WORCESTER City came crashing back down to earth on Sunday afternoon as they were dumped from the FA Cup at the first hurdle in the extra-preliminary round by Coventry United.

Two goals in the opening five minutes of the clash knocked the stuffing out of City and they couldn't recover despite a spirited second-half performance.

"Everything goes out the window when you go two goals down so early," said manager Tim Harris.

"We gave them too much time, too much space - we lost focus so early and it was so easy for them, I don't know quite what was going on.

"Balls have done us down the sides, over the top and we stood there watching them.

"We had done our homework on them, we have had them watched and we knew their strengths. They are a good side and they are physically strong - they bullied us and that's really disappointing from my point of view.

"Defensively we were poor but we were also defensively poor in midfield as well and we didn't adjust. We didn't get tight enough to their players to affect the game."

Having been 4-0 down after three minutes in the second period, City rallied and dominated the remainder of the tie.

Archie Muirhead scored his first competitive goal for the club and it could have been a more respectable scoreline had captain Aaron Roberts converted his penalty.

Coventry's goalkeeper Reece Francis also pulled off a number of top saves but Harris admits his side were not clinical enough.

"The second half we created a lot more chances," he added.

"We had 13 attempts at goal and 11 on target. they have had eight on goal, four on target and scored four goals.

"We weren't clinical enough, the stats don't lie. But the bottom line is that at the start of the game, we got caught cold, we weren't on it.

"It was a rude awakening for some of them today, especially the new lads."

City will have to lick their wounds and dust themselves off ahead of their Midland Football League Premier Division campaign kicking off this weekend.

The new Worcester boss, who took charge of his first competitive fixture at the weekend, is after a big reaction when they host AFC Wulfrunians at Claines Lane on Saturday (3pm KO).

"We have to dress ourselves down. The lads know how I feel about it and we have gotta man up a little bit," he said.

"It's also about consistency. Some of the performances in pre-season have been excellent and then after that they haven't been at the same level.

"Again today, it's a slight concern. In the FA cup against a good side and we are a goal down inside 90 seconds.

"But now we're out the cup, and that's disappointing for the fans, but we have to concentrate on the league.

"We will have to do better than what we saw today (Saturday) and that's an understatement."