Cameron Jerome denies Norwich City's squad is divided.

The Canaries' 5-0 Championship defeat at Brighton last weekend led captain Russell Martin to publicly question the professionalism of some of his team-mates. Jerome, however, insists suggestions of splits in the camp are wide of the mark ahead of Saturday's Carrow Road duel against Leeds United.

'There is no truth in that,' he said. 'This is one of the best changing rooms I have been in, in terms of the atmosphere within the squad. I have been in changing rooms where you might be divided with young and old or the English lads and the foreign players. But we are close-knit and a good group.

'People speculate and try to point fingers when things are going wrong. There were no rumblings of that nature when we were winning games. People want to blame something for poor results but we have not performed.

'From our point of view as players the manager sets us up to go and win games and we have fallen short. We have not been good enough. The manager takes responsibility because he picks the team but we have to look at ourselves. We have enough experience in the camp.'

Jerome labelled Martin's rallying cry, following a painful Seagulls' surrender, as a throwback to a different era.

'Russell is our captain. He has been here a long time and experienced the ups and downs. Sometimes things like that have to be said in football,' he said. 'People perhaps within the game are too nice now, they don't want to upset others. When I was starting off, 10 or 15 years ago that sort of thing happened on a regular basis.

'For me it is refreshing for that to happen. If there is frustration and people are having a go at each other then in my opinion that is fine. Nowadays it is more about breaking down parts of the game and analysing things. Russell said a few words, everyone in the changing room agrees with him, and he is entitled to express his opinion.'