HARRY’S BOYS ROCK RAFA
Chelsea choker as Wright-phillips seals crucial win for QPR
THE celebrations from Shaun WrightPhillips were muted, just a simple nod of the head to acknowledge his outrageous winner. He left the whooping and hollering to Harry Redknapp and his assistant as they bounced off each other’s chests like tennis doubles champions the Bryan brothers.
Up in the Shed End, QPR fans paused for a moment, checked with the assistant referee Scott Ledger and then referee Lee Mason.
The goal, struck 12 minutes from time by former Chelsea winger Wright-Phillips, was good. And then all hell broke loose.
It was pandemonium, bedlam at Stamford Bridge as Chelsea’s supporters looked at each other in disbelief.
This felt more like an FA Cup shock than QPR’s second Barclays Premier League victory of the season.
The Great Escape and all that is on for Harry Houdini. Cheesy? Yes, but who cares after this crazy result. Anyone who watched QPR’s dismantling by Liverpool on Sunday at Loftus Road expected an avalanche last night.
Surely no Rangers fans would have complained if Brendan Rodgers’ side had rattled in 10 past Julio Cesar
That’s the way things are when your team are bottom of the table and getting beaten every week by the likes of Swansea, Southampton and West Bromwich Albion, never mind Liverpool.
You turn up, you lose, you get relegated at the end of the season.
Even Chelsea fans, long before Wright-Phillips scored with a rasping drive from the edge of the area, were putting them in the picture.
‘We’ll never play you again,’ they sang from the Matthew Harding Stand and a look at the league table confirmed the reasons why.
As things stood, QPR were preparing to renew their west London rivalry with League One promotion- chasers Brentford in the Championship next season. Hold on a minute, though.
This time — and it has to be this way when you’ve got an owner as ballsy as Tony Fernandes and a manager with the reputation of Redknapp — they have finally shown a bit of spirit.
This victory will not stop Fernandes digging deep in the transfer window as Redknapp presses him for the four players he believes can keep Rangers up.
This is lift off. Their next game in the Premier League, against the boss’s old club Tottenham on January 14, cannot come soon enough.
They are in with a shout again via a player who scored one Premier League goal at Stamford Bridge in three seasons as a Chelsea player.
Wright-Phillips was only thrust into action when Junior Hoilett succumbed to an injury after 15 minutes. But his intervention delighted his QPR team-mates, who shouted and screamed the place down as they walked down the tunnel.
That’s when they finally got there, milking the moment by celebrating the club’s first league win at Stamford Bridge since 1983.
Redknapp was in front of them, punching the air and promising Rangers fans they would never give up after this extraordinary win.
Captain Clint Hill joined him, marching the length of the pitch with Shaun Derry to salute 3,000 delirious visiting supporters.
Hill deserved this moment. Against Liverpool he was turned inside- out numerous times by Luis Suarez but showed his character last night.
But this was a bad 90 minutes for Rafa Benitez, a real bite on the bum after four successive victories.
They were looking good, sharp and accomplished after victories over Leeds, Aston Villa, Norwich and Everton.
Benitez put out a Capital One Cup team but it should still have been enough to beat a team without a win on the road since they beat Stoke on November 19, 2011.
‘The lads are going made in the dressing room, the best atmosphere since I’ve been here,’ admitted Redknapp.
Across the corridor it was like a morgue. Chelsea had been on a charge and Benitez was brought in to chew teams like QPR up.
This should have been be easy for Chelsea but they hardly got past Hill and Ryan Nelsen.
That central defensive pairing — combined age 69 — is creaking but they allowed Fernando Torres just one effort on goal all night.
It came via a deflected effort by David Luiz and even then Cesar, disinterested during the defeat by Liverpool, was on hand to bat it away to safety.
There were other chances. Frank Lampard’s effort was ruled out and Branislav Ivanovic’s header was inches over the crossbar.
Even without the creative talents of Eden Hazard and Juan Mata — both started on the bench — Chelsea still had match-winning potential all over the pitch.
One of them, Marko Marin, was lucky to remain on the field after an outrageous two-footed lunge that shredded the socks of QPR midfielder Stephane Mbia after just four minutes. The Germany man escaped with a booking.
Perhaps Manchester United’s sparkling form over Christmas — beating Newcastle, West Bromwich and walloping Wigan — has ended Chelsea’s title challenge.
Perhaps the players, after slipping 11 points behind United and four short of City with 18 left to play, they feel their race has been run.
They have slipped up too often — losing and drawing against Rangers, drawing with Swansea, losing at West Bromwich and West Ham when they have pedigree and players to win those games.
Instead they blew it and that’s why this morning is all about QPR and that man Redknapp.