18’s Hit Five At Lesser Hampden

 Queen’s Park 1 Rangers 5

Rangers Under 18’s recorded another league win, this time over Queens Park at Lesser Hampden tonight. The game had been brought forward, which Rangers were happy to do despite several players unavailable through injury and international call ups.

The home side were first to threaten with an attack into the right side of Rangers penalty area with Jay Hogarth standing up to block the shot with his leg. On the quarter hour mark Queens attacked again, this time into the left side of the box with Jay Hogarth turning the ball behind at his near post.

Within a minute Rangers took the lead, Nathan Young-Coombes broke from his own half to deep inside the right side of the penalty area where he went down under a challenge. The referee allowed play to continue put the linesman indicated a penalty with Ciaran Dickson converting the rather soft award. A few minutes later the ball broke for Ciaran Dickson which allowed him to break into the left side of the box with keeper Evan Collumbine getting a touch to divert the ball over.

With the half-hour mark approaching Alex Lowry won possession and released Ciaran Dickson inside the left side of the box but he shot across goal and wide of the far post. The next attack came for the home side which took them to the right hand byline and when the ball was cutback the shot was straight at Jay Hogarth.

Queens had an another chance a minute later, a ball over the top of Rangers defence allowed Reece McGuire to break into the right side of the box and Jay Hogarth was forced to tip the shot wide of his right hand post. Seven minutes before the break Rangers doubled their lead with a fine goal, Alex Lowry passed to Aaron Lyall wide of the right and he picked out Ciaran Dickson inside the box and he shot high past the keeper.

Half-Time:- Queens Park 0 Rangers 2

Ten minutes into the second half Queens Park switched play from left to right and when they broke into the box the referee pointed to the spot for the second soft award of the game. Gregor Nicol sent Jay Hogarth the wrong way from the spot. Rangers immediately restored their two goal lead, the attack came down the left and when Evan Collumbine parried the cross it went straight to Matty Yates who fired into the net from around ten yards.

With twenty-five minutes remaining Queens put together a fine move and Jay Hogarth made a decent save from the right wing cross. The Rangers keeper was called into action again with the game entering the final ten minutes, saving a twenty-five yard strike low to his left.

Rangers added further goals in the final couple of minutes, a superb first time pass from Dire Mebude allowed Alex Lowry to break from halfway, he fed Matty Yates on his left and he continued into the box to shoot past the keeper. The last action saw a Connor Allan pass to Alex Lowry and he sent Matty Yates clear to go on and shoot past the keeper and complete his hat-trick.

Full-Time:-Queens Park 1 Rangers 5

Queens Park:- Evan Collumbine, Mark McQude, Kai O’Neill, Euan Rodger, Aiden McDonald, Drew Marshall, Andy Caffrey, Alex Bannon, Reece McGuire, Callum Biggar (Dylan Kerr 68 mins), Gregor Nicol.

Subs:- Adam Fernie, Alfie Robinson, Ben Kerr, Matthew McConnechy, Sean Coyle.

Rangers:- Jay Hogarth; Ryan Muir (Harley Ewan 80 mins), Adam Devine, Harris O’Connor, Matthew Henderson (McKenzie Strachan 77 mins); Umaro Balde, Ciaran Dickson (Connor Allan 86 mins); Aaron Lyall (Dire Mebude 62 mins), Matty Yates, Alex Lowry; Nathan Young-Coombes (Robbie Fraser 62 mins).

Not Used:- Lewis Budinauckas (Gk), Kelsey Ewan