Marti Cifuentes was quick to praise Scott Twine for his "excellent" free-kick during Bristol City's draw with QPR at Ashton Gate on Saturday afternoon.

The attacking midfielder broke the deadlock as the two sides played out a 1-1 draw in BS3 at the weekend, finding the top left corner with his first touch having been introduced from the bench by Liam Manning only seconds earlier.

Although the former Burnley man's goal looked like it would be the first of many for the Robins, Rangers quickly hit back to level things up as Paul Smyth beat Max O'Leary to a loose ball on the halfway line before lofting into the empty net from some 40 yards out.

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Manning's side had other chances to claim all three points, the best of which fell to Nahki Wells and Anis Mehmeti, but a lack of cutting edge in the final third came back to bite the Reds and not for the first time this term.

While Cifuentes' was pleased with how his side defended against City, he did appear to be impressed by Twine's immediate impact off of the bench.

"Today the performance, I would say the last 20 minutes were perhaps better, but the way Bristol dominated the game, the way they started the game I cannot be just blinded because today we got a point," admitted the QPR manager.

"As I say, I'm very, very extremely proud about the guys, about the way they work, the way they commit. Despite an excellent goal on a set piece, in open play, we didn't concede. It says a lot about our mentality, the reality is that football is so ruthless that we need to keep improving and hopefully everyone in the club understands that now we look at the table and look at the result and everybody might think everything's going to be fine, Marti is fantastic, no. We need help, we need to keep improving and we're going to have again a bad trend. Hopefully, not as bad as it was at the beginning of the season because there were a lot of things, injuries and so on, but we need to keep improving as a club."

Having returned to Ashton Gate permanently this summer after spending the second half of last season on loan in the West Country, Twine has now managed to score three goals in just 12 Championship appearances this term, including two in his last two matches.

Although injuries and illness has stopped the 25-year-old from putting together a consistent run of matches since early October, the Robins will be hoping the attacking midfielder can play a big part as they look to get back to winning ways over the busy festive period.

Manning himself was left in awe of Twine's "outstanding" free-kick and after the full-time whistle, the Reds head coach admitted that his return to the scoresheet and matchday squad could only be a good thing for his side over the coming weeks.

"We always were going to do it, but we obviously rushed it forward just because that’s the quality he’s got in those areas," explained the 39-year-old in his post-match press conference. "It’s a moment of outstanding quality.

"We've got depth, good to have Ross [McCrorie] back, good to have Twiney back, and George Tanner is close. We're going to need the bodies and ultimately people are going to have to step up because now what we've got is options to change it."

City and Twine will next be in action when the Robins make the trip to The Hawthorns on Sunday to face Carlos Corberan and West Brom as the Reds look to secure a first win in four games before Christmas.

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