ZAT KNIGHT has warned Wanderers that they must “get serious” if they are to reverse their slump to the bottom of the Premier League pile.

Five defeats out of six mean Owen Coyle’s side prop up the table heading into October and a meeting with Chelsea at the Reebok on Sunday.

Knight admits the run has hit confidence in the camp hard, but the defender has also called into question the attitude displayed since the 4-0 victory over QPR on the opening day of the season.

“The last few weeks have been very frustrating,” he told The Bolton News. “Take away the Carling Cup performance and it has been very hard to motivate each other.

“We're at the bottom because we haven't done well enough in the last five games and something has to change.

“Everyone has to be a bit more competitive and take things a bit more seriously. Individually, we need to inherit more responsibility because when you look back at some of the goals we have conceded, it's been a case of slack defending or someone's runner has gone off them. That's the difference.

“We need to get back to being difficult to beat. When you don't win, you don't lose.”

Knight took some solace from Wanderers’ resolute first-half display against Arsenal last weekend and has called for more of the same against Chelsea.

Defeat could cut the Whites adrift ahead of the international break, and as such, the big defender reckons the team must leave nothing behind against the West Londoners.

“You have to try and concentrate on the positives, and against Arsenal, that was the first half defending,” he said.

“If we can do that against Chelsea at home then maybe we get something out of the game. But it's another big ask. It's one of those games where we have to go all or nothing. We haven't got a game for two weeks. Some of the lads will be out on international duty, others will be resting up.

“We need to go out all guns blazing because we need the points more than anyone else at the moment.”

Owen Coyle has pledged to make changes in an effort to stop the slide, and has also abandoned his favoured 4-4-2 formation in the last two games.

His plan worked well in the Carling Cup win at Aston Villa but struggled after David Ngog was taken off with concussion at the Emirates.

Knight admits the squad are still coming to terms with the change in shape.

“The last two times we have played five in midfield and looked strong defensively but sometimes it's the other side, going forward,” he said. “In the whole game we created two chances, one half-chance and then Chris Eagles on the counter attack.

“It's definitely not good enough on the attacking side but while we did reasonably well in the first half, we got punished defensively in the second and the sending off killed us as well.

“But it's football and we have to lift ourselves up. We're still only six games into the season.

“I just hope we pick some points up from somewhere because when it comes to Christmas, which is only a few months away, you definitely don't want to be down there.”