Alex Neil makes brutally honest Stoke City admission ahead of Burnley clash | OneFootball

Stoke City boss Alex Neil admitted he questioned the effort of his players in their heavy defeat to Watford last time out, as he demands an improvement against Burnley.

The Scotsman has endured a mixed start to life at the Bet365 Stadium, with the undoubted low point coming as the Potters were hammered by the Hornets on their own patch.

Whilst there was a temptation to rip into the players for the way they performed, Neil explained how he offered more measured analysis to the squad, but he told Stoke-On-Trent Live that he felt they weren’t putting in enough towards the end.

“I’m not naïve not to recognise that the effort levels towards the end of the game were extremely disappointing and what I said to the lads is that what I can’t do and will not do is defend you for that. I said, ‘You need to be ready to fight to the last minute irrespective of the circumstances.’

“I think they are disappointed in themselves, I think I could see that in them. But what they want to do – and they’ve got an opportunity to do that now – is go out and put it right.”

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The verdict

The Stoke fans were rightly furious on Sunday and you can understand why, as the side weren’t good enough and, as Neil says, the effort levels weren’t where they should be.

So, it’s good that Neil hasn’t tried to hide away from that and the players will know that they can’t fall to that level again.

It will have also given the new boss a good idea of the scale of the job in front of him but his only focus now will be on getting a response against Burnley.