Clarets boss was left shell-shocked by defensive collapse at Cardiff

The Clarets coach had been relatively pleased with his side’s stability following the opening two games of his tenure.

A point at home in the stalemate against Portsmouth was followed by the midweek 1-1 draw at QPR.

In the short time since his appointment, Celestini revealed he had spent a considerable amount of time on the training field trying to make his side harder to score against.

Having shipped 25 goals in their opening 12 games, just one goal conceded from his first two games in charge appeared to be a huge step forward.

However, the team is back to square one after a calamitous final half-hour in South Wales saw the Clarets relinquish a 4-1 advantage to lose 5-4.

From conceding only 16 goals all season during the last time they were in the Championship​, the Clarets have now let in 31 from 15 games – the worst record in the division.

“Yes, for that, it’s very difficult to accept this situation because in the last two games, the team was more consistent,” Celestini said.

"We trained exclusively in the defensive phases, at the moment, to be solid.

“We don’t need to score four times to try to win the game, because I understand it’s not so easy in our situation to score three, four, five times.

“For that, I can’t understand really now, from this consistency, and all the work we do to try to not concede goals, and you are 1-4 with more confidence, you see you have the possibility to score more goals, and you concede four goals in 20 minutes.

"We must understand what happened. But I think it’s to see the reality in front of where we are, and now we must fight every centimetre of the pitch, like it’s our last action in our career.

“I think it’s that, otherwise we can’t concede two goals like we conceded with crosses.

“[Yousef] Salech is absolutely alone to score two times. We can’t concede in this kind of situation.”

Celestini admitted he has much work to do to try and improve his side’s mentality.

“Maybe (we need) something different in the last 20 minutes, to say that I must be dead on the field if I don’t concede one more goal.

“I can understand the fragility, when you win 1-0 in our situation, I understand, it’s normal.

“But with 1-4, I’m waiting for something different, to control the game, to fight on the box, because in the end, the last goal is okay, we must accept it, it’s an incredible goal, 5-4.

"But we have the 5-4 with [Aaron] Ramsey’s chance before. It’s always something that happens.”