Brian Howard believes that last month’s 4-1 thrashing at QPR was the wake-up call Royals needed.

Reading started October with defeats to Middlesbrough and West Brom, but the unacceptable performance at Loftus Road hit the players the hardest.

Since then Brendan Rodgers’ side impressed in an undeserved 1-0 defeat at home to Leicester City, beat Coventry 3-1 and drew 1-1 with Ipswich Town.

And Howard insists that the woeful display at QPR was the turning point.

He said: “That game hit home with a lot of people. There are good players here, but you can’t just turn up and not put the hard work in.

“You have to have that first and we didn’t work hard enough and got turned over. It was embarrassing for everyone at the club.

“That was the lowest a lot of people had been for some time and the feeling was that we didn’t want that again and let’s kick into gear.”

Reading now have seven games in the space of a month, starting with Saturday’s visit of Blackpool.

And Howard revealed that the squad has broken down the rest of the season into small blocks of fixtures.

He said: “We work it out so we need this many points from a certain amount of games – and we will reflect every four or five games. If we pick up enough points in those we have a day together where we will all go to lunch or have a game of golf.

“If not, then we will train a bit harder and make sure we do it in the next block of four or five games.

“If we sit staring at the league table then it will all be doom and gloom. So we will look at it game by game and we know on any given day, against any team, that we can pick up the three points.”

A lack of goals has been the major problem for Royals this season.

They have only scored 15 times in 16 games. Only one other Championship club, Swansea City,  has had less success in front of goal .

And the former Sheffield United midfielder insists it is the responsibility of the whole side to find the back of the net.

“We need to look at getting goals from all over the pitch,” said the 26-year-old. “Myself and Marek (Matejovsky) have spoken about it and said we would like to chip in a bit more.

“The wide boys chip in with a few goals and we have some big, strong centre-halves here and they have to look at picking up some goals from corners and free-kicks.

“It is a team game so we can’t just rely on the boys at the top to get the goals.”

Reading return to action on Saturday with the visit of Ian Holloway’s Blackpool side (3pm kick-off).

The Seasiders currently lie fifth in the Championship table and have surprised many this campaign, including Howard.

He said: “They must have had 11 or 12 new players come in and Ian Holloway has worked his magic and I think he has got that team spirit going.

“They play for each other and they have picked up some unbelievable results.

“You think ‘oh maybe their bubble will burst this week’ and then they go and hammer Scunthorpe 4-1 in their next game.

“We know it will be tough, but you don’t go into any game thinking we will win this or we will get beaten today.

“It’s a great chance, but everyone will be on their toes, as they know how well Blackpool have been playing this season.

“We will be at our best and hopefully we can get that home win.

“People say that Blackpool have done well this season, but that we are still expected to beat them.

“We just want to make sure that doesn’t creep into the players.

“They have been in top form, so we need to be at our very best to get the result.”

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