Gary Whild called upon his Harriers side to 'stand up and take responsibility' after they fell to a third defeat of the season at Newport County on Saturday.

A penalty brace from Craig Reid and a Robbie Matthews free-kick were enough to give County their first win at this level.

And bar a late charge and one early chance, Harriers never looked like taking the tie to their hosts, leaving Whild to offer apologies to the 150 fans who made the trip to the International Stadium.

Speaking after the final whistle, the assistant manager said: "I feel sorry for the spectators who have travelled down today because everything was far too easy, once the first goal went in, and it was was nowhere near good enough.

"You have to perform every week and in every game in this division.

"There's no point going to York and rolling your sleeves up or going to Wrexham and starting to play when you're two goals down because you give yourself a mountain to climb.

"We're conceding too many goals as a team at the moment and we've got to work hard to put that right.

"To be fair to the gaffer, the lads have got to stand up and take responsibility a bit on the pitch because I think they're letting him down at the moment if I'm honest."

When questioned on the issues of the decisions that, in terms of a score line at least, changed the game, Whild admitted that the visitors had no right to feel sorry for themselves.

"I think the opinion of everybody in the ground is that the two penalties were soft to say the least," he added.

"But I don't think we deserved those decisions to go our way because, simply, you earn your right to get a bit of luck and we didn't earn that right today.

"We aren't going to turn up in this league and have any easy games and today was no different.

"We've got enough players in that squad to cope with what they threw at us today.

"We know what they're capable of and they've shown that this season but you've got to be doing it every week."