Dowie liking the smell of his dressing-room

QPR played without Matt Connolly for 65 minutes after the defender was sent off following two bookings for fouls - the second a crunching challenge on Matty Pattison.

But eight minutes after the dismissal, despair turned to delight for QPR as captain Mark Rowlands lashed home the winner with a low free-kick.

Manager Dowie said: "I like the smell of the dressing room here. There are some good characters in there, some good leaders, and I thought you saw a lot of characters out there against Norwich.

"Our response to going a man down was terrific. We got our goal and then defended superbly, while we could have easily have gone further ahead ourselves.

"It's not as if I had to talk about a lot of Radek Cerny's saves. We restricted them to very few clear chances. It's a very pleasing result, much more pleasing than Sunday when we won 4-1 against Southampton because this was a real backs-to-the-wall team effort."

The spirit the manager has encouraged among his players was epitomised by centre-back Damian Stewart, who played the whole game despite still suffering the effects of a head injury sustained in pre-match training.

Dowie admitted; "I went against the doctor's advice to play him, which worried me a little bit because Damian picked up a touch of concussion after a clash of heads. Rather than make a quick decision, I just sent him away to rest and fortunately when he got up in the morning he was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. I'm glad I went with my instinct because Damian was superb, as were all the back four."

The only sour note for Dowie was the dismissal of Connolly. He said: "I thought the second yellow was a little bit harsh because the player was falling over anyway. But what really annoyed me was hearing a cry of 'that's a red card' from the direction of the Norwich bench. That's not something I like to see - but let's not let it detract from an excellent result for us.

"This performance was all about desire, and we had plenty. We certainly felt we deserved that win because we harried and pressed, and our shape was excellent.

"Defensively I thought we were brilliant. Kaspars Gorkss came in and was terrific, I was delighted for him."