The Coningham Arms, Shepherds Bush, W12

This is a spacious street corner boozer with a bit of an Irish pub feel to it, although there was none of the usual stereotypical tat on display to explicitly confirm this. Inside, there’s a single, long bare boarded room with the servery down the left-hand side and a bunch of randomly scattered seating elsewhere. The bar has a cool counter with a decorative arch motif on its front, let down by a rather plain, grey bar back fronting a blue wall. Two large screens above the bar were showing a horse racing channel whilst a large drop-down screen to one side remained unused. Seating comes almost exclusively in the form of basic tables and chairs, mainly down the right-hand wall, but with others dotted around in a seemingly random manner. Plenty of folk were also sat at stools along the bar, but these had been sensibly spaced out so as to not impede access. Elsewhere, a projector screen to the front left was showing live football with no sound, whilst another TV could be found above the attractive entrance porch, showing a different racing channel. Traditional features were few and far between, but I did note leaded windows down two sides of the room, albeit rather uninteresting ones. The room has a grey and cream colour scheme, which is as dull as it sounds, and has been enlivened only by a few promotional posters detailing upcoming events and the like. The slightly detached rear part of the room is dominated by a pool table, with trophy shelves above and a juke box to one side. Loud country music was playing throughout much of my visit, although some of the punters were loud enough to drown it out at times. Just the one handpull in operation, dispensing the ubiquitous Sharps Doom Bar, but I couldn’t face any of that, so took a pint of Guinness instead for £4.10. The very friendly barman explained that card payments can only be made for orders of £5 or more, but thankfully I had some cash on me, so all was well. This is one of several down-to-earth local’s boozers out in this part of town and I felt quite favourably towards it despite it not really offering all that much beyond a vague sense of community. This won’t win over the traditionalist, the ale drinker or the foodies, but it still serves its purpose, and I was glad to spend a little time here.

I dropped in here on a desperately hot 30c summer day, and although there was a handpump with a Doom Bar clip I opted for a half of the Birra Moretti (£2.50 a half) instead just to sure of getting something drinkable. There was a mixture of fixed bench seating and normal tables and chairs, and with a pool table and dartboard down at the far end. There was some of the usual grey paintwork, but enough blue and white to satisfy the local footy supporters. It’s clearly a locals’ pub, and hasn’t changed much since the previous reviewer’s visit earlier in the year.

Exterior painted green now.Clean and tidy but very basic interior.Absolute lager drinkers paradise but no cask.Sky sports obviously