Devonshire Cougars head coach Omar Butterfield has warned his players must start taking responsibility for their actions on the field.

Butterfield was left frustrated following his side’s 6-3 defeat against BAA on Thursday night in an encounter they were more than matching their hosts for large periods.

However, a dismal second-half display which included individual mistakes and a rush of blood from striker Allan Douglas, who received a red card for kicking out at Zeon Robinson in the 72nd minute, having already scored a hat-trick, extinguished Cougars chances of getting a result.

“Some things you can’t control as a manager like someone losing their head and getting sent off,” said an angered Butterfield at full time. “The players need to be responsible for themselves sometimes.

“I can only do so much in my role as their coach, the players have to start taking responsibility for their actions on the field.

“They need to take themselves out of certain situations and allow the game to take care of itself.

“I’m handcuffed by the constant individual mistakes at the moment. There are so many little things that we shouldn’t be doing that are letting us down.

“There was just too many individual mistakes and that really hurt us on the night.”

The Cougars will have just over a week to prepare for their next encounter which comes in the form of a Friendship Cup quarter-final tie against league-rivals Boulevard Blazers on Sunday, December 16.

Butterfield is confident his side can rectify their on-field issues but reiterated the need to eradicate the costly individual errors.

“The ambition every week is to keep on improving but we keep suffering setbacks and mistakes which are holding us back massively,” he added. “If we can cut those out then the results will come.

“We’ll go away and work on things and that includes myself, we all need to work harder as a group.”