'Still fuming now' - What Ryan Lowe said straight after Preston North End's loss to QPR

Preston North End manager Ryan Lowe was bitterly disappointed in his team as they lost 1-0 to Queens Park Rangers.

Lyndon Dykes scored the only goal of the game, 20 minutes into Saturday evening’s meeting at Loftus Road. North End had missed a golden opportunity, through Liam Millar, moments earlier and Dykes then pounced on a Freddie Woodman error - to strike the eventual winner. It was PNE’s third straight defeat in the Championship and Lowe pulled no punches in his post-match verdict.

He said: “Not good enough, first and foremost. Nowhere near the levels. I am disappointed. I know it is a mistake for the goal, but we’ve got to do better all-round. I have just said to the group in there, that I didn’t recognise that as a Preston North End team. That was a Preston North End team of old - the reason I got brought into the football club, because that was that. And I didn’t like any of it. It’s back to the drawing board, with two games to go. I don’t want the season to fizzle out - we have done fantastically well to get to 63 points.

“We felt today was a game we could compete in and win. We competed, to an extent but the quality on show from both teams wasn’t great. I expect my team to be better. We started okay - Liam Millar had a good chance and it was a bit of a basketball game. Once they got the goal, their tails were up and they started piling a bit of pressure on. We didn’t recover really in terms of getting the ball down and having a calmness. We got in at half-time and I said more than a few words. We just didn’t do enough, with or without the ball.

“We didn’t sustain attacks, we didn’t look after the ball - there were ifs-and-buts moments, but that wasn’t a performance I felt could win a game of football. We cannot now let the season peter out. They were expected to take a few extra days this week, but we will be back at the training ground, working hard. We’ve got to nail down and get back to being us, because we’ve got this far and we were nowhere near today. I have never questioned the attitude and application of my players, and I’m not. I am just questioning one or two things we need to be better at.

“Just don’t think that it’s alright, because we’ve got 63 points and there are two games to go. No, it is not alright and we need to be better. I am on the side and I was telling Freddie to get his head up - I thought he was fine. When you make a mistake like that, it’s always easy to keep throwing the ball down your throat and he dealt with that well, I thought. It was just the overall play. We were in tight areas and we didn’t get out quick enough and get it to the other side. We gave sloppy passes away and caused our own problems really, didn’t we?

“I think the last 12 minutes, we had a bit of a foothold and put pressure on. But, they are fighting for their lives - it’s too late. In the first half, we got into good areas and tried to play a killer pass, instead of keeping going. There were loads of things I was frustrated with; the reaction (to going behind) - that is down to the players on the pitch, to be a little bit better. If you take the mistake out of it, does it end up being 0-0? I don’t know, but yeah, I’m just disappointed overall.”

On whether ‘not liking’ the performance was because it reminded him of last season’s poor finish to the season, Lowe said: “Yeah, it did. I didn’t like it at all; I am still fuming over it now. That is the old Preston; that is not us. The lads know that, they have just spoken in there - Robbie and Browney, key leaders who will say it how it is. I can only say what I see and I don’t want to be too harsh on my players, because they’ve been brilliant. But, this might be a bit of a reality check in that we’ve got 63 points - but we want more. We have got to work hard to get more. We cannot just turn up and expect to win. You’ve got to stick to the plan and do the cra--y bits like they did, to get a result.”