2GS The Sunday Times April 3, 2022 7Aleksander Mitrovic scored his 36th
and 37th league goals of his record-
breaking season as the leaders
Fulham enjoyed a 2-0 win away at
Queens Park Rangers (Peter Wilson
writes). The Serb tapped in early on
to give the away side the lead, and
then converted a late penalty after
Lee Wallace had handled.
It was QPR’s fifth defeat in six
matches and seventh in ten, putting
more pressure on their manager,
Mark Warburton after his side’s
slide out of the play-off places.
Fulham remain eight points clear
of Bournemouth, who came from
behind to beat Bristol City 3-2.
Robert Atkinson’s first goal, a
header, for Bristol City gave them a
fourth-minute lead. But the hostsdrew level just before half-time
when Dominic Solanke scored from
close range. Lewis Cook put them in
front just after the break, with Siriki
Dembele hitting the third. Andreas
Weimann pulled a late goal back.
Swansea City won 4-0 away to
Cardiff City to become the first side
to do the double in the 110 years ofP W D L F A Pts
Fulham 38 24 8 6 92 32 80
Bournemouth 37 21 9 7 62 33 72
Huddersfield 40 18 12 10 52 43 66
Luton 39 18 10 11 58 44 64
Middlesbrough 38 18 8 12 52 40 62
Blackburn 40 17 11 12 51 41 62
Nottm Forest 37 17 10 10 57 36 61
Sheff Utd 39 17 10 12 52 41 61
QPR 39 17 8 14 54 50 59
Millwall 39 15 13 11 41 38 58
Coventry 39 15 11 13 51 48 56
West Brom 38 14 12 12 42 36 54
Stoke 39 14 10 15 49 44 52
Blackpool 38 14 10 14 43 45 52
Preston 39 12 15 12 40 45 51
Swansea 38 14 9 15 45 52 51
Cardiff 39 13 7 19 45 60 46
Bristol City 40 12 8 20 51 72 44
Birmingham 39 10 12 17 42 58 42
Hull 40 11 8 21 33 45 41
@Reading 39 11 7 21 45 74 34
Barnsley 39 6 11 22 29 55 29
*Derby 40 12 13 15 39 45 28
Peterborough 39 6 8 25 32 80 26
* deducted 21pts for breaching financial rules
and for going into administration
@ deducted 6pts for breaching financial rulesFulham’s Mitrovic scores twice to put Warburton under pressure
run to eight matches with a 4-1 win
away to Blackpool. Philip
Zinckernagel opened the scoring
before Johnson struck twice. Sam
Surridge hit the fourth, with Callum
Connelly replying late for the hosts.
John Egan’s late own goal helped
Stoke City to beat Sheffield United
1-0, while Reading’s Josh Laurent
scored a late equaliser in the 1-1
draw away to Barnsley. Carlton
Morris scored the early opener.
Blackburn Rovers finally scored
away from home after seven blank
games, but they conceded late to
draw 2-2 against Coventry City.
Viktor Gyokeres headed the
equaliser in the ninth minute of
stoppage time. Harry Pickering’s
ninth-minute own goal had put the
Coventry in front. Substitute
Bradley Dack ended the away goal
famine before Scott Wharton
headed Blackburn in front.this fixture. Michael Obafemi hit
two, with Ben Cabango and Hannes
Wolf helping to make history.
Middlesbrough won 4-0 away to
Peterborough United to move into
the top six. Marcus Tavernier fired
them in front before Folarin
Balogun added to the three goals he
scored for England Under-21s
during the international break.
Substitutes Josh Coburn and
Duncan Watmore finished off Posh,
who slumped to bottom spot.
Derby County moved off the
basement position thanks to Ravel
Morrison’s goal in the 1-0 defeat of
Preston, who had Liam Lindsay
sent off in the first half. He was
followed by Derby’s Max Bird in the
55th minute. Brennan Johnson
scored twice as Nottingham Forest
continued to make a convincing
case for the play-offs as they
extended their unbeaten leagueMitrovic has scored 37 goalsCHAMPIONSHIP ROUND-UP
SKY BET CHAMPIONSHIP
I
t has not been often in the past
three decades that a Manchester
United team could host their
end-of-season party before
Easter but Ralf Rangnick may
now have entered such territory
after seeing his side drop two
points only hours after declaring
there was “no margin for error” left
in their bid to qualify for the
Champions League.
Even in the past two seasons,
relatively unproductive ones by
United’s standards, they have faced
Leicester City late in the campaign
with both sides competing for the top
four and Champions League football.
This time, the game looked exactly
what it was — a meeting between the
Premier League’s sixth-placed team
and the one in tenth, although for
most of it, Leicester looked like the
former and United the latter.
Yes, Rangnick was without
Cristiano Ronaldo because of “flu-like
symptoms,” and Edinson Cavani but
the malaise afflicting United was
summed up by his decision still not to
find a place for Marcus Rashford,
Rangnick citing his lack of confidence
as the reason.
Indeed, there was only one moral
victory here, and that belonged to
Brendan Rodgers’s team, who have
the consolation of a Europa
Conference League quarter-final with
PSV Eindhoven to look forward to.
For Rangnick, apart from over-
seeing a handover to his successor,
the interim manager’s only
remaining task may well be to ensure
that this team avoid the ignominy of
recording the lowest points total in
their Premier League history —
currently the 64 amassed by United
under David Moyes in the first season
after Sir Alex Ferguson’s retirement.
They were fortunate to collect
even a single one here, after James
Maddison had a 79th-minute effort
ruled out for a foul by Kelechi
Iheanacho on Raphaël Varane, as he
muscled and finessed his way
through the home defence. But itMANCHESTER UNITED
Fred 66 1
LEICESTER CITY
Iheanacho 63 1Iheanacho heads
in Leicester’s
opener at Old
TraffordIan WhittellWhatever those decisions are, they
will not have to be made with any
bearing on the Champions League,
based on this latest setback, one that
might have been even worse.
Scott McTominay, for example,
could count himself fortunate to see
only yellow, rather than red, for a
mid-air flying hack at the ankle of
Maddison after 49 minutes, a
decision that was followed by VAR
and Andre Marriner ruling out a
potential Leicester winner.
“I was disappointed with the goal,”
said Rodgers. “Varane used his
experience, got a touch and went
over. The disappointment for me is
that didn’t lead directly to the goal.
“We had a similar decision [to
McTominay’s] earlier at West Ham,
Ayoze Pérez went in committed. This
could very easily have been a red too,
that’s the inconsistency.”
Rodgers, at least, saw his team
enjoy the better of a game in which
they scored first on 63 minutes, after
United cleared a Leicester corner but
twice were weak in possession and
lost the ball around halfway.
The visitors countered, Maddison
delivered an exquisite cross and
Iheanacho stopped, bravely and
skilfully, to convert a diving header.
The poor defending in that was
duplicated by Leicester minutes later
as Kasper Schmeichel’s poor
clearance was returned by Varane,
Fred skilfully set up Bruno Fernandes
for a shot, which the Leicester
goalkeeper parried back to the
waiting Brazilian, who converted.
There might have been more for
Leicester, with a terrible Jadon
Sancho back-pass playing in
Iheanacho, who scooped over from
six yards, and Wesley Fofana, so
impressive despite suffering from the
physical effects of fasting in
Ramadan, producing a header that
was well saved by David de Gea.Star man James Maddison (Leicester City).
Manchester United (4-2-3-1): D de Gea 7 — D
Dalot 6, R Varane 6, H Maguire 6, L Shaw 5 (A
Telles 45min, 5) — Fred 8, S McTominay 6 (M
Rashford 54, 6) — J Sancho 6, P Pogba 6 (N Matic
74), A Elanga 6 — B Fernandes 7. Booked Shaw,
McTominay.
Leicester City (4-2-3-1): K Schmeichel 6 — J Justin
6, J Evans 6 (D Amartey 65, 6), W Fofana 7, T
Castagne 6 — Y Tielemans 7, N Mendy 6 (H
Choudhury 90) — J Maddison 9, K Dewsbury-Hall
7, H Barnes 7 — K Iheanacho 7 (P Daka 90).
Booked Fofana, Tielemans
Referee A Marriner. Attendance 73,444.took a 66th-minute equaliser from
Fred, just after Iheanacho had
handed the visitors a deserved lead,
to rescue even that point.
“I’m not the kind of manager who
is trying to look for excuses,”
Rangnick said. “But also, it’s an
unusual situation: the middle of the
season, 2½ weeks without a game,
players on international duty, coming
back on Wednesday and Thursday,
some with jet lag. And we were
missing Cristiano. So we just have to
admit this was a fair result and it
doesn’t help at all to look at the table
and speculate what might happen.
“Right now, we’re not favourites,
for sure, but we still have eight
games. Then it will be time to draw
conclusions and take the decisions.”RACE FOR
FOURTH PLACEARSENAL
P28
PTS 54
TomorrowCrystal P (a)
Apr 9Brighton (h)
Apr 16Southampton (a)
Apr 20Chelsea (a)
Apr 23Man Utd (h)
May 1West Ham (a)
May 7Leeds Utd (h)
May 15Newcastle (a)
May 22Everton (h)
TBATottenham (a)TOTTENHAM
P29
PTS 51
TodayNewcastle (h)
Apr 9Aston Villa (a)
Apr 16Brighton (h)
Apr 23Brentford (a)
Apr 30Leicester (h)
May 7Liverpool (a)
May 15Burnley (h)
May 22Norwich (a)
TBAArsenal (h)MANCHESTER UTD
P30
PTS^51
Apr 9Everton (a)
Apr 16Norwich City (h)
Apr 19Liverpool (a)
Apr 23Arsenal (a)
May 2Brentford (h)
May 7Brighton (a)
May 15Chelsea (h)
May 22Crystal P (a)WOLVES
P31
PTS^49
Apr 8Newcastle (a)
Apr 24Burnley (a)
Apr 30Brighton (h)
May 7Chelsea (a)
May 15Norwich City (h)
May 22Liverpool (a)
TBAMan City (h)VAR to the
rescue for
wasteful
United
WEST HAM UTD
P30
PTS^48
TodayEverton (h)
Apr 10Brentford (a)
Apr 17Burnley (h)
Apr 24Chelsea (a)
May 1Arsenal (h)
May 7Norwich (a)
May 15Man City (h)
May 22Brighton (a)SIMON STACPOOLE