Paul Clement admits he may have got his team selection wrong as Reading lost 1-0 to QPR at Madejski Stadium.
Following Saturday’s 2-2 draw at Brentford, Clement brought Sone Aluko and Liam Kelly in for Yakou Meite and John Swift, but had to make another late switch, restoring Meite to the side after Jon Dadi Bodvarsson was injured in the warm-up.
Toni Leistner scored the only goal of the night, bundling home from a corner in the second half.
The Royals struggled to create chances throughout with Yakou Meite hitting the post late on in the only real opening.
And Clement was far from impressed with the overall display.
On the defeat…
I’m not happy with the performance. Even if we’d nicked a draw at the end with the one that was off the post and another close one, I still would’ve been disappointed with the way that we played. We started off the season poorly and then we’ve made some improvements. At the moment we’re a team that’s gone from being not very good with our start to making a forward step, then a backward step, then a forward step, then a backward step. Now we’ve got to make the next progression with this team and find consistency, especially at home.
Our home form is dreadful. Five losses out of six is not good. Away from home we’re battling away. I think maybe we’re more concentrated away from home because you know it’s so tough and you’ve got to get the fight right and you’ve got to get the tactics right. Today we were caught between in a lot of situations. The shape of the team was not right and then we got caught between going and pressing the ball and being compact and it wasn’t a good situation.
On Jon Dadi Bodvarsson’s absence…
I don’t think the reason we played poorly was because we didn’t have Jon Dadi. He has been doing well. It’s not an ideal situation that you’ve got to make a change during the warm-up, but we did it swiftly, we had another player to bring onto the bench. We are always ready for those kind of situations but I thought in general the first half was flat. It was a poor game, not a good standard. We looked tired. That’s not an excuse. I tried to freshen it up a little bit because we had players cramping up in the heat the other day at Brentford. I didn’t think it was wise to go with the same 11 based on that fact but I did think we looked leggy tonight.
On the three second half penalty calls…
I thought the third one was a good shout for a penalty. I haven’t seen any back on replay. I thought the third one was. Just from looking real time.
On the referee’s performance…
I thought he made a lot of mistakes. So, not very good.
On if he will talk to him after the game…
I think I’m allowed to go in half an hour afterwards but I generally tend not to bother, unless I’ve got steam coming out of my ears. In my career as a manager I’ve only ever been in once and I can’t see a lot of point. But it will be reflected in our report that we have to put in.
On if he could’ve made more changes to the team…
I’m disappointed, I think I could’ve chosen a better line-up. I still believe it was right to make some changes, particularly with Saturday-Tuesday. People that were here that were at the game the other day, we saw the players cramping up and some had to come off and some were almost carried off. So I think I was right to do that, whether I got the changes right or not is another matter.
On Bodvarsson’s injury…
He’ll probably have a scan but he hurt his calf in the warm-up. It’s a suggestion of fatigue and you don’t know sometimes who’s really the most tired and who’s at risk of injury and who’s not.
On Meite playing up front…
I thought Yak did alright in pre-season in that position. He is a multi-position player and he does have versatility. I thought he battled away. He tried his heart out all night, it just didn’t quite come off for him and obviously it hasn’t quite come off for the team.
On the goal QPR scored…
Very frustrating. Up until the corner at Brentford, since I’ve been here we haven’t conceded from a corner. We’ve conceded that one on 92 which cost us all three points, but at least we got someone close to the first ball in the last game against Brentford. On that one it’s difficult to understand. The ball’s gone in there and there’s just no-one within five metres of the player who has flicked it on. Then it’s in a really dangerous area and I know it rattled around for a little while but it was that first ball that we never dealt with.
On how to prevent goals like that in future…
We do practice the situations and I think that’s why we’ve been so good at them. At that point, whether that’s a question of concentration or fatigue, but it has to be executed better because ultimately it’s cost us the game.
On Meite’s chances late on…
QPR are not in great form themselves and their confidence is not that high so once they get that goal they’ve got really something to fight for and they sit off a little bit more and you get more of the ball and more time and more space and you can throw more bodies forward and I thought that’s what happened. When we went behind we looked at our most dangerous in the game. Maybe we could’ve ended up with a draw but I still felt overall our performance wasn’t very good.
On if players would rather not play at home at the moment…
No I don’t think so because I think the fans here in general are being patient. I’ve been at other clubs where your fans can be ferocious when the team are not playing well and they’re not seeing what they want. I think the fans here are being supportive. Of course they’re disappointed and understandably so but I also think they are being patient with the players. I don’t think the fans are giving the players a hard time.
On if not being concentrated enough for home games is down to him or the players…
It’s a big responsibility of mine to prepare the team home or away whatever the challenge. I think as a team we’re doing better away from home, at home we’re not, so we’ve got to find some solutions. I’m the first one that has to look at that and then hopefully the players can follow my lead.
On how soon into the game he thought the players were feeling the affects of Saturday…
I thought we were too stretched. We were too open. It was that situation where you get caught between them playing it out from the back, do we want them to have the ball comfortably at the back, should we go and press and then all of a sudden you get stretched back to front, you’re not quite getting there and winning the ball back high. Then they’re playing balls through you and Saeid’s got 20 metres of space either side of him and it was counter attack after counter attack after counter attack, set play, set play, set play. I think we didn’t make it difficult enough for them in the first half.
