Mark Warburton conceded his Queens Park Rangers team were not at their best but found a way to win by beating Coventry 2-1 at the Coventry Building Society Arena.
Albert Adomah headed home QPR’s winner in the 88th minute after Jordan Shipley’s thunderbolt levelled things for the Sky Blues after the break.
Andre Gray had opened the scoring for the visiting side inside six minutes, but they had David Marshall to thank multiple times as they weathered the Coventry storm throughout the afternoon.
“We lacked energy and intensity about our play today,” said Warburton.
“You can talk all you like about formations and tactics, but the simple fact is we lost too many duels and didn’t get tight to our opponent, but take nothing away from the players, they found a way.
“The players deserve a lot of credit but let’s be honest, we’ve been on the other end of that, played outstandingly well and come away with nothing.”
“Mark (Robins) and his team will come away feeling very hard done-by but that’s football, that is the Championship, but the overriding factor is being way below our best, coming up against an opponent that played significantly better on the day and we’ve emerged with three points, which is the sign of a good team.
“You’ve got to come to these places when you’re not at your best and have to win those games or emerge with a point.
“I thought people like Sam Field were outstanding, some of the saves that David Marshall made and the fans were magnificent.”
The victory was QPR’s fourth consecutive 2-1 win on their travels taking the Hoops two points away from the coveted top two with a game in hand.
Warburton added: “My son gets bored of me saying the same things but it’s one game at a time, our focus now has to be Swansea who will move it well and cause us problems, but we have to deliver a better performance in front of our fans.”
Sky Blues boss Mark Robins claimed that QPR ‘got away with one’ as Coventry failed to notch the winner during a game in which the hosts had 21 shots to QPR’s eight.
Robins said: “Got away with one, didn’t they?
“We’ve got to find a way to get a result against teams at the top of the table. We had good chances and loads of opportunities in the final third which we didn’t take apart from a brilliant goal from Jordan Shipley.
“We opened them up brilliantly, the lads have been fantastic, got to a really high level and even if we drew the game we’d be thinking how have we not won it? But to lose it, is a right kick in the teeth.
“We had enough chances to go on and score a second and maybe even a third, but they’ve got the likes of Austin, Dykes, Willock and Andre Gray.
“Their ability to go and sign players, we are a million miles away from it and the fact they can score goals out of nothing obviously helps in games like this if they’re under the cosh.
“We’ve got to dust ourselves down and get back at it on Tuesday.”
