Gareth Southgate has demanded that his players clean up their act.

The Middlesbrough boss says his men must address the disciplinary issues which have plagued his side's season.

Few football observers would regard Boro as a dirty side, but the club have picked up 82 bookings this season - the highest tally in the Premier League.

Only Blackburn have a worse disciplinary record with 70 yellows and six reds.

"It's something we have to improve on certainly," Southgate told the Gazette.

"We've got a small squad and we need to get as many of those players on to the pitch as often as possible.

"Injury-wise we have to try and improve but discipline wise we have to improve also. And the disciplinary side of things we are in much better control of than the injury side." Frustratingly for Southgate, a significant number of the bookings could have been avoided and were given for dissent or rash challenges.

"We need to learn the lessons of the bookings that we picked up unnecessarily this year because we can't afford to lose players like that," he concluded.