MANAGER: No need for a knee jerk reaction

“It’s always important after a defeat not to have a knee jerk reaction,” he said. “I’m aware of what is in that changing room and we’ve had a reaction out of some of the players when we’ve asked for more. We need that again.

“I told the lads after the game that we will have some truth and honesty with each other on Monday, but I’m getting involved. 

“I’ll get my opportunity to tell the players exactly what I think of them. There are players I think can give us more and those who I think perhaps don’t work at their profession as much as they could. 

“We’ve got a well maintained training ground but I don’t see players out there working on their game enough. We’ll have to deal with whether or not players are more interested in their future career rather than what they have to work on now. That’s why they are in the bottom reaches of the second division, because sometimes they don’t do that extra work. 

“I want an ethic at this club where everyone knows how to improve and how to do their job. The last thing I say to the players when they take to the pitch is ‘do your job’ but we didn’t get anywhere near that at Dagenham.”

And on adding to the squad, he said: “That is always a work in progress. It may be that we have to evaluate what’s in the dressing room on a weekly basis because they tick the right boxes and give us the performances we’re after on occasions. 

“What we don’t have is the consistency in their performance to give us that every week at the moment. We have the friendly at Burnley on Tuesday and that will be another chance to look at some of our players and a few trialists who come along with us. Like I say, we don’t need any knee jerk reaction because we know the players here have good technical ability. We just need them to prove it for us every time they go onto the pitch.”