Fulham have survived a frantic Queens Park Rangers fightback in a spell of injury time which lasted nearly 10 minutes as the Cottagers ran out 2-1 winners in Friday night's Championship clash at Loftus Road.
The home side began brightly but the first chance of the game fell to the Cottagers in the fifth minute, with Liverpool loanee Sheyi Ojo getting in behind the QPR defence down the right-hand side, but his subsequent effort flew wide.
At the other end, Jake Bidwell's cross on seven minutes fell kindly for Idrissa Sylla, but the 26-year-old blazed his shot over the bar, although it would not have counted as he was in an offside position.
QPR enjoyed a bright spell thereafter, with Joel Lynch, Pawel Wszolek and Luke Freeman all weighing in with chances, but Fulham also came close when Stefan Johansen's effort on 17 minutes bundled into the side-netting.
With both sides playing attacking football, a goal appeared imminent one way or another, and in the 41st minute, the deadlock was broken courtesy of a QPR own goal.
Ryan Fredericks decided to have a shot from 25 yards out, and despite the effort lacking the required power, the ball took a big deflection off Jack Robinson and went beyond Alex Smithies, who had already began moving the opposite way.
Ian Holloway's night was set to go from bad to worse as Ojo fell awkwardly onto his left shoulder under a tackle from Lynch and had to be stretchered off with a suspected dislocated collarbone.
In terms of second-half action, Fulham overcame another bright QPR start to take hold of the game, winning a penalty in the 82nd minute when Lynch brought Neeskens Kebano down in the box.
Although Rui Fonte blasted his penalty high above the bar, the 27-year-old made up for his error two minutes later when he squared for Johansen to rifle home.
However, with the game seemingly all but settled, nine minutes of injury time were announced, and in the second of those, Matt Smith nodded a free kick down to Conor Washington, who fired into the net via a Fredericks deflection.
The remainder of the match saw QPR desperately try to find an equaliser, with Smithies going up from his goal and heading wide, while Tomas Kalas had to clear an effort off the line.
Ultimately there was to be no more drama as Fulham held out until the final whistle and celebrated three points which edged them closer to the playoffs.
Giuseppe Labellarte
