ALAN Knill has called for strong characters to drag Bury out of their current slump in form.

The Shakers manager was furious that his side surrendered two sloppy goals in being defeated against Accrington Stanley on Saturday — the side’s fifth loss in eight games.

Knill believes his players have the ability to reverse their fortunes, but he has warned it will take an improvement on their recent showings.

“We have lost our last three league games now and that’s not good enough,” he said, ahead of Saturday’s visit of Cheltenham Town.

“We can’t accept what we saw on Saturday and I don’t think we competed as well as we could have.

“We have to learn how to see games out when we are not playing as well as we can. We should never lose games like we did on Saturday. We gave away two shocking goals.

“But it has to be a collective effort because we win and lose together. I’ve been there before as a player and a manager and you have to have strong characters to get through it.

“It’s not just one area that is letting us down and we have shown the lads where we think they are going wrong on a dvd. But we also let the players have their say and it has been constructive because we are all honest here. We all see what everyone else sees.

“The players have reacted well to what we have shown them and we have got to get back some form of consistency where we remain unbeaten if, for some reason, we cannot win.”

Bury have not even scored a goal in their four games at Gigg Lane this season and Knill accepts that confidence can become an issue, but he is a strong believer that the men who took his team to the verge of League One have not become bad players overnight.

“I suppose confidence can become an issue,” he added. “It takes strong characters and I know I have got players who are proven.

“I believe in them and they should believe in themselves. There has not been much change in personnel.

“We have asked them to be responsible for their performances.”

Bury will still be missing Danny Carlton, David Buchanan, Andy Morrell, Michael Jones, Danny Racchi and Damien Allen through injury for their weekend clash.