CHAMPIONSHIP JITTERS
Monday 14th April 2008
by Ron Norris

The under 18’s were hit with a case of championship jitters on Saturday as they slipped to a 2-1 defeat at struggling Southend United. Despite the loss the lads are still well placed to secure the title in the remaining fixtures.  

Southend are milling around at the wrong end of the table but have enjoyed something of a renaissance of late, they were unbeaten in four going into this one and have now stretched their good form to five games.  

Rangers never took charge of this one and were always chasing the game. The Shrimpers took the lead three minutes into the second half when David Obaze knocked home from a good flick on.  

Danny Maguire scored his first goal of an injury ravaged campaign to level things up, hammering home off the underside of the bar to make it one each. However Southend hit back with a last minute sucker punch through James Lindie’s header.  

There are still technically three teams who can win this division, Orient are in fourth and can catch our points total if we lose both our remaining games however they would have to overhaul our massive goal difference of plus twenty five which effectively rules them out. Luton in third are out of it having played a game more than us which really only leaves Gillingham as title rivals and they play Peterborough on Saturday.  

That said The Gills are totally reliant on us slipping up, we travel to face bottom side Brentford this weekend and a win there will be enough to be crowned champions once again.  

QPR: Crowther, Coyne, Ford, Brown, Ilesanmi, Morgan-Cummings, O’Brien, Maguire, Arthur, Fernandez, German. Subs not used: Goodchild, Wright, Smith, Harris, Sutherland.