Nigel Pearson says his side lacked bottle after his Bristol City side crashed out of the Carabao Cup with a whimper.
The hosts were humbled 3-1 by League One Lincoln and were second-best all over the field after Pearson had made eight changes to his starting XI. Matty Virtue fired the visitors ahead on six minutes with a terrific effort from distance to beat the dispairing Stefan Bajic on his City debut.
Another full debutant Joe Low, starting on the right side of defence, was at fault for the second when he dwelled on the ball for too long. Ben House dispossessed the 20-year-old before finishing beyond Bajic to double their advantage.
City were lacklustre in the opening 45 minutes and were booed off the field as Pearson made a triple substitution for the second period in an attempt to change the course of the game. But his half-time team talk fell on deaf ears in the 49th minute when Paul O'Connor scored from close range after City failed to defend a set-piece.
Substitute Tommy Conway did give City hope with 10 minutes to play just before Chris Martin agonisingly missed at the back post. Antoine Semenyo missed a couple of decent opportunities but it was the best the hosts could offer with Lincoln happy to sit back and absorb the pressure.
City fans made their thoughts on the performance clear at the full-time whistle with City now on a run of just two victories in 13 matches.
"I don’t know if it’s a lack of confidence or a lack of bottle, quite frankly," Pearson said when addressing the performance.
"Some players just not turning up, unfortunately. Unfortunate when you make mistakes, so I feel for Joe for the second goal. But I don’t think he got a lot of help tonight out there. We’ve got some big selection issues for the weekend now.
"I think what it does show is that we don’t have the depth of quality in the squad. You look at when we made changes in the second half our intensity got better, but we huffed and puffed. We are our own worst enemy and unfortunately, we didn’t give ourselves a chance of winning the game.
"The chances that we made we spurned and gave away poor goals again. When the subs came on it was a different game.
"The fact that I leave Andy King on at centre-back says everything, doesn’t it? Kingy is visible, he’ll have the ball, he’ll organise. Others didn’t do that.”
Low, who has been outstanding for the Under-21s this season, endured a difficult evening before being replaced at half-time. Pearson was keen to take responsibility for his selection but also criticised his team-mates for not helping him out.
"Joe is a youngster and I take full responsibility.," he added. "You’ve heard me say in the past it’s always a difficult one to judge and you hope that when players get their full debut, they’re able to negotiate the game and come out with a positive experience and for him unfortunately tonight he made a mistake tonight which cost us a goal and he’s obviously upset.
"But he’ll be okay, he’ll come back from it. He’s a decent player, he’s made good progress but unfortunately tonight he’s had a difficult experience.
"What annoys me about it is that he wasn’t helped out on the field by his teammates. He was constantly given slow passes which invite people to press him.
"It’s infuriating really, so just from his perspective it’s a difficult night, but he’ll be okay. If you remember back to last year with Ryley Towler, he had a difficult afternoon against Millwall, Ryley’s doing great now on loan at Wimbledon.
"It’s not necessarily long-term damage but I was hopeful that Joe could have a positive experience tonight. But to do that you need players around him with more experience to help out and that didn’t happen really.”
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