‘One of those days’ – Marti Cifuentes left frustrated by QPR’s goalless draw with 10-man Plymouth

QPR boss Marti Cifuentes was disappointed with his side’s first-half display in their 0-0 draw against a Plymouth Argyle side that played with 10 men for more than an hour at Loftus Road on Wednesday.

Rangers missed the chance to extend their three-match winning run and move out of the Championship relegation zone.

Despite Plymouth’s Dan Scarr being sent off after 25 minutes for a wild challenge on Ilias Chair, QPR only sporadically threatened the visitors’ goal.

“Today is one of those days,” Cifuentes said. “I told the players this would not be an easy game.

“Sometimes when a team starts a good trend, like we have in the last three games, someone can expect that playing against a team that is close to you in the table will be easier. I was saying to the guys that this would not be an easy game.

“The start of the game was very poor. The first 15 minutes were perhaps the worst 15 minutes since I’ve been here.

“We were terrible… conceded a lot of turnovers.. [there were] a lot of chances for them. So, in that sense we could say that we were lucky to be 0-0 at half-time because it was not a good first half.

“In the second half we pushed much more. Plymouth defended very well in a low block, [it was] very difficult to really create clear chances.

“We got the situations [to score] but not as clear as we should. We missed that quality that we have had in other games.

“We still got a point. The guys were really disappointed about only getting one point today, which is a good signal, but at the same time when we look back it has not been a good performance.

“From the beginning of the game we did not have the flow, the team did not have the confidence of other games.

“The best teams can win when the flow is not there, I think good teams can manage to not lose a game like this.

“Credit to the players but this proves it will not be an easy journey. We need to work a lot and improve a lot.”