REBOUNDING SUPERHOOPS

Saturday afternoon was, in microcosm, like the seven day period of which it was a part: a discouraging start, a few twists and turns, then concluding with a very satisfying flourish.

Rewind seven days. QPR supporters were trudging away from Loftus Road, their side's first Premier League fixture for fifteen years having ended in heavy defeat to a fit, well-organised Bolton Wanderers outfit. Booing boomed from some sections of Loftus Road, with chants aimed at board member Flavio Briatore.

Within days, it had been confirmed that Briatore and the majority shareholder Bernie Ecclestone had finally relinquished their interest in the club after weeks of speculation. The new man with a controlling stake is Tony Fernandes, a Malaysian national whose business interests include low-cost airlines, hotels, financial services, prepaid mobile phone services, movie production, concert promotion, a Formula 1 team and his home country's professional basketball league. Having initially voiced a note of caution about Fernandes, I've been encouraged by the noises he's been making about possible player signings, about ticket prices and about openness towards supporters.

So the week leading up to yesterday's fixture at Goodison Park had been going pretty well.

Saturday afternoon also came to a satisfying conclusion after an inauspicious start. Having heard on the internet grapevine that the Everton match was to be shown at the British Queen on the Uxbridge Road, I fancied watching the game among fellow Rangers fans. This seemed preferable to  the other options that came to mind - watching on a tiny laptop screen or in an Old Street boozer decked out with Arsenal paraphernalia.  So I schlepped over to Shepherds Bush, emerging from the tube station during a squall of unseasonably cold, hard rain. I was soaked by the time I made it to the pub, getting there just as Luis Suarez was compounding the Arsenal's misery with Liverpool's second goal. An Irishman in Liverpool colours was perched on a bar stool and gleefully pumping a fist. I hoped this was not to be a bad omen: a London side losing to Merseyside opponents.

For those who have never been there, a few words about the British Queen. This is a pub that has decidedly not succumbed to the rising tide of poncification that has washed over so many other Shepherds Bush hostelries. The Defector's Weld it ain't. The Goldhawk it is not. The Stinging Nettle (i.e. the sadly renamed former Bush Ranger)? No, the BQ is most assuredly dissimilar to any of these. No high-priced posh nosh in here. No ironic styling. No BBC types looking down their noses at noisy football supporters.

I made my way to a good spot in front of the TV and got to work on the first pint. Before long, though, it began to look as though the trip might have been wasted. For reasons that remain a bit obscure, the satellite signal did not come online until nineteen painful minutes into the match, during which time the assembled drinkers had resorted to checking the score on their mobile phones. Well, you can do that while being dragged around Brent Cross, Bluewater or Westfield, right? Nice though a pint of lager is, you don't need to make the effort to get down to the Bush just to keep squinting anxiously at your Blackberry.

When the signal finally came, the picture was patchily pixellated, freezing and bumping in a most distracting manner. Each time the action fuzzed back into view, this was greeted with a lusty cry of U RRRRRRRRRsssss. You would have thought the Rangers had scored. They hadn't. Not yet.

Picture quality causing concern at the British Queen

Soon, thankfully, the picture became clearer, with audible commentary in English, despite the coverage coming courtesy of a Norwegian channel. It was immediately striking that the travelling QPR supporters were in better voice than the home fans. So our lot were outsinging the Scousers. Could the team do their bit and really give the away fans something to shout about?

The British Queen crowd were getting a first look at QPR's away strip, a reasonably inoffensive orange and black number. While some may talk in terms of it being 'embarrassing' that the Rangers are the lone Premier League side whose shirts do not carry a sponsor's logo, I think it looks pretty good, not least in the case of the hooped home strip.

As the action unfolded, I was fearing another defeat. Everton's Leighton Baines was a useful choice for fantasy football managers everywhere last season, a fullback able to bag good goals from dead ball situations. So it was an early test for the Superhoops when Baines stepped up to take a free kick from a dangerous position. I feared the worst, briefly entertaining dark visions of a successful strike leading to an avalanche of unanswered scoring for the home side: the after effect of watching the previous weekend's capitulation at the hands of Bolton, no doubt.

The men in orange prepare to defend a Baines free kick

But it didn't go in, and there were signs that QPR were going to be better organised and harder to beat in their second Premier League outing of the season. 

Around twelve minutes after we finally got a watchable picture on the TV, pandemonium broke out in the British Queen. Admittedly helped a bit by a static Everton defence, our magical Magyar was defying any critics who felt he might not make the adjustment to Premier League football. Buzsaky offered a useful pass to Tommy Smith, who duly delivered a nice finish well beyond the reach of Tim Howard, who had, inexplicably, turned up to play in some kind of crazy camouflage outfit.

Oh joy unbounded. Grown men running the length of the barroom to enter beefy bear hugs. This is what goal celebrations might be like at Loftus Road if we had any legroom. Legroom? At QPR? Preposterous. Perhaps we might get some when uncle Tony and his pals buy us an 80,000-seat mega-dome on  the site of Television Centre.

The t-shirt slogans say it all

Smith's sweet strike was, according to the stats at the Sky Sports Centre, one of only two shots on goal from QPR, with Everton having six times as many attempts. The home team's attempts, however, all came to naught, with the Rangers prevailing to bag their first three Premier League points. Even the wearer of the rosiest-tinted specs, though, would have to admit that QPR had at least their fair share of good luck on the day. Messrs. Cahill and Beckford were wasteful in front of goal, making life easier than it might have been for the excellent QPR 'keeper Paddy Kenny.

Come on U RRRRRRRRRRRRsssssssssss

Man of the match, for me, was our grey-haired ball winner Shaun Derry, whose name was sung loudly at the British Queen and at Goodison Park. Although QPR did enjoy the rub of the green at times during this match, Derry's timely interventions were so often crucial. Another Rangers man making the adjustment to top flight football, it seems. Age shall not wither him.

The afternoon, then, ended happily. The rain had passed, the sun was out, and the Rangers were on the up, with points on the board and the prospect of reinforcements joining before the transfer deadline. An upward turn in the always twisty-turny life of QPR and their supporters.

U RRRRRRRRRRRRRRssssss

The sun shines on the Uxbridge Road, on the British Queen and on QPR supporters everywhere