MARTI Cifuentes said his Queens Park Rangers side “lacked ideas” in the attacking third as they lost 1-0 away to Stoke City on Tuesday night.
QPR’S four-match unbeaten run was ended as the Potters edged it through Wouter Burger’s goal on 45 minutes.
Paul Smyth forced Stoke goalkeeper Daniel Iversen into a good save in the first half.
Hoops stopper Asmir Begovic kept out Michael Rose’s header and also denied Niall Ennis before he was beaten by Burger.
QPR didn’t have a shot on target in the second half and it was Steven Schumacher’s side who had the best opportunities to extend their lead. QPR are now six points behind Stoke.
The R’s missed the chance to close the four-point gap to relegation rivals Millwall, who were thumped 4-0 by Ipswich Town at The Den on Tuesday.
“It wasn’t a great game from our point of view,” Cifuentes said on QPR TV. “We had two good chances in the first half, but the reality is that we were one down at half-time.
“I’m not satisfied with our performance. Stoke tried to stay low in the second half, waiting for their chances during the rest of the game, and we lacked the ideas and quality in the final third in order to create big chances.
“It’s a game of small margins. We had a situation where we could have easily been awarded a free-kick, then the ball goes out for a [Stoke] corner which we should have done better from.
“It’s certainly not the result we wanted.
“Stoke played with five at the back in the end and it wasn’t easy to penetrate them.
“We got into a lot of situations in the final third, but we lacked that last touch or deliveries as good as they should have been.
“We need to recover quickly from this one. As I said, it’s not the result that we wanted, and we’re all naturally very disappointed.”
QPR face Bristol City at Ashton Gate on Saturday.
Cifuentes added: ”We have to learn and prepare for another very important game on Saturday.”
