Last Saturday’s loss at Brentford means it is now five games without a win for Nigel Adkins’ side, with two draws and three losses in that period.

Royals were riding high in sixth place after their last victory, at home to Millwall. But two points from a possible 12 has seen them drop to 13th place.

And Cox - who has not been included in Ireland’s squad for the upcoming Euro 2016 Qualifiers against Gibraltar and Germany - believes the two-week hiatus comes at the right time for Reading.

“The international break can either help or hinder you,” he declared. “And I believe it’s come at a really good time for us.

“It’s one of those where we can get some rest in and some good time to work on stuff that needs to be addressed.

“The lads on international duty will go away and do their thing for their respective countries, but those of us here will work hard and put the graft in on the training pitch to ensure we get everything right so that we’re ready for Derby.

“We need to get back to doing the basics right, stop conceding soft goals and also work on getting it right at the other end as well.”

The Reading-born striker had scored four league goals in 11 appearances ahead of the trip to Brentford, but was relegated to the bench last weekend.

Adkins introduced him at half-time and it took less than four minutes for Cox to wriggle free of his defender and fire Reading back into the game.

The decision not to name him in the starting line-up was a shock to many Royals fans, and the 27-year-old admits he was disappointed to have to watch from the bench.

“Of course, you always want to play from the start,” he said. “But I’ve played 11 or 12 games since being here so the manager decided to freshen up the squad and I thoroughly respect that.

“You have to remain professional and I came on and scored a goal, but unfortunately it wasn’t enough. It’s disappointing as it’s a game that we expected to get something from.

“They’re a team that have come up from League One and these are the games that we have to be winning.

“No one intends to make mistakes but mistakes cause goals to be conceded and we’re getting punished for them.”

Reading players on international duty are Chris Gunter, Hal Robson-Kanu and Jake Taylor (all Wales), Hope Akpan (Nigeria), Adam Federici (Australia) and Alex Pearce (Republic of Ireland).