Nathan Jones: Charlton lacked clinical touch in QPR stalemate

Charlton manager Nathan Jones felt the only thing lacking from his side was a clinical touch in Friday night’s goalless Championship draw against QPR at The Valley.

Rangers goalkeeper Joe Walsh kept his clean sheet intact with big stops from Luke Chambers, Conor Coady and Lyndon Dykes.

The Addicks made it successive shutouts as they moved four points clear of the bottom three.

QPR took 70 minutes to register their first shot on target but finished the closing stages strongly, Thomas Kaminski bravely raced off his line to shut down a chance for substitute Rayan Kolli.

Jones was left ruing that his Charlton side did not record back-to-back league wins for the first time since late October.

“For 90 minutes I was really, really pleased with the level of performance – for the last eight minutes we caused ourselves problems with turning the ball over and giving them opportunities to counter-attack,” said the Welshman.

“In the second half we had three chances and their keeper made three saves. A great save from Dykesy, a save from Luke Chambers and another one from Charlie Kelman.

“We’ve had some really good chances tonight. It’s just a shame that we didn’t have that bit of composure or quality to win the game.

“The Championship is the Championship. QPR are in good form and have a very experienced back four that know how to defend.

“Their keeper has had man of the match tonight – it shows we have done something right. We were the better side and looked the more dangerous.

“Apart from injury time, I didn’t really feel under any pressure. In injury time we have to manage the game better.

“We needed a bit more impact from the bench and to make better decisions in the final third.

“We really pinned them back in the first half.”

QPR were missing seven first-team players in south-east London including Ilias Chair and top goalscorer Rumarn Burrell.

This was a fourth draw in a seven-match winless spell on the road.

Rangers manager Julien Stephan said: “We were under pressure in the first half, not under pressure in the second half.

“In the second half we were dominant and finished the game very strongly physically and had the best chance in it.

“The first half we were too much in between with the first line of pressure and they used a lot of long balls.

“We lost the battle of the second ball in the first half but the players had a strong collective reaction after that. We fixed a couple of problems during the half-time (break).

“The keeper made a good save from the Rayan Kolli situation. We shot 18 times during the game, more than the opponent. Probably at the end we deserved more than the opponent.”