North Queensland Fury has ­overcome off-field dramas to keep its slim finals hopes alive after defeating Newcastle Jets 2-1 at Dairy Farmers Stadium last night.

A rescheduled game due to bad weather conditions saw just a small crowd of 4156 watch a deadlock created by goals from the Jets’ Matthew Thompson and the Fury’s Chris Grossman, only to be broken by Chris Tadrosse’s strike in the 80th minute.

The Fury’s finals hopes depend on it winning its next two games with other results having to go their way, while it is still possible for Newcastle to miss out despite being four points clear of seventh-placed Brisbane.

The Jets took full advantage of the first real chance of the game in the 18th minute when a corner from Jin Hyung Song was passed into the penalty area and poor Fury defence gave the ball to Jets captain Thompson who promptly delivered the visitors a 1-0 lead.

They looked for their second shortly after with a through ball from Song finding Thompson who got an accurate cross away to Jobe Wheelhouse whose shot was desperately saved by a foot deflection from Fury goalkeeper Justin Pasfield.

North Queensland found the equaliser in the 38th minute with a long ball from Matthew Smith rebounding off Dyron Daal’s chest and finding Chris Grossman who managed to get a powerful shot into the back of the net.

A foul from Newcastle’s Tarek Elrich on Paul Kohler just outside the penalty box gave the Fury the opportunity to get ahead but substitute Terry Cookes’ shot drifted over the crossbar in the 68th minute.

The deadlock was broken 10 minutes from fulltime when a long cross from Cooke was brilliantly volleyed into the back of the goal by Tadrosse to give North Queensland the three points.

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