Marti Cifuentes urges QPR to ‘stay together’ after loss at Derby

Marti Cifuentes wants his QPR side to “stay together” after a 2-0 defeat against Derby at Pride Park left them winless in five Sky Bet Championship games.

Curtis Nelson headed in Nathaniel Mendez-Laing’s corner after 54 minutes before Marcus Harness swept a first-time effort into the top corner less than a minute later.

Cifuentes signed a new long-term deal to remain with QPR at the start of the week and the Spaniard remains confident his side will turn their poor form around as the season wares on.

Cifuentes said: “We didn’t defend the corner well (for the first goal) and we lose the ball immediately after the kick-off in a way that is difficult to understand but we need to accept that.

“It’s not a good performance; I need to help the players to perform at their best. I’m not here to point any fingers, mistakes are part of the game but we can play much better.

“There are some things we need to improve, I’m not happy, no manager in the world would be happy after three defeats (in a row) but there’s a lot of time to improve as a team.

“Now is a moment to stay together – as a club we made certain decisions in the summer in terms of the player profile, many signings arrived from other leagues, the club knew it could take time, it’s my job to make sure it works as soon as possible.

“We need to make sure we’re very clear on the things we must improve (during the international break), I’m very confident we’re going to improve.

“I understand the disappointment (from the fans); it’s right they’re angry at the moment because we lost in a bad performance.”

Derby snapped their three-game losing run to move back into the top half of the table as the Rams secured a fourth victory from five home matches at Pride Park this season.

Rams boss Paul Warne is happy with his side’s start to the campaign, following promotion from League One last season, but feels Derby could have taken more points from their opening nine matches.

Warne said: “I’m really pleased, we were really good box-to-box in the first half but in the box we were honking, we played a little bit too soft.

“In the second half we were better and created good chances and did enough to win, we were more aggressive on the press and a little bit more positive in the final third.

“We have to be at our very best to beat anybody in this league and at times we have been and still haven’t won, I’m really proud of the group, it’s a great group to manage.

“We’ve been unlucky on a couple of results, we could have had more points but we’ve played some really good teams, there’s a lot to be pleased about.

“Irrelevant of the scorelines, I judge it on the performance, 12 points from the opening gambit isn’t bad but we could have had more out of it, I’m not getting carried away, we’re just a little but unlucky here and there.”