A mixture of first teamers and reserve players comfortably saw off League Two title favourites Crawley Town on Tuesday night as QPR’s pre-season campaign nears its conclusion.

They were standing five deep on the platform at London Bridge as the 1747 to Bogor Regis finally honed into view. The departure times of services to that part of the world had been coming and going for most of the afternoon with no trains materialising to fulfil the commitment. People were starting to question whether a train would ever run that route again.

Somewhere 15 miles south of the organised chaos a water main installed when Queen Victoria was still on the throne and since left to its own devices by a company that this week announced a £2m bonus payout to its top executives had given up the ghost. Huge jets of water had quickly turned a railway bank to mud near East Corydon and sent liquid soil flowing out across the railway line.

It should be pointed out that this had happened more than 24 hours previously, but there’s not a lot of Japanese work ethic and urgency available to harness in South London I’m afraid. It might have been quicker to allow wind erosion to take its natural course on the blocked line. In the searing summer heat they stood, fed up and sweating, looking at a picture in the evening paper of no fewer than 16 workmen in orange jackets all standing around the land slide and looking at it. Not a single shovel between them, no evidence whatsoever of anybody doing anything other than standing, and looking. “It was a scene to sum up modern Britain,” a Daily Mail reader probably said.

On the train, in conditions outlawed for the transport of cattle several years ago, passengers wearily took in the body odours of their fellow sufferers. The guard told passengers he was “declassifying first class” to ease the overcrowding. The 862 people standing up heaved forwards towards the eight new seats that were now available. As we ground to a halt in Norwood Junction (not a scheduled stop) the crackly public address system advised us that Southern Trains apologised. For the land slip? For the delays? For life? It was white noise to the poor bastards that do this every day, the drudgery of their existence long since crushing any fight and spirit that once upon of time may have stirred some anger within them and caused them to write a strongly worded letter.

Hogan Ephraim: Yoga and Meditation Techniques, is available on audio cassette free of charge to all Southern Rail customers.

Four people out of what seemed like thousands on the 1747 were there by choice. I should imagine the people of Three Bridges go to bed on Sunday night abjectly miserable in the knowledge of what’s to come on Monday morning. Had you told them that we’d crammed ourselves in here with them to go and watch a football game, with nothing at stake, on a working week night, would they have laughed or cried? Possibly both.

Our destination was, of course, Crawley – the newest addition to the Football League. This is a place best known for being next to Gatwick Airport but such is the rapid ascension of the football team it could now have something to really shout about – although question marks remain about where exactly the money to finance it all is coming from at this club that has gone bust twice in recent times and would quickly do so again if the mystery Far Eastern consortium that’s behind all this lost interest. “We’re only doing what everybody else is doing,” argues board member Susan Carter. Quite.

On arrival at the functional but characterless Broadfield Stadium which sits tight to the A23 Brighton Road we found an interesting QPR team selection laid out before us. Alejandro Faurlin played in the holding midfield role he has made his own under Warnock and I think it’s safe to assume he will do likewise against Bolton next week. Heidar Helguson started as the lone striker but again I think we can say with some certainty that he will be behind Jay Bothroyd in the pecking order this season.

Faurlin, surely one of the few involved here guaranteed a start against Bolton?

I would say the other nine players in the side were all being given a chance to play their way into or out of contention. Kaspars Gorkss, possibly Southampton bound but otherwise competition for Danny Gabbidon and Fitz Hall who seem to be the front runners for the centre half slots as it stands, started at the back with trialist Bruno Perone who is dividing opinion among the fans and clearly struggling to convince Neil Warnock one way or the other. Another trialist, Brian Murphy, started in goal. <br> Doubts about Clint Hill’s ability to play in the Premiership persist so Matt Connolly was given a chance to impress in his position here. Bradley Orr may find himself under pressure from Kieron Dyer who certainly wasn’t signed as a right back but impressed there in Italy so he needed a big game.<br> Petter Vaagan Moen, still clinging to the idea that there is more time and space to express yourself in the Premiership, partnered Faurlin with Tommy Smith, Hogan Ephraim and Akos Buzsaky playing behind the main striker and all facing a battle with Adel Taarabt, Kieron Dyer and probably DJ Campbell for starting berths.<br> Troy Hewitt was named among the subs giving QPR fans a chance to assess him for the first time. Lee Cook was on the bench as well, despite not being included among the squad numbers announced earlier in the day. He wasn’t actually named on the bench here either, and it was suggested that he’d just come along out of boredom, but he did play in the second half and clearly had a point to prove when he came on.<br> <img src=" width="600" />

An unfamiliar familiar face in the crowd.

Despite the rather mixed bag of players sent out by Neil Warnock, and Crawley’s status as League Two title favourites who already have a competitive win against AFC Wimbledon under their belts, Rangers started the game in the ascendency and rarely let up. It took eight minutes for a serious effort on goal, Tommy Smith lobbing the advancing Scott Shearer in the Crawley goal but seeing the ball cleared off the line. It mattered not, within two minutes the R’s had forced a corner and in a break with tradition they actually sent in a really good delivery from Akos Buzsaky which meant Kaspars Gorkss was able to lash home powerfully from close range after his initial header was blocked. The quality of the set piece delivery from Buzsaky and Vaagan Moen was a real positive of the QPR performance.

The flow could have been disrupted on the quarter hour when Bruno Perone, fresh from a wild clearance onto the roof of the main stand, took a hefty blow to the face which left him with a nose that looked like a nuclear bomb site. Gorkss, who isn’t happy unless he’s sporting a bandage around a deep nine inch long facial wound of some sorts, didn’t seem too impressed with Perone’s cries for help and the Brazilian then spent some considerable time on the touchline with up to five members of the QPR backroom staff having his face reassembled. If he is going to sign, at least he has his English centre half’s nose sorted out nice and early.

While Perone was changing his shirt, and his shorts as well bizarrely (a miracle QPR have spares in green given the continuing farce with our kits this summer), Matthew Connolly marauded forward from left back and let rip with his right foot from 25 yards but could only find the top of the crossbar with a powerful effort. Connolly barely put a foot wrong all night, but even in a game being played at 60 per cent against meagre opponents the limitations of having a left back who constantly has to come back inside onto his right foot were frequently on show. Here it didn’t matter, and Connolly looked one of our better players, in the Premiership we’ll get found out very quickly if we try it.

You wouldn’t wish Perone’s nose injury on anybody, but Kaspars Gorkss who knows a thing or two about head wounds seems unimpressed. In best Ranier Wolfcastle voice: “Tis only a flesh wound.”

Crawley’s first real threat came just before the half hour when Tommy Smith was penalised for a foul on the edge of the area and a wicked delivery to the back post from former Wycombe man Sergio Torres was volleyed wide from close range by defender Charlie Wassmer, up from the back and sporting a nicotine yellow rinse job. He should have scored.

Apparently buoyed by this the home team quickly set off in search of an equaliser again and Rangers needed former Ipswich keeper Brian Murphy to stand strong at his near post when Ben Smith worked a clever one two with Torres on the edge of the area and struck for goal from a narrow angle.

Murphy was always the favourite to win through in that battle but should have been left with no chance seven minutes before half time when Crawley left back Dean Howell, whose delivery was spot on all night, whipped over a great cross that John Akinde, newly signed from Bristol City, should have buried but instead contrived to head over the bar and into a following of around 500 QPR fans.

The home team’s ten minutes in the sunshine continued when Thomas turned on the edge of the box and hit a low shot that deflected wide and perhaps it was QPR who were the more grateful side to hear the half time whistle.

Wholesale changes were made by Neil Warnock at the break. Radek Cerny came on in goal, Peter Ramage and Danny Shittu ran out as centre backs, Lee Cook and Patrick Agyemang joined the attack with Faurlin, Gorkss, Perone and Smith the outfield players making way. By now dusk was settling and while Crawley’s ground seems well set for its Football League debut, its floodlights do not. I half expected to see a man go around lighting the gas lamps as the gloom set in and the final half an hour of the game was like football by candlelight.

Those substitutions reaped immediate rewards when Agyemang cut in from his position wide on the right and fed Cook in the area whose cross shot was hammered into the roof of the net by Helguson arriving in the nick of time four yards out at the far post. We’ve seen Helguson miss from there before, and an inch or two more trajectory on this and it would have been appearing on air traffic control radar.

Somewhere on the adjacent A23 motorists continue their journeys, oblivious to the horror that could have resulted had Helguson’s shot for the second goal been an inch higher.

At the other end Crawley striker Wesley Thomas and their star man in the second half Scott Nielson gave Danny Shittu a nervous moment when the latter retrieved a ball Danny had seemed happy to shepherd out for a goalkick and created a goalscoring chance for the former who blazed over. Then just before the hour they did score their first goal of the game with QPR not heeding the warning they’d been given from a set piece in the first half. It’s amazing to think that sporting a head of hair that was causing 747s to miss their final approaches to Gatwick Charlie Wassmer was able to sneak into the penalty area unnoticed for a second time in the game and this time head calmly home past Radek Cerny.

The game then entered a terribly scrappy phase of play. What little shape QPR had shown to this point dissolved into a footballing blancmange and the game became punctuated by marauding solo runs from players who rarely had the ball under control. Nielson was first to go, accelerating through a startled QPR backline and shooting powerfully but failing to score thanks to Cerny’s reflexes. The Patrick Agyemang bumbled through the Crawley backline on the counter attack before being absolutely pole axed by Crawley’s uncompromising defender Kyle McFadzean. Play continued as QPR kept the ball and Lee Cook saw a shot deflected wide.

Vaagan Moen, possibly about to fire off another wonderful crossfield pass, as long as that nasty opponent doesn’t try to tackle him.

Agyemang I just despair with. If a player of such limited ability is going to play any serious part in the forthcoming season then we may as well give up now. It would be a new low for QPR, and possibly English football in general, if such a poor player was found to be of any use at all in the top division in this country. Watching a man of that size running with the ball with absolutely no control whatsoever over either of his legs is actually quite unsettling.

On a more positive note, Lee Cook was catching the eye in the right way. Denied a squad number for the new season earlier in the day and originally not even named on the bench prior to this match he had a point to prove and set about doing so with a lively and committed display that was in stark contrast to his disinterested showing when he was last in front of the LFW travelling party at St Albans earlier this summer. A low cross from Cook deflected into Agyemang’s path at the midway point of the half but his shot was knocked wide by a Crawley defender.

The third QPR goal did duly arrive moments later. Petter Vaagan Moen, tidy on the ball but terrified of tackling or being tackled for fear of hurting himself or anybody else, played a superb through ball that cut Crawley in half and sent Buzsaky, probably QPR’s most accomplished performer on the night, racing through into the area where he unselfishly set up Helguson to waltz around the keeper and walk the ball into the empty net. It was a shining moment of Premiership quality and it brought the first big cry of “You R’s” from the terraces.

It was around this point that attention was drawn to a fat middle aged man walking along the front of the away end in a Chelsea shirt. There are no words really, not repeatable ones anyway. A new candidate for the ‘World’s Thickest Man’ award I would suggest. Actions akin to cleaning a bull’s pen out in a bright red boiler suit.

That was enough for Helguson (the goal, not the tool in the stand) and he was withdrawn along with Hogan Ephraim (neat, tidy, anonymous) and replaced by former Harrow man Troy Hewitt and young midfielder Michael Doughty. Now Doughty was another who played at St Albans earlier in the summer and barely looked up to the standard of his non-league opponents. Here however, with the greater motivation of a first team outing in front of a big crowd, he turned in a really eye catching performance of sharp passing and tricky skills. One cross, beautifully dug out after a fine dummy and spin on the byline, landed plum on Hewitt’s head and should have been converted from close range but he rather snatched at the chance.

A first look at Troy Hewitt, who should have scored from Doughty’s cross.

Doughty was a clear QPR winner on the night and will now no doubt become the latest subject of the “why don’t we give him a chance” message board posts that have previously been used for Angeo Balanta, Antonio German and others. Hopefully Doughty will fare better than those two as their careers appear to be stagnating – the key could be a successful loan spell elsewhere and having shown that he’s a cut above what Crawley currently have playing on the right side of their defence last night League Two should be the minimum level we’re looking at for him.

Doughty saw a shot fly wide after build up work from Cook and Ayemang while at the far end of the ground an improvised over-the-shoulder hooked effort from James Dance had Cerny scrambling to save.

Rangers made it 4-1 with ten minutes to go. Doughty and Cook were at the heart of it again, the former playing in the latter who decided to have a go himself from a tight angle and powerfully beat Shearer with a fine left footed shot into the top corner.

It’s this sort of action shot, for Lee Cook’s goal, where Neil really earns his money. If we paid him any money that is.

Warnock responded by replacing Connolly with youngster Michael Harriman but it did little to boost QPR’ resistance against the lively Thomas and Nielson partnership which almost brought a second Crawley goal five minutes from time. Nielson hit a fierce shot towards goal that flew straight at Cerny but was only parried by the Czech keeper who then had to extend himself to full stretch to keep out the mishit rebound from Thomas that seemed destined for the far bottom corner.

When Nielson reached the byline in this next attack and crossed the home side did get their second goal – but bizarrely it was Wassmer again, stealing in unmarked from the back in almost Stewart Wardley-like fashion to grab his second goal of the game. The former Hayes and Yeading man could easily have had a hat trick from centre half as it transpired.

Three minutes of time added on at the end of the game seemed a little officious for a pre-season friendly, and the otherwise excellent referee seemed to agree because after only a minute and a half of it he blew for full time.

So what have we learnt? Well possibly nothing we didn’t already know. Gorkss should not be sold to Southampton in my opinion because he was the best of the four centre halves on show here and it will only be a matter of time before he’s needed if Danny Gabbidon and Fitz Hall are to start as first choice this season. I give it about half an hour of the Bolton game before a reserve centre back is summoned from the bench and hopefully that won’t be Perone, because while Warnock still seems undecided I’ve seen nothing yet to suggest he’s any use to a Premiership team at all.

Vaagan Moen when given the ball to feet can pass it with a vision and accuracy far better than anybody else we have at our club apart from Faurlin and Taarabt, but his tepidness when not in possession is a real issue. Matthew Connolly seems to be re-finding his form and confidence, but you can’t play with a right footed left back for too long in my opinion. Heidar Helguson looked good, Tommy Smith and Hogan Ephraim were a little bit too anonymous for my liking.

Michael Doughty, the new messiah? We should know, we’ve followed a few.

The two big winners on the night were Cook and Doughty. Warnock confirmed afterwards that even though he’d played well, Cook will be moving on as soon as possible. That makes this game a shop window exercise for the former Watford man and any visiting scouts will probably be reporting back favourably - certainly more favourably than they would have done from the St Albans game. Doughty seems to very much be part of the plans, and having seen so many promising youngsters come through our ranks only to stagnate at age 17 or 18 in recent years it’s important that the club gets its next move with him absolutely right.

In the meantime, Luton away on Friday. Which should be just lovely.

Crawley Town: Shearer 5, Howell 7(Davies 46, 6), Wassmer 7, Dempster 6 (McFadzean 46, 6), Akpan 6, Torres 7 (Neilson 46, 8), Thomas 7, Simpson 6 (Trialist 46, 6), Smith 6 (Trialist 46, 6), Wilson 6, Akinde 5

Subs: Kuipers, Tubbs, Bulman, Barnett, Napper

Goals: Wassmer (58, 88)

QPR: Murphy 6 (Cerny 46, 6), Orr 6, Gorkss 7 (Ramage 46, 6), Perone 6 (Shittu 46, 6), Connolly 7 (Harriman 80, -), Faurlin 6 (Cook 46, 7), Buzsaky 7, Vaagan Moen 6, Helguson 7 (Hewitt 70, 5), T. Smith 5 (Ageymang 46, 6), Ephraim 5 (Doughty 70, 8)

Goals: Gorkss 11 (assisted Buzsaky), Helguson 48 (assisted Cook) 67 (assisted Buzsaky/Vaagan Moen), Cook 80 (assisted Doughty)

QPR Star Man – Akos Buzsaky 7 Difficult to give a man of the match award to a player who has only been on the field for 70 minutes, although Doughty was clearly the main talking point among Rangers on the way back to the station. Of those on for longer Buzsaky probably looked the most accomplished, rarely giving the ball away and whipping in several really dangerous and impressive set pieces from wide areas.

Referee: Mr Rob Whitton 9 Nothing to referee really, as is often the case in pre-season, but still hardly put a foot wrong all night and it’s hard to recall a decision he got wrong.

Attendance: 1,415 (406 away) That’s the official figure, I felt there was more of a 50/50 split between the two sets of fans to be honest. A calm and serene atmosphere befitting the occasion, broken only by the Chelsea shirt incident. A clear case if ever there was one in support of the forced sterilisation of stupid people.

Full high res image gallery from last night courtesy of LFW snapper Neil Dejyothin can be viewed here.

Photo: Action Images via Reuters