Keep on battling urges Zat

Victory at Hull proved to be a false dawn as the claret and blues slipped to a 3-1 defeat at Knight's former club on Saturday, leaving them with just one victory from their last 14 games.

They remain on course to finish fifth, however, after Everton drew with Tottenham – but Knight insists they must do better against Middlesbrough next weekend.

He said: "Hopefully this will have given us a kick up the backside to finish the season on a high. We want to finish fifth and it is still in our hands.

"We need to go to Middlesbrough all guns blazing and put in a strong performance and then continue that into the last home game against Newcastle.

"There was great support for us on Saturday and we have let them down again. Hopefully they will come up to Middlesbrough, show the same spirit as they did on Saturday and we can give them a nice trip back home.

"It hurts individually and as a team because I don't think anyone played well.

"We just didn't have enough fire in us – our passing was poor, we didn't hold the ball up and we didn't really trouble the goalkeeper except for a few crosses.

"He (Mark Schwarzer) didn't have any saves to make in the second half."

Knight insists the Villa players are determined to secure fifth spot and beat last season's sixth-placed finish.

He said: "I think there is still something there to fight for. We finished sixth last season and we want to better that."