Roy Hodgson pleased to shore up Bristol City’s defence after second clean sheet

Roy Hodgson says he is pleased to have made Bristol City more solid after a goalless draw at QPR.

The Robins are unbeaten in three matches since former England manager Hodgson took interim charge and made it back-to-back clean sheets.

They had won just one of their previous nine matches, leading to the sacking of head coach Gerhard Struber.

But they defended well at Loftus Road and look well organised under the wily Hodgson.

“It’s a key priority in any team. When you come into a new club, one of the things you try to achieve is to get across that you’re not going to concede too many goals,” he said.

Bristol City looked the more threatening team and Rangers goalkeeper Joe Walsh denied Mark Sykes and Emil Riis.

Hodgson said: “I thought the teams cancelled each other out. They made it difficult for us to get behind them and get the ball to our front players, and we made it difficult for them.

“But I thought that we were a bit more adventurous in the second half and the chances that were there went our way.

“We could have scored a goal or two, but it was a fair result because neither team really did enough to win it.

“I wanted to see a bit more of what we showed in the second half. I wanted to see it played forward a bit more.

“But to be fair, we’ve had very few training sessions and little time for me to suggest things to them.”

QPR head coach Julien Stephan insisted there was no lack of effort on the part of his players, despite the game between two mid-table teams having a definite end-of-season feel to it.

“The season is not finished and I think, when you see the effort of the players today, they showed that it’s not finished for us in their mindset,” said Stephan.

“The players tried everything on the pitch, but sometimes you have less efficiency. But I don’t think the players could have this kind of effort on the pitch and keep the clean sheet if they felt the season was finished.”

Rangers are now unbeaten in five matches and were able to welcome back striker Rumarn Burrell, who came on as a second-half substitute.

Burrell made a big impact following his move from Burton last summer, scoring 10 goals before a hamstring injury sidelined him for more than three months.

“It was good to see Rumarn back,” Stephan said. “It’s important for him to rebuild his confidence now and his physicality.”

The Frenchman added: “I think the two teams were very well organised and it was a tight game. But it was not a bad game – it was just a tight game between two teams very close in terms of level.

“The positive side for us is to keep a clean sheet and five games unbeaten now – a very good run.

“We tried to find a solution but, to be fair, they defended very well, and when we had a couple of situations offensively, we missed them because the last pass was not good enough.”