HEAD coach Darrell Clarke said he doesn't want his players to be 'nearly men' after Saturday's 2-1 defeat at home to Birmingham.

The Reds went 1-0 up early in the second half thanks to some great play from Stephen Humphrys who cut inside and saw his effort put into the back of his own net by Park Seung-ho.

But just a minute later and £10m striker Jay Stansfield fired in from 30 yards out.

Adam Phillips was then sent off on 70 minutes and the Blues went ahead with another Stansfield goal from a set piece.

Barnsley dominated large parts of the game but came away with nothing to show for it.

Clarke said: "It's frustrating.

"A lot of the things we were doing we were doing well.

"We were the team on the front for the majority of the game.

"It's not acceptable to go into a 1-0 lead, celebrate - which you want the players to do but then you want a reset - and then for the ball to be in the back of our net 30 seconds later it's not good enough.

"To give the second goal away from a set piece with the players not doing their jobs - it's not acceptable."

Clarke wants the players to not be 'nearly men' and admits that there needs to be a lot of improvement if they're to be promoted this season.

He added: "To be a proper winner, not a nearly man, you have to make sure you get the second and third goal - and to not switch off.

"We want to get in the Championship.

"We've got a lot of work to do to make sure that we're not nearly men on too many occasions."

He said they need to be ruthless in the future - and says there are some players who need to do a lot better.

"We have to be ruthless," he said.

"It's hard to find positives when you're saying the same old.

"I am ruthless - I am a ruthless manager.

"Players that I don't think have that natural desire to go and kick the club one and kick themselves on to be better players will fall by the wayside with me.

"I don't want to be known as the nearly men.

"I want to win."