Mark Warburton reveals what QPR lacked in Stoke City loss | OneFootball

Queens Park Rangers manager Mark Warburton has admitted his side lacked the quality in attack to go on and take all three points from yesterday’s game as they fell to a 2-0 loss to Stoke City, speaking post-match to West London Sport.

The R’s had scored in each one of their opening 20 league matches of the 2021/22 campaign coming into this game, establishing themselves as a real threat going forward but failing to make their dominance of possession pay yesterday as they were undone by two moments of quality from the visitors.

Though they had the chance to level the game through a spot-kick just after the hour mark, having gone behind early on through Tyrese Campbell, Charlie Austin failed to get on the scoresheet as he had his effort saved by Adam Davies.

Quiz: Has Charlie Austin ever scored a goal for QPR at each of these 26 stadiums?

This was a theme of the afternoon, with the Welsh international shot-stopper putting in a stunning display to deny the hosts on a number of occasions, though they will have been disappointed to have given the ex-Barnsley goalkeeper a chance with some of their efforts.

Conceding just two goals in their last five fixtures, Warburton’s men also endured an uncharacteristically bad day at the office defensively with the west London outfit’s defence switching off for both of the away side’s goals.

But the 59-year-old cited their lack of guile in attack as a key reason why they were unable to win a point or three from the game, criticising aspects of their second-half performance as they failed to utilise their home advantage.

He said: “I think you saw us try to force it in the second half. Don’t force it – we’ve got enough quality to keep moving the ball.

“In the first half we were moving the ball well – and when you move the ball well the opposing team is working constantly.

“When you shift them, so many times they make a mistake and you can capitalise on it. That’s what good teams do, but we stopped doing it.

“I just felt today that in the final third we lacked that little bit of real guile to go and win the game.”

It wasn’t to be for QPR yesterday, but that shouldn’t discourage them because as Warburton alluded to in his post-match interview with Sky Sports, fine margins decided that game on the day with Stoke taking their chances.

The visitors have to be commended for doing that and because they were clinical, they were the deserved winners in the end.

However, it wasn’t the worst performance from the home side and they still showed enough intent going forward for alarm bells to remain unsounded.

When Lyndon Dykes finally returns, he will be another key asset going forward and the fact they have managed to cope reasonably well without him until yesterday is a promising sign of things to come.

But now they need to focus on their next task as they travel to Sheffield United next weekend. The Blades conceded twice against Cardiff City on Saturday, giving the R’s real hope of grabbing a goal or two at Bramall Lane.

However, they can only get something out of this game if they can tighten up in defence, because the South Yorkshire outfit look much more threatening going forward under new boss Paul Heckingbottom.

This needs to be the London-based side’s focus going into their next game, even though they did lack the quality in the final third needed to get on the scoresheet yesterday.