PHIL Parkinson questioned the mindset of his Charlton side after their 4-0 drubbing at the hands of league leaders Brighton on Saturday.

Charlton were embarrassed by the south coast side at The Valley but Parkinson feels his players failed to keep their pride after being undone twice late-on by substitute Kazenga LuaLua.

The Addicks boss said: “At 3-0 down with five or six minutes to go, realistically we’re not going to get back into the game.

“We have to play the situation and put balls into the danger area but not over commit players and whatever the score, it’s important that we go off the pitch with some pride and respectability but at 4-0 down we didn’t do that.

“Like in any football match, if you concede goals in the manner that we did then it’s going to have an effect on the confidence of the team throughout the 90 minutes.”

News Shopper: Phil Parkinson anxiously looks on as Kyel Reid is treated on the pitch

Parkinson admitted to being “caught by surprise” by his opposite number Gus Poyet’s tactics but did see stillsigns of encouragement from the heavy defeat.

“They had a lot of possession,” he added.

“But when we got the ball back and got it into wide areas I think a lot of the things we did were good.

“They are the league leaders because they’ve been playing very well.

“But I still expect us to put in a better account of ourselves and come out of the game with something because I believe all the lads are very good players and that we’re still going to do very well this season.”

News Shopper: An angry Charlton fan is led away after confronting Phil Parkinson in the dugout

Despite this claim, Charlton are nine points worse off in this campaign than they were after 12 games last year and find themselves in a lowly 14th place in the League One table.

Parkinson said: “We’re striving for consistency in the team and when we’re not playing well, we’ve got to try and come out of the game with something but recently we’ve conceded too many goals.

“The league table suggests that we’re worse than this time last year, so I can’t say that we are a better side, but we have a good squad and I’m confident that we will be challenging in the top six.”

More alarming for Charlton fans was the sight of Kyel Reid being stretchered off in the second half.

The manager added: “Kyel hurt his ankle ligaments and I don’t know how bad that’s going to be but it didn’t look too good when he was stretchered off.

“I don’t think he’ll go to hospital because it should be something our physio and doctor can deal with.

“Managers are under pressure every game but when you lose so heavily at home it adds more pressure to your next game and that is something that you have to deal with.”