Watford head coach Javi Gracia was pleased to see his side take part in a close game against Queens Park Rangers on Saturday, as the Hornets picked up a 1-0 victory at Loftus Road.

In a scrappy encounter, Watford came out on top after Etienne Capoue's deflected shot divided the sides and Gracia said he wanted to see his team tested before they start their Premier League campaign.

"QPR played really well, in my opinion not too physically," said the head coach.

"Tactically and technically it’s a good team and we knew it and for that reason we wanted to play against them because we knew it would be demanding for us.

"It’s a good moment to compete against good teams. We don’t want to play against teams to win 7-0 or 10-0. We would prefer to compete well and to detect our defects and try to improve for the next games."

Gracia admitted his side is still lacking a bit of match fitness at the moment, but hopes that come the opening day of the season, they will be ready.

The Spaniard took comfort from knowing that his players are all in fairly good condition, despite having to rest some key figures for the first of two pre-season friendlies to be played in England.

"In this moment our main target is to try to accumulate minutes," he said.

"To compete against I think all of them good teams and to compete with players in good condition, no injuries and after that, we need to improve many things.

"At the moment, the players feel a little bit tired but it’s normal. Now is the moment to have those feelings and after I’m sure we’ll be better.

"There are some little problems, all of them, little. Chalobah, Holebas, Gerard (Deulofeu) are players today we preferred to rest, but in a couple of days maybe all of them will be ready. In this moment, we prefer to be cautious with them.

"I think we need more time to be better and the next two weeks will be important for us to train, but at the same time rest. We need to rest a little bit and I think we will be ready soon."

One player who has been available to play throughout pre-season is new signing Craig Dawson, who Gracia feels is already helping the team to improve.

Looking ahead to the new Premier League season, the head coach is looking to build on the last campaign's successes, while not planning too far into the future.

"From the first day he’s (Dawson) a very good professional and is always focused on the way to help the team," said Gracia.

"I think it’s very good news for us to have Craig with us.

"Always, always, I think our mentality is to improve. But after that we will see the results.

"There are many different circumstances that arise during the season and in this moment I prefer to be only focused on the first game, on Brighton and try to do like we did in the last season, try to get the three points in play.

"In this moment, our target is to try to win the first game and after, the second game and this way, with this mentality always is the best because when you look very very far, it’s not good.

"I prefer to not see what other teams are spending, I prefer to not speak about money, I prefer to speak about what we did last season, what we were able to do last season and the challenge I think is with ourselves is to try to be again very demanding, try to do our best and we’ll see. We’ll see."