Blues boss Paul Lambert believes the club has moved on a long way since their FA Cup defeat at Accrington in January but says it is still miles away from where it could ultimately end up.

After the third round defeat at the Wham Stadium an angry Lambert said: "This club needs to be rebuilt. Players are not good enough and without a doubt some will go. You have to hit that level.”

He added: "This club should never be in the state it’s in. It should never be in the mess it's in.”

Looking back on the time since that 1-0 loss, courtesy of Billy Kee’s 76th minute goal, Lambert said: “I think the club has moved on an incredible amount. As I said before, the community is huge and I think there is a really good feeling between the club and the town, the support and the football club.

“With the kids coming back and the Community Trust getting going, the club is now in a really good place. It's small steps, but it's in a really, really good place at the minute.”

But he says there remains a lot of work still to do: “We're miles away from where you want to get but what we have got is the support back which is the catalyst of the club starting to rebuild again.

“We had to get the support. We had to get the community back involved. You had to do all of that side of it because it wasn't working before. We needed to bring everybody back to the stadium.

“We've started the season well, but the biggest thing for me and the catalyst of it is the support coming back.

“Not just the support coming back, it’s the atmosphere in the stadium, they're right behind it and they're on it and they're creating a vibrancy, and it's spreading through all four stands, which I think is important.”

He added: “We’ve been here nearly a year now and the football club has come a long way off the pitch, I think the infrastructure is getting there.

“As I said before, if you don't have an infrastructure and your team falls, it falls a great height, but if the infrastructure is there it will only fall a bit and then it will kick on again. It's getting there.”

What would completing the rebuild look like? “If this place got going really? Dear oh dear, this could be huge if it really wanted and it really wanted to go to the Premier League which everybody wants to get, you wouldn't get a ticket for this place, that's for sure.”

Photo: TWTD