By Will Castle

Marti Cifuentes has lamented QPR’s dire start to the new season after suffering their third defeat on the trot going into the October international break.

Rangers capitulated to a 2-0 defeat at the hands of Championship new boys Derby County on Saturday, conceding two second-half goals from Curtis Nelson and Marcus Harness in the space of two minutes.

The result leaves QPR straddling in the relegation zone with just seven points from nine games.

Cifuentes failed to hide his disappointment at Pride Park, insisting that work will need to be done over the next two weeks to whip his side into shape.

“It was a really bad first half - then we conceded two goals in quick succession,” Cifuentes told the club’s official website. “It’s not been good enough so far.

“When things are not going well, it’s very easy to point fingers. But the most important thing is how we react. 

“Now we have an international break which is going to be tough for us, because we know we have two weeks of feeling bad about how we’ve done this week - in terms of results and performances.

“It’s a time we need to use properly to look at what is missing and what we are failing at currently.

“We have to make sure that we come back stronger, because it’s very disappointing - not only for the players and staff who are working hard, but also for the supporters.”

Having overturned a six-point deficit at the foot of the table to stave off relegation last term, the Spaniard has taken responsibility to turn things around once again.

“It’s my job to try to fix that,” he added. “Last season, we were in a similar situation at the beginning and managed to turn things around. We’re disappointed to start in this way.

“But I’ve been in these situations before in my career and I will work my best to make sure we get out of this situation.

“Today we saw two teams with totally different styles and we need to be much better at what we do.

“We’ve signed a profile of player to play a certain style of football and we need to be better at playing it - when games get more physical, we need to be better at getting the ball on the ground and finding solutions.

“We need to play the football that we want to.”