Queens Park Rangers vs Crystal Palace

hoops
QUEENS PARK RANGERS 6
CRYSTAL PALACE 0
SUNDAY 9TH MAY 1999
NATIONWIDE LEAGUE DIVISION ONE
A MEMORABLE hat-trick by Chris Kiwomya
helped QPR avoid relegation on the final day of
the 1998/99 season. Our other scorers were
George Kulcsar, Tony Scully and Tim Breacker.
There was intense pressure on Rangers, but we
mastered the nerve-jangling occasion in some
style by romping to a 6-0 victory.
Kiwomya recalled: “(Manager) Gerry Francis tried
to keep everyone calm in the dressing room
beforehand. His team talk got us fired up and gave
us a lot of confidence.
“Gerry said to make sure we didn’t concede a
goal early on as that would make the supporters
edgy. He stressed that the most important thing
was to keep a clean sheet and then our strikers
could do the rest.
“When we ran out on to the pitch, the atmosphere
was absolutely electric, like an FA Cup final. The
R’s fans were really brilliant – they had turned out
in their thousands and were like a 12th man for us
with a capacity crowd present.
“Fortunately we got an early goal by George
Kulcsar. He had never scored before so we knew it
had to be our day. We went on to hit Palace for six
and I was really pleased with my hat-trick.
“It was great to see all those happy faces of our
supporters when the final whistle sounded and we
had stayed up!”
RANGERS: Miklosko, Breacker, Baraclough,
Kulcsar, Linighan, Maddix, Scully, Peacock,
Rowland (Gallen 86), Slade, Kiwomya (Murray 86).
Sub not used: Plummer.
Attendance: 18,498
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