QPR boss Beale: Compliments have made us weaker – my players didn’t heed our set-piece warnings

QPR boss Mick Beale feels that recent praise for his team has taken away some of their edge after they lost 2-1 at Huddersfield Town on Tuesday night.

Lyndon Dykes fired the R’s into an early lead on the road.

But Josh Ruffels scored twice before the half-hour mark as the rock bottom Terriers collected maximum points.

“We didn’t have the mentality to degend the set plays,” Beale told the club’s official media channel. “We spoke all week about this game being about set-plays. We knew they went away to Luton and scored a couple, maybe even three, off them. We knew set-plays and counter-attacks would be important.

“We put it in big bold letters in the meeting and spoke about respecting the set-plays. If we don’t then what we are is a team that has let five of our last six goals in from set-plays. We won’t get where we want defending like that.

“We’ve got to get back to putting our bodies on the line for each other. Their keeper made two or three big saves and defenders were heading off the line, making blocks and crashing into each other – it looks a bit like us at Sheffield United, but how many weeks ago was that? Do all the wins make us softer or do they make us stronger, more confident and more hungry?

“In the last few games we have got to make our own luck. We can’t keep saying the ball drops to them or there is a richochet. We have to make that our moment and be more decisive.

“Us as a young group and me as a young manager need to prove more at this level. Compliments have made us weaker and that is not a mentality I want my team to have.”