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Very little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game on Thursday evening against the Texans.

Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a close defeat.

The quarterback took consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.

Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.

“We had a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “We did a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”

It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and hit four other times. The QB threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.

“When they hit our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to play and it’s not a good way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”

Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently during the game.

It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a few myself. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was going backwards.”

The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to top the Houston defense. His second one came when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.

Buffalo competed for a second straight game without wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.

“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” the coach said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”

Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.

Allen was frustrated that the team were unable to execute down the stretch.

In the end, we must execute, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”