Late Portsmouth Goal Downs Struggling Middlesbrough

In a dramatic turn of events, Portsmouth secured a crucial victory with a goal in the seventh minute of stoppage time, giving their Championship survival hopes a significant boost. This win also dealt a major blow to Middlesbrough's fading automatic promotion bid. The visitors, Middlesbrough, failed to have a shot on target until the final seconds of the game, when Andre Dozzell's volley deflected in off Conor Chaplin, ending an eight-game winless run for John Mousinho's side. Boro is now winless in six games and trails second-placed Ipswich by three points, with Ipswich having two games in hand after Kieran McKenna's side won at Norwich earlier in the day. Portsmouth's win keeps them a point and a place above the relegation zone. Despite having 20 shots compared to Portsmouth's three, Boro has only scored four goals in their last six games, with two of those coming in a draw at Swansea on Monday. The home side started strongly, with Alan Browne forcing a good early save from Nicolas Schmid after being set up by Jeremy Sarmiento. From the resulting corner, centre-back Adilson Malanda had a shot deflected onto the roof of the net. For all Boro dominated the ball in the opening 45 minutes, they struggled to create meaningful openings, with Browne's effort being the home side's only attempt on target until Dael Fry's close-range header was saved by Schmid in the last minute of the first half. Boro could have opened the scoring two minutes into the second half when David Strelec split the Portsmouth defence with a through-ball, but Schmid denied Riley McGree with his feet. Middlesbrough then had a glorious chance to break the deadlock when Tommy Conway robbed Regan Poole of possession midway inside the Portsmouth half, sparking a two-on-one home attack. Rather than shoot, Conway opted to try and tee up strike partner Strelec, but his pass was intercepted by Madiodio Dia, the only covering defender, and Poole then recovered to block the rebound from McGree. Conway again chose to pass rather than shoot when he had another opportunity soon after, and this time his attempted through-ball for McGree bounced off defender Jordan Williams and rolled agonisingly wide of Schmid's left post. Portsmouth launched a rare attack at the midway stage of the second half, and Terry Devlin picked out Colby Bishop, but the striker's audacious flick went wide. Boro very nearly forced a breakthrough in added time, but half-time substitute Sontje Hansen saw his shot cleared off the line by Dozzell. Portsmouth then won a corner at the other end, and Fry's headed clearance only reached Dozzell, whose first-time strike deflected in off his teammate. Middlesbrough's Kim Hellberg expressed his disappointment and devastation at the performance, stating that the first half was 'terrible' and 'like watching paint dry.' He acknowledged that the team created enough chances in the second half but were not efficient enough to score. Hellberg criticized the team's energy and performance, calling it 'boring' and 'lazy.' Portsmouth's John Mousinho described the result as 'amazing' and emphasized the importance of picking up points at this stage of the season. He acknowledged that Middlesbrough is a good team and that Portsmouth had to defend for long stages and get through some difficult moments. Mousinho admitted that his team got lucky, which is something they haven't had this season, especially when they're at the bottom of the table.