Gozie Ugwu?s first-half strike was enough for Raith Rovers to crawl over the line against a Queens side who, admittedly, played with energy and urgency throughout the second half.
There was just one change to the Queens side from the team that drew with Inverness, with goal scorer Aidan Fitzpatrick coming into the side for Isaiah Jones, who dropped to the bench. Nortei Nortey was back on the bench in the place of Stephen Dobbie, who dropped out of the squad after picking up an injury on Sunday in training.
Rovers were without Lewis Vaughan, Kieron MacDonald and Jamie Gullan. Frankie Musonda switched to left-back while Ugwu was used next to Danny Armstrong up front.
The game got underway in scrappy fashion, typical for a play-off ?six pointer? at this stage of the season.
Indeed, it took 15 minutes for the games first shot on target, a speculative effort from Regan Hendry from 30-yards that found its way into the safe hands of Ferguson.
It was a warning of things to come in the opening period from Rovers. John McGlynn had his side well drilled and left Queens no space in behind their defence whatsoever, an area the South are so good at exploiting.
17 minutes were on the clock when the away side did take the lead though, in somewhat fortunate circumstances. Reghan Tumilty got a fortunate deflection on the ball that allowed him to hit the right hand byline and deliver a wicked low cross into the area. Despite Gregor Buchanan?s best efforts to block his man, Gozie Ugwu got infront of the centre-half and fired home from close range.
Ugwu nets the winner
That was really as good as it got for the visitors who, despite eye catching performances throughout the season, didn?t create much in the way of clear cut chances for the remaining 70 minutes.
Wullie Gibson delivered a sublime ball into Dapo Mebude after 21 minutes only for the Rangers loanee to fire his volley well over the bar.
Rohan Ferguson was forced into making a good save, again from Ugwu, after the striker powerfully shot from the right hand side of the box.
HT: Queens 0-1 Raith
A quiet first-half all things considered, but both sides had chances. Rovers were the better team, keeping the ball with ease and passing at will.
The second-45 was a different story however as a rejuvenated Queens side had clearly had their half time oranges and came out searching for an equaliser.
Ciaran Dickson saw a volley from 10-yards crash into the wrong side of the net after 55 minutes, before four minutes later Ayo Obileye skied a glorious chance.
Obileye cant believe his missed opportunity
A Buchanan header was nodded down to the nine-goal-midfielder, but Obileye scooped his volley well over from three yards.
Queens struggled to keep the ball after this. Mistakes from attempting to pass the ball out from the back were causing issues, although apart from that Rovers? attacking threat was virtually non-existent.
The next good chance fell the way of Obileye again after 81 minutes. After a myriad of shots in the Rovers box were blocked, Obileye had a clear effort from 12 yards to the left of the goal, but he sliced his shot well wide.
FT: Queens 0-1 Raith
Oh, what could have been.
Queens had chances, the better of them too, but were unable to capitalise on any. A month ago those Obileye shots would have undoubtedly went in but tonight wasn?t his, nor Queens?, night.
Play-offs may look like a far-fetched dream now, but three wins from three final games could well see Queens with an outside chance of promotion to the top flight yet.
Finlay Jack