The Warwickshire players spend more than an hour in the dressing room before talking to the media, after losing for the fourth time in six Championship games this season by an innings.

Captain Ian Bell emerged to say: “There weren’t harsh words said, just a bit of honesty, it’s what you have to do. There‘s no point running away from poor performances and it’s been a really tough year for us so far. It’s down to the players. The way we’re performing at the minute we’re not doing it. We have to get better.

Four-day cricket is tough and we have to be more consistent in our performances

Ian Bell

“It was all the players there. We just talked honestly. There have been a few of those in my time!

“You can’t paper over cracks, can you? You can’t just wish and cross your fingers and hope things are going to get better. We’re in a professional business and it’s ruthless. Every team here is very good and there are going to be no ‘matey, we’ll give you a game here’, we have to work hard for this a claw our way out together.

“You can’t turn up and play well for a session and poorly for a second and expect to be OK. Four-day cricket is tough and we have to be more consistent in our performances and front up, starting next week against Lancashire.

“It was a really great toss to win. It really did spin. It was the biggest spinning pitches I’ve seen in a while in terms of off the straight. We’ve been on the end of a few bad tosses, but you can’t rely on winning the toss to win the game and having the conditions in your favour all the time, it’s not what it’s all about. You have to adapt and we’re not adapting enough.”

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