NEWPORT County boss Justin Edinburgh is demanding a big response from his players after their hammering at Cambridge United last weekend, writes Michael Pearlman.

The former FA Cup winner has also warned his charges they’ll be out of the side if they can’t manage to lift their game at Northampton Town tomorrow.

“We have no complaints, first and foremost we weren’t near the standard we have set over the duration of the season and it is clear we won’t get anything out of these games unless we are at our best,” he said about Saturday’s 4-0 reverse.

“It is as harsh and fair as that, we had far too many players who weren’t close to the levels we have set this season and if we aren’t at it we will get what we deserve, which is nothing.

“We expect a tough time in any game in this division, we need to be focused and committed and on top of our game and we see evidence week on week that anyone can beat anyone on their day.

“And we’ll need it. I think 75-80% of our players at Cambridge were below the standards they set and that can’t happen again.”

Edinburgh wouldn’t entertain the notion that the speculation linking him to the vacant job at Gillingham was a factor in the Cambridge result while admitting that tomorrow’s hosts have underachieved so far this term.

“You would look at Northampton and say they’ve been underachieving, they made a lot of signings and continue to do so and they’ll feel they aren’t in the position they would like to be,” he said.

“But I still think they are one of the teams in with a chance of achieving success this season and if we are going to get something there we’ll have to reach similar levels of performance to the home game, when for a spell we were excellent.”

And on the subject of the speculation Edinburgh was forthright before admitting he’s happy with the level of competition in his squad: “The performance at Cambridge had nothing to do with the situation with myself, I won’t use anything to excuse that display, it didn’t affect the players or myself and we intend to continue to progress, not dwell on the defeat,” he said.

“We are pushing in the right direction in terms of players coming back from injury and competition for places and we are very pleased with that, I have options to make changes if that’s what we decide to do.

“The friendly with Cheltenham came at a great time, it gave me a chance to give some boys match minutes and stake a claim and we have very good competition for places.”