By Fraser Watson
For Steve Cooper and his Swansea City side, the Boxing Day trip to Loftus Road will be about maintaining momentum.
There should be no repeat of 12 months ago, when an away display that bordered on surrender allowed QPR to run out 5-1 winners in an ultimately irrelevant FA Cup tie.
Following last Saturday’s 2-0 win over Barnsley, Cooper’s men will head to London as favourites with their hosts 19th in the Championship table – and without a win in seven matches.
But, regardless, the occasion is unlikely to match that at the same venue not so many moons ago, proved the springboard for Swansea’s most successful ever season.
In August 2012, trepidation reigned among the Jack Army when Michael Laudrup and co kicked off the club’s second Premier League campaign.
The great Dane’s reputation as a player was unquestioned, and yet the jury was out on his credentials as a manager.
He had quite the act to follow after Brendan Rodgers, who in the previous two seasons had masterminded Swansea’s promotion and eye-catching first top flight campaign, and then had left for Liverpool that summer.
Midfielder Joe Allen had gone with him, Steven Caulker had returned to Spurs after a successful loan spell, and more significantly Gylfi Sigurdsson had followed the defender to White Hart Lane.
Laudrup had brought his own overseas signings in, of course – Pablo Hernandez, Jonathan De Guzman, Chico Flores and the relatively unknown Miguel Michu, but these were unproven quantities on British soil.
Talk of uncertainty and second season syndrome was rife.
Some even deemed the clash with QPR, whose own Premier League survival under Mark Hughes had only been sealed on the final day of the previous season, as an early ‘six pointer’. And they weren’t referring to the top end of the table.
As it turned out, as commentator Alistair Mann later pointed out on Match of the Day, there couldn’t have been a smoother baton change.
Indeed, Laudrup’s side would produce some dynamic attacking and enjoy a dominance not matched until another famous 5-0 win the following February – when beating Bradford City in the League Cup final at Wembley.
It began fortuitously, Michu’s speculative left foot 25 yard shot squirming unforgivably under Rob Green.
The Spaniard would then join Flores in rattling the bar before half time – but after the break came a moment which would propel his name into the headlines.
It would ultimately stay there for the rest of the season.
His sublime first time effort from Wayne Routledge’s pass bent into the top corner – and the hand to ear celebration – that may have bewildered some first time around – was soon to become plastered all over the papers.
Nathan Dyer continued the rout with two goals of his own before Scott Sinclair, on as a substitute, scored with what would prove to be his final act in a Swansea shirt.
Trepidation and scepticism that had derived from the Rodgers body-blow soon gave way to optimism, and the fervour heightened seven days later with Michu again on the scoresheet in a 3-0 win over West Ham.
The aforementioned League Cup success and eventual ninth-placed Premiership finish would ensure the excitement wasn’t misplaced, and whilst things would turn sour under Laudrup the following season, the foundations laid that baking hot day at Loftus Road remain etched in the memory.
Come Boxing Day, Cooper’s side will travel in much less glamourous circumstances.
There will be no travelling support, no Michu up front, and certainly no searing heat – but there will be the same necessity to negate a potentially tricky fixture.
That day in 2012, Laudrup’s side made a monumental statement and reaffirmed their status as a proven Premier League outfit.
To enhance their chances of that latter notion becoming a reality again, then come Saturday Cooper will want his side to make a similar statement of their own.
