Mark Hughes made his fair share of mistakes while in charge of QPR but he made one key decision to give the Hoops some breathing space at the bottom of the Premier League when Swansea City came to west London in April 2012.

Three days before the Swans visited Loftus Road, which they will do again on New Year’s Day, Rangers had travelled north to take on the mighty Manchester United as the battle to beat the drop approached its conclusion.

Hughes made the tough call to leave Joey Barton out of the side that lost 2-0 to the Red Devils to avoid the fiery midfielder picking up a costly suspension that would have seen him miss key matches in the ensuing relegation battle.

Memories: Joey Barton celebrates against Swansea

Barton was back against Swansea and he returned with a bang, wearing the armband with passion and pride and putting in an inspirational shift, the skipper led by example to help his side earn a valuable three points.

He opened the scoring in this 3-0 victory with a fine finish before the since-departed pair of Jamie Mackie and Akos Buzsaky added the gloss on a fine evening’s work that gave QPR a two-point cushion above the trapdoor.

Hughes said: “It’s a period of big games, intense games, so the circumstances with Joey not being involved at the weekend were that we can’t afford to lose him for a number of games through suspension. The benefit of that was that he came in and was fresh.

Blast from the past: Jamie Mackie celebrates his goal with fans

“It’s difficult games at this time of the season. We’ve got to use our resources and make sure we keep the players fresh. I thought we saw that tonight and the boys were still flying at the final whistle.

“It was an important fixture for us. I thought we were excellent from start to finish today. Swansea are a side who play in a certain way and you have to have a game-plan to play against them and negate their threat. The players have to go out there and perform.”

QPR went on to survive despite slumping to a dramatic 3-2 final-day defeat which handed the title to Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium and will go down in competition’s history as one of the most incredible afternoon’s of football.

Mark Hughes
Former boss: Mark Hughes

Hughes had grown increasingly confident that if Rangers could win their final two home games, which they duly did by beating Spurs and Stoke, they would stay up. However, he didn’t know how many points were needed after the Swans result.

Hughes added: “We’ve just got to take care of our own business. If we play like we did tonight we’ll take points. How many points are needed to stay up? It’s difficult to call that at this moment in time.

"Certainly, if we play like we did this evening I’m convinced we’ll be fine. I sense they have a real understanding of what’s required.”

Support: Queens Park Rangers fans

The answer was in fact that 37 points were needed to escape relegation.

QPR finished with that total to send Bolton, Blackburn and Wolves tumbling into the Championship as the season drew to a close.

Follow all the build-up, matchday action and post-game reaction from QPR v Swansea City here on GetWestLondon.