GARRY MONK has urged his Middlesbrough players to improve their “focus and application” as they look to put last weekend’s horror-show against Derby behind them when they travel to Bristol City on Saturday.

Boro crashed to a 3-0 home defeat against the Rams, with a series of individual errors proving extremely costly. Martin Braithwaite and Daniel Ayala were at fault for Derby’s second goal – Ayala was later sent off – while Darren Randolph’s miskick enabled the visitors to add a third goal to make the game safe.

Monk has held a series of meetings with his squad this week in an attempt to get to the bottom of the mistakes that have plagued their season.

He has identified focus and concentration as key areas of concern, and is confident of seeing a positive response at Ashton Gate this weekend.

Monk said: “We all feel frustrated. We’re making really avoidable mistakes that have led up to conceding goals, and we need to be more ruthless on front of goal too. That is what is holding us back.

“You’ve seen from the games we’ve won, when we’ve got those things spot on, what we’re capable of. It’s about working hard to rectify those things. It’s about making sure those things are minimal, but in a majority of our games this season, they’ve been apparent.

“It’s about focus and application, focusing on what you need to do in those moments. We’re the best in the league in terms of our defensive shape and our set-up, but you can’t have the lack of focus at crucial moments amongst that.

“We’ve been heavily punished as well, but the response from the group showing them what happens when they are fully focused has been good. That’s really the only thing that is holding us back.”

Rudy Gestede is set to return to the squad at the weekend, having played the full 90 minutes of Sunday’s development-team game with Southampton. With Ayala suspended, Dael Fry is expected to start at centre-half.