A “frustrated and angry” Mark Robins felt Coventry were their own worst enemies after succumbing to a 2-0 Championship defeat at Preston.
Daniel Johnson and Sean Maguire scored in each half as the Sky Blues’ winless run in the league stretched to four matches.
But that barely scratched the surface of the game for Robins, who felt the better team on the night lost at Deepdale.
“I feel frustrated and angry but there is a part of me that thinks we played some really good stuff and we’ve given the game away so we’ve got to stop giving goals away like we’ve done tonight,” he said.
“We haven’t been like that for a long time and tonight we were on top in the game.
“We created a load of chances but looked like we wanted to try and score a perfect goal.
“We’ve opened them up a number of times. They couldn’t live with us, we’ve played some good stuff and gave them their goal, which gave them a foothold in it.
“We kept going. Then we gave another poor goal away from a foul on the outside, Jamie Allen’s foul. The ball comes in and we haven’t defended it properly.
“It’s a strange one because we should have won that game, it shouldn’t have even been a draw.”
Maguire’s early enterprise paid off as he won the ball and played in Johnson to open the scoring within 20 minutes.
But home goalkeeper Declan Rudd remained busy with Gustavo Hamer among those to squander opportunities.
And the visitors were made to pay when Maguire deservedly scored, poking home following a set-piece scramble.
Preston move back into the top half with three wins on the bounce but manager Alex Neil was still after more.
“It was pleasing. I think we’ve still not really hit top form as well in terms of how we can play,” he said.
“What we did do that we have been talking about is to keep more clean sheets. We’ve been conceding too many goals and I think the last three performances have been particularly strong.
“We looked more solid at the back, we conceded less opportunities and we defended well. I think for me I was frustrated in the first half.
“There are very few teams that come here and control the ball. We set up the same way as Coventry but they just did it better than us in the first half.
“To be honest, I didn’t really feel we were going to lose the game at any point.
“I thought defensively we were solid and once the second goal went in they had to chase it and went two up top and that helped us even more.”
