Second-from-bottom Barnsley are inactive on Boxing Day due to Covid issues at scheduled opponents Stoke City and due to return to action at high-flying Blackburn Rovers on December 2 - followed by another difficult away day at Nottingham Forest to start 2022.

The Reds have endured a grim campaign thus far and are yet to register a win on their travels in 2021-22, while their tally of 15 goals is the poorest record in the Championship and the joint second-worst in the entire EFL.

On the defensive front, Asbaghi has steadied the ship to a degree with Barnsley conceding five goals in five matches and keeping two clean sheets.

But there is a mountain of work to do on the attacking front.

Asbaghi said: "It is a balance in what we are expressing. I think we have a pretty stable foundation to go into games, knowing that it is not so easy to crate a lot of chances and score goals against us. This is an important foundation and what you can have with this kind of organisation is that you are a hard team to beat.

"But you also need to have an offensive approach to score enough goals to turn draws into wins and that is the balance we are in.

"I don't know if the right word is to take more risks. It is more about developing and implementing the ideas which we use every day.

"In games, we have shown pretty good combinations in a couple of minutes, but they are not shown as frequently as we want to, which is normal (n our position).

"The time we have been here (so far) has not been really long and comparable to a normal pre-season what you have with a club. But we have arrived in the middle of a season which is a challenging situation with the table. We cannot have the same patience and we need to develop and improve fast.

"But I have been happy with the defence and look forward to what we can do even more with the offence."

Meanwhile, Asbaghi insists he remains comfortable with his attacking options and is confident in his capacity to improve the individual performance of several players.

He added: "I am comfortable that we can improve our offence with the players we have, compared to what we have shown with the same players.

"We can improve the offence with the players we have and they can create more chances and score goals and I am comfortable knowing we can do this."

Poya Asbaghi on Barnsley FC taking more risks