Alan Reynolds says Bohemians need to stand up and show their mettle when they make the short trip to Tolka Park for a Dublin derby against Shelbourne on Monday night.
Bohs come into the game on the back of two defeats in a row, away to Derry City nine days ago and at home to Dundalk on Friday.
Having taken the lead in both games, Bohs have also come in for criticism for failing to build on their early advantage only to end up empty-handed.
Their hosts tomorrow come into the game in a different mood – their four defeats in a row in April a distant memory now as Joey O’Brien’s side look to extend their unbeaten run to nine games.
Reynolds said: “We have to worry about our own form and our own performances and not worry about anyone else’s. We want to go to Tolka Park and win but we’re under no illusions how much better we have than we have been over the past two games to be able to do that.
“We’ve started well in our last couple of games and ended up with nothing from either of them. That’s on us. We haven’t been good enough and we got what we deserved from both games.
“It has not been good enough from us to be taking the lead in games and then to throw it all away. We have to work harder in games, when we have the ball and when we don’t, if we are to improve our form.
“We’ve had good performances where we’ve dropped points this season and I’ll defend the group and our performances when that happens but our performances in the past two games, particularly in the second half of both of them, have not been good enough.
“We started well on Friday – we spoke all week about Dundalk’s work ethic and how they would press us, and how we would have to match that but we got the perfect start with a great header from Cian Byrne to put us ahead.
“Dundalk had a decent spell in the middle of the first half and got the equaliser but overall it was an even enough half but we have to be better than what we were, and take more of the chances we create.
“In the second half, they simply out-worked us and that’s simply not good enough from us. We didn’t defend either of Dundalk’s goals well enough – we didn’t defend as a group, we didn’t have enough men around the ball, and we were too slow to close them down.
“We have a good group, talented players and some great characters in there but we have to be better than that. People have questioned our character and the only way to answer that is to go out now and show our mettle and show what we are capable of.
“We have to take that criticism on the chin. Nobody in the group is feeling sorry for themselves – we all want to put it right. That means we need our experienced players to lead and we need our younger players to not let their heads drop either.
“There can’t be any passengers. We all need to lift each other and push ourselves on, both the players themselves and us as a management team. We need everyone, including myself, to stand up now, and let’s dig in, dig deep, to get this right.”
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