of Gianni's interviews last summer and isn't my favourite person in the world as I regularly said on the old Rivals site. He said back in the studio that appoining De Canio hadn't worked out and we should appoint Allardyce for the next two seasons.

Anyway in a piece shot at the West Brom home game that also featured cautious optimism from Les Ferdinand and Gerry Francis the main focus was on Briatore, and just what he intends to do with our club now he’s got his hands on it.

BBC - You're well known in Formula One that has wonderful corporate hospitality and entertainment, can you bring that to Queens Park Rangers or are we a long way away from that?
FB - It is already, we are already refurbishing the stadium for next season. We are refurbishing the corporate boxes and Cipriani's are taking over the catering for the stadium. It's not going to be like football anymore where you arrive at quarter to two and you leave at five, it's going to be a place for entertainment.

BBC - is it fair to say you're not really a football person?
FB - I'm like everybody in Italy. There you have 70 million people and 50 million think they're the coach. Now they have one less because he's here (obviously filmed before De Canio's departure). I'm not looking for a new job, and Bernie is not looking for a new job and Mittal is not. We all have our on jobs. Firstly, this is three friends together on a project.

BBC - technically you're the world's richest club and everybody is waiting for you to go out and buy all the players, is that going to happen?
FB - In sport you don't buy the success, fortunately as well because otherwise all the people with money would buy all the success. Success is not with the money, success if respecting everybody, success is working hard, success is creating a new project with a reputation and going step by step.

BBC - you have a five year plan, correct?
FB - Yes. Premiership in five years is our target when we arrived, we want to be in the play offs in three years. Maybe it happens sooner but five years is our target.

BBC - Can you be a Premiership club at Loftus Road?
FB - We want to stay here. I believe it's sexy to have the stadium in the centre of London

BBC - People have you down as a play boy, do they have you wrong?
FB - I don't care, I know what I am and I know what I'm doing, I'm not looking for a job, this is who I am.

The BBC also spoke with Ahmit Bhatia outside the ground and he seemed as amiable and pleasant as ever. AB - Football is all about having fun. As long as we can produce results on the field the more fun we can have off the field.

BBC - We're hearing reports of QPR and Zinedine Zidane, are people getting a little ahead of themselves?
AB - I think so, I think so. We're making slow progress and we think that's the best way to do things. That was news to me, I've just landed here about an hour ago and heard the same news you did but it's funny.

It still seems amazing to me to have QPR featuring on programmes like this, and people talking up our chances so much so soon after we came within hours of dropping through the trap door altogether. On Saturday morning the Fighting Talk panel on Five Live agreed that the only club in the country capable of breaking the big four monopoly in the Premiership was QPR. It’s all rather surreal.

Flavio's not without his faults and QPR is still far from perfect - we could do better than Iain Dowie in my opinion if it is indeed him that we’re going to appoint as manager later this week and it's ridiculous that we still don't know how much we're going to have to pay for our season tickets. But compare the above to the equivalent transcripts from last summer and it’s clear we’ve come a hell of a long way in a short space of time.

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