'We're quite a nice team' admits Neil Warnock who has encouraged his Middlesbrough side to get nasty following Luton Town defeat

Boro went in front against Luton Town through Josh Coburn’s early strike on what was his first start for the club before a five minute capitulation in the second half saw the Hatters race into a 3-1 lead.

The result sees Boro slip into the bottom half of the table once more ahead of a difficult trip to West Bromwich Albion this weekend and Warnock believes his side need to learn the physical side of the game more.

“You’ve got to look at the players that are out there on the pitch,” the Boro boss explained to BBC Radio Tees.

“We haven’t got that nastiness that they’ve got, that little bit of what you need in the Championship. We’re quite a nice team if I’m honest.

“[We] Play decent football, should have won the game tonight, but when you’ve got to be physical and you’ve got to defend and you’ve got to have that mentality, we haven’t got enough of that.

“It is annoying. Matt Crooks knows what he’s done. He left [Aden] Flint when he nearly scored at Cardiff so we’ll have to look at that won’t we, about who marks who.

“You can’t have a free header like that, deary me. It’s like schoolboys isn’t it.”

Warnock did go on to praise 18-year-old Coburn who grabbed his opportunity in the starting XI by scoring his second goal of the season after a late strike as a substitute in the win over Peterborough United last month.

Coburn is a product of the club’s academy system and has impressed Warnock in his time with the first team.

“I said to him, ‘you’ll remember this night, your debut, and I’ll remember it for a different reason’. He really deserved it. I was so pleased for him.

“And I was so pleased the crowd stayed behind to clap him. I said to him ‘go on son, get over there’.

“He’ll have learned so much tonight. He’ll be a good player in the next few years.”

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