Michael Beale lavished praise on his QPR side after a hard-fought 0-0 draw away to fellow promotion chasers Norwich City.

The Super Hoops stayed two points above their hosts after Wednesday night’s draw and will now turn their attention to home games against West Bromwich Albion and Huddersfield Town, the Championship’s bottom two sides.

For Beale, their performance in the Carrow Road clash was as good as any in recent weeks.

“I am absolutely delighted with that performance, that effort, that energy,” said the R’s boss. 

“That looked a lot more like us and on another day we might take one or two of our chances and win the game, but it is also fair to say Seny (Dieng) did well.

“I thought we looked good and let’s not forget how many players we had missing from the squad.

“We came here a little bit wounded from Birmingham on Friday night in terms of players missing but I thought we were excellent throughout. 

“There were one or two bits where we could have shown more belief but we will grow. We are a young team coming together – new manager, young players. I think we will be delighted with that point come later in the season. It could be a big point for us.”

The visitors could have moved to second place with victory but Beale certainly saw it as one point gained as opposed to two dropped.

Chris Willock struck the upright when introduced as a second-half substitute and Lyndon Dykes had Angus Gunn at full stretch to deny his close-range header.

Rather than focusing on his team’s profligacy, Beale chose to celebrate their defensive discipline.

“I thought defensively our shape was really good,” he said. “In the last couple of away games we had a lot of the ball and maybe we took our eye off it in terms of our out-of-possession pressing but we had that.

“I thought our centre-backs (Leon Balogun and Rob Dickie) were excellent – that is our fourth centre-half pairing of the season and we are very, very lucky at QPR to have four top centre-halves and I think we have seen that already.”

The result leaves QPR fourth in the table after 18 fixtures, and Beale said: “When you look at the league table, we have played all of the top nine teams away from home apart from Burnley. 

“So the fixture list has not been too kind to us, we have gone to some tough away grounds but if we can put in performances like we did here we shouldn’t worry about playing anybody.”

Beale’s boys have just three fixtures to play ahead of the World Cup in Qatar, with a mouth-watering trip to Coventry, who currently sit third, coming after the two winnable home matches.

But Beale is taking nothing for granted and has called upon his team to maintain focus.

“We mustn’t drop our standards,” he said.  

“We mustn’t lose that fight, that togetherness, that grit. It’s a special group and there is a special feeling. It is important we keep enhancing and moving on. 

“If we give everything then we can expect a lot.”