KEITH Andrews has urged the Wanderers players to do a spot of soul searching during the international break.

The Irish international does not blame those being critical of the Whites’ recent performances and admits he’d be hurling abuse too if he was in the stands.

But the midfielder is confident the rot has not set in permanently, so long as the dressing room take collective responsibility for the poor start to the campaign.

“You can understand the frustration,” he said. “We are all grown men and we need to stand up and be counted.

“The fans are entitled to their opinion and if I was one of them, I wouldn’t be overly enamoured with what I was watching.

“I thought we were second best in a lot of areas and, in the main, didn’t perform anywhere near as well as we can.

“There will be an inquest into why we performed like we did and that should be led by the manager.

“But any player worth his salt should be doing the exact same. We need to look in the mirror as individuals and then collectively we need to get in and sort this out because we’re not where we need to be at the moment.”

An Achilles problem means that Andrews will not be linking up with the Republic squad for their World Cup qualifier in Kazakhstan this week, but several Wanderers players will be jetting off on international duty, leaving Owen Coyle potentially with just two full days to prepare a team for the next home game, against Watford, on Saturday week.

The Scot came under vocal fire from his own fans at the KC Stadium but Andrews feels the players also have to stand up and take their share of the blame.

“The manager bears the brunt because he picks the team and sends us out there but we all need to look in the mirror individually,” he said. “Not many people came out of the game knowing they had done what they had been asked to.

“It’s not just down to the manager, we’re all in this together.”

With Wanderers just a point above the bottom three in the Championship and with one win in their first five in league and cup, it is safe to say this was not the situation Andrews thought he would be stepping into when he signed after the summer’s Euros.

“I didn’t expect to be in this situation but I’m also not scared of a fight either,” he said.

“I knew it wasn’t going to be too easy because the three relegated clubs are seen as scalps.

“We need to stand up and be counted now because it’s about the characters we have in the dressing room. I keep harping on about it, but we need to do the ugly side of the game.

“If we can match teams for hard work then I believe we’ll win games at a canter.”