‘Everyone knew Chris Gieler was a wrong ’un but nobody said anything’ - former QPR player on how ex-scout abused him

A former Queens Park Rangers player has said he was sexually assaulted by Chris Gieler, who was once the club’s chief scout.

The former player, who has remained anonymous, gave an account of Gieler’s behaviour during a one-off incident in the Eighties.

Speaking on the BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire programme, the former player said: “I had a sore groin — he [Gieler] came into the treatment room. I had an ice pack on my groin and he started touching that.

“We were 14, 15, 16. You’re not going to [talk about it] — people would’ve said, ‘You should’ve just knocked him out’.” He said he “slapped [Gieler’s] hand out of the way” when the approach was made and also described Gieler as “very touchy feely”.

“After a youth-team game, he would come and start talking to you in the shower. Everyone knew he was a wrong ’un but nobody said anything,” he said, before adding he believed Gieler “did much worse with some of the other boys”.

Gieler left QPR in 2003 and died the following year. The club issued a statement yesterday to say they were “taking the allegations very seriously and will co-operate fully in any forthcoming investigation”.

Gieler was QPR’s head of youth recruitment for 30 years before leaving Loftus Road suddenly. The club decided not to mark Gieler’s death a year later, despite his long service at Loftus Road.

Another former player said Gieler “used to give boys presents and gifts” and that he “was picking boys up and taking them out for evenings”.

A report in this morning’s Daily Telegraph claimed Gieler insisted that boys report to him alone at the club’s training ground and remove their trousers so that he could examine their legs, despite being unqualified to do this; encouraged boys to stay over at his home in Hillingdon; called boys late at night and asked them questions about their relationships while he masturbated.

He is also accused of talking to boys about their genitalia and sexual development in front of others; and, on one occasion, taking a boy shopping to buy skimpy underwear which he insisted the boy display to the rest of the youth-team squad.

Meanwhile, the Football Association will speak to Dario Gradi, the Crewe director of football, as part of their investigation into child sexual abuse within the game.

There have been claims that Gradi visited the parents of a Chelsea youth player to ‘smooth over’ a complaint of sexual assault against Eddie Heath, the chief scout who has been identified as a repeat offender in the Seventies. No action was taken against Heath by Chelsea and Gradi has denied any wrongdoing.

A total of 350 people have alleged they are victims and 55 amateur and professional clubs are linked to allegations of abuse going back several decades.