“Not good enough” – Kenny McLean issues brutally honest Norwich City claim following QPR defeat.
Norwich City midfielder Kenny McLean didn’t hold back disapproval of his side’s performance in their 3-0 defeat to Queens Park Rangers on Saturday.
The R’s continued their recent upturn in form with a commanding victory over the Canaries, in a result which has seen Marti Cifuentes’ side elevate themselves out of the relegation zone.
And after a poor showing in west London, McLean came out and publicly criticized his team’s performance, saying that what Norwich showed on the pitch at Loftus Road “wasn’t anywhere near good enough.”
Norwich City performance v QPR panned by Canaries midfielder Kenny McLean
Kenny McLean
Speaking to The Pink Un after the game, an angry McLean didn’t hold back his thoughts on the defeat.
The Canaries captain said: “The performance wasn’t anywhere near good enough, we did nothing to give ourselves an opportunity in the match. We played into QPR’s hands, and they did the job.
“I don’t know what we expected from a place like this. I think we expected to turn up and go and play the way we do at home sometimes with people giving us time on the ball. That’s not the case.
“It’s a tough place to come, and it’s like we thought we could do what we wanted at times, but we got punished. It’s not good enough, really. It’s sloppy goals that we continue to concede. We were so far off it in every department.”
The rather brutal assessment from the Scotland international comes after two back-to-back victories over Plymouth and Luton – where the Norfolk outfit scored 10 goals – had built optimism over a play-off push.
However, Saturday’s heavy defeat to a club that have struggled to string together wins in 2024-25 has brought that hope crashing back down.
Norwich City must avoid trying to rely on Borja Sainz’s individual brilliance.
borja sainz
The frustration of McLean was clearly directed at a deeper problem.
The 32-year-old was left disappointed at two of QPR’s goals, which came from individual errors, and cited a reliance on individual quality going forward as the main factors that let his side down.
“We continue to rely on individual quality to win us games. We need to give ourselves the chance to win games,” McLean added.
“We never seem to win a game 1-0; we need to work so hard to score goals, and then we give away such cheap ones.
“It’s disappointing because we can play all the nice football that we want at Carrow Road, but as soon as we come away and things are a bit uncomfortable – we don’t handle it well enough.
“That’s what we need to change. We need to find the answers, and we need to stand up to a fight because teams are going to come after us. Tuesday is going to be no different. We need to find the answers because that was nowhere near good enough.”
It would be a fair assumption that the comments were in reference to Broja Sainz, who has scored 15 league goals for the Canaries so far this season.
The Spaniard was unable to have an impact on the game yesterday, ultimately leaving Norwich with no outlet for goals, and with Josh Sargent sidelined as well through injury, there are a lack of real attacking talents in Johannes Hoff Thorup’s squad that can really turn a game on its head.
Summer signing Ante Crnac is doing his best to show some consistency in that department, having had his best game yet against Luton Town last weekend when hitting the back of the net twice, but the Polish youngster can’t be relied upon just yet to be a constant game-changer.
Norwich will look to rectify their latest setback on Tuesday evening when they head to Fratton Park to face Portsmouth, and only time will tell as to whether McLean’s words will encourage his team-mates or have no effect at all.
