ALEX Davies believes the current crop of Lancashire coaches are the right people to guide the Red Rose back into the top tier of the County Championship.

Lancashire were relegated to Division Two after a season which yielded just two victories.

Coach Glen Chapple, assistant Mark Chilton and director of cricket Paul Allott have been criticised in some quarters while some players have also been called out for performances on social media.

But Darwen’s Davies believes the club has the right staff in place to bring success to Old Trafford.

Davies, who was a shining light in an otherwise disappointing batting campaign, said the blame sits squarely with the players.

He said: “I try to steer away from Twitter, I am not one of these players who engages or bites to things on there.

“In my view none of the performances are down to the coaches, it is the players who go out and play and we haven’t been good enough.

“We’ve got two coaches who are Lancashire through and through and they have Lancashire’s best interests at heart.

“I would tell you if their hearts weren’t in it but they are. They care as much as everyone else, if not more.

“There were a couple of dark days at Yorkshire and at Hampshire on the last game of the season and the coaching staff were really hurting.

“They are Lancashire through and through and they want what is best for the county. We know we have not had a good season and we are all determined to put that right.”

Lancashire’s four-day struggles came after a last eight defeat in the One-Day Cup and a semi-final defeat in the T20 on Final’s Day.

And Davies accepted that the year has been one of lows, even if he feels there have been signs of encouragement.

“Once we knew we were struggling in the County Championship if we had managed to grab the T20 it would have been a nice bonus for our season but it wasn’t to be,” said the 24-year-old.

“We are certainly not happy with how we performed in four day cricket.

“A club of this size should not be in division two.

“We had the two leading wicket takers in the division and I think we had the third most batting points in the division so that doesn’t scream relegation.

“We did play some good cricket over the season but as Liam said at the end of the season when we were bad we were very bad.

“It wasn’t even a day or even a session, it was just a bad hour where we collapsed with the bat and that can lose you a game. That happened too often this season.”

Davies admits that it is difficult to put a finger on what exactly went wrong for Lancashire who struggled with the bat throughout the season.

“I am not sure what it is down to but it could just be players losing form at the same time,” he added.

“In the past someone like (Shiv) Chanderpaul has been able to come in at five and steady a ship but he couldn’t find a run this season and that was the case for a couple of other players as well.

“At times we had some young players in the batting line up and it was up to the more experienced players like myself to help them out with weight of runs, we should try to protect our youngsters a bit more from being on the frontline.

“When I was coming through I always felt the likes of Ashwell (Prince) and others would score runs. That hasn’t happened enough this season.

“We can’t shy away from the fact that it has been a disappointing year but there were a couple of silver linings.

“It was good to see Josh Bohannon come through and take to it like a duck to water and Rob Jones who has been around it for a few years finished the season really well and that bodes well for next year.”

Davies counts himself as a player who could have contributed more with the bat even though he made 732, the second highest total at the county behind Dane Vilas (792).

“I always think I can do more,” added Davies. “If I had scored an extra 50 or 100 runs or my average (30.50) had been five runs higher than maybe we wouldn’t have been relegated.

“I will work hard over the winter and in training to try and get that right in the four-ball game.”

The challenge for Lancashire is to bounce back at the first attempt, something they managed in 2013.

“We’ve done it before, going down and then going straight back up but that doesn’t mean it is going to happen again,” Davies said.

“We are under no illusions how hard it is going to be next season. Division two is a different league with different challenges playing on grounds we are not used to.

“There is a World Cup on so there will be a lot of out grounds to play on and we know we will have to be at our best.”