Under-fire manager Alex Neil may be bearing the brunt of criticism for Norwich City's dreadful form but full-back Ivo Pinto believes the Canaries' squad must also take a long, hard look at themselves.

Chants of 'you're getting sacked in the morning' were clear for all to hear at the Madejski Stadium as City were beaten 3-1 by high-flying Reading in an action-packed Boxing Day encounter.

Angry boos at the decision to substitute in-form striker Nelson Oliveira after Jonny Howson's red card and the Royals' second goal also saw almost 1,500 travelling City fans make their thoughts crystal clear.

'It's always the first target isn't it, so I think we should look to ourselves,' Pinto said of the venom directed at Neil.

'Each player should look at the work that he is doing at the moment. Don't take it wrong, I think all the lads worked really hard in the game but I think we should start at the beginning, look to ourselves to do better and if we do that we are in a good place to help the team.

'If we have 11 players like that I think we can find a way out.'

The popular 26-year-old was among the group of players to make their way over to the travelling Canaries faithful at full-time.

Those players largely received applause, despite the anger directed at Neil, but Pinto admits a run of eight defeats in 10 games is taking its toll on the City squad – ahead of the trip to Brentford on New Year's Eve.

'Of course we are disappointed, also I think that we played a good game,' he said.

'I think we lost the game in little bits, set-plays, the penalty, they miss it and the ball goes straight to their player so…

'It's not easy to keep losing games so the lads are a little bit down but we have one more game in front of us and then another one, and another one, it is not the end.

'We just have to keep working to find a way out of this.'

Watch the views of our reporters in the video above