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Managerless Southampton ended their losing run with a 2-1 victory at QPR in their first match since the sacking of Will Still.
Teenager Jay Robinson’s deflected strike put the visitors, who had under-21s coach Tonda Eckert in interim charge, ahead early in the second half and Léo Scienza’s brilliant goal doubled their lead. Rumarn Burrell pulled a goal back but Rangers were unable to find an equaliser, slumping to a third consecutive defeat.
Southampton had lost their previous three matches, with Saturday’s home defeat by Preston resulting in Still losing his job, and were without a win in five.
Thierry Small’s sensational early strike set the tone as Preston moved up to fourth after beating Swansea 2-1 at Deepdale.
The 21-year-old let fly with an eighth-minute arrow from 30 yards to open the scoring and Milutin Osmajic got the decisive strike with a somewhat scruffier second after 49 minutes, his fourth goal of the season but his first since 23 August.
Eom Ji-Sung came off the bench to halve the arrears with a curling strike from range with 10 minutes of regular time to go but Preston held on for victory.
Barry Bannan’s early goal was not enough to give Sheffield Wednesday a morale-boosting win as the basement club were held at home by Norwich.
The club captain Bannan fired Wednesday in front after four minutes and the score stayed the same until just after the hour mark when Mathias Kvistgaarden equalised from Josh Sargent’s pass. The draw ended a run of six consecutive league defeats for the Canaries, who remain in the relegation zone ahead of both the Sheffield clubs.
Arthur Okonkwo made two superb second-half saves to earn Wrexham a point in a 0-0 draw at goal-shy Portsmouth.
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Pompey are the lowest goalscorers in the Championship but had 18 shots on the Welsh side’s goal, seven of which were on target. Josh Murphy’s near-post stinger and Ibane Bowat’s point-blank header were brilliantly saved by Okonkwo.
It meant Portsmouth have still only scored 10 times in the league this season and have just a single win in nine, with Wrexham losing only once in nine league outings to sit 14th.
