"First of all, we have to thank the club and all the people that have worked to get the game on, because there's been a lot of work behind the scenes and it was so important to do that," said Jones.

"We thank the fans in terms of the things they have done to make sure that this club can survive. And we miss them. This place is...you say about sides that are really going to miss a crowd, and I think we are one of the top sides that are going to miss the crowd.

"There's Leeds and a full house, but the Kenny when it's rocking is unbelievable and we are going to miss our fans. The point is for them, who couldn't be here but we know they were watching. We are going to gather momentum and at the minute we are not at the levels we need to be because we've had three weeks work with them, and we are not miracle workers in terms of that.

"So we will build and that's a good point today. The fans have been brilliant for us in terms of every single week, and it's a shame they're not here because we miss that, we really do."

On the game itself, Jones reflected: “It’s a bit mixed really, I didn’t think we were anywhere near where we needed to be. Up until their goal I thought we were looked solid, defensively we were very good and they worked so hard, it’s just we lacked a little bit of fluency today.

“That’s maybe to be expected with obviously the lay off and only three weeks to work with them, but they’ve been excellent. To go down through a goal that is not a great goal to give away. You’ve got to deal with the first ball and then we’ve got to somehow deal with Sinclair a little bit more.

"Really, I felt we limited them to very little and I felt we felt we really finished strongly. I think if we had a full house at the Kenny, I think we might have gone on and nicked that.

“We said about the importance of game-changers. We always reiterate that whether we’ve been up, whether we had to chase a game or whether we’ve had to take a game away from a team in the past, we have always reiterated the importance having game-changers and in today’s environment even more so because of fitness levels and so on.

“We made subs at we felt the right time, could we have made them earlier? Maybe because the impact they had was superb and I was really pleased for Macca because he’s been so bright. Bree very good going forward so we were pleased with the impact they gave because there wasn’t much in the game.

"Preston are a well-drilled, experienced side that have been together for a long time, so I was pleased. It really is unfair to say we could have nicked it, but we finished stronger and that was the thing I was pleased with.”