With big games against Arsenal and Chelsea to come, Gareth Taylor looked to use his Manchester City side's defeat to Aston Villa in the FA Cup as a learning curve in the build up to the league run in.
A Deyna Castellanos header was not enough at the Poundland Bescot Stadium for the outfit sitting third in the Women's Super League as goals from Rachel Corsie and Rachel Daly put the West Midlands outfit into the semi finals after extra time.
After the game, Taylor described it as "disappointing. Two cup competitions we've gone out in extra time which is frustrating because it shows we were there, we wanted to be through to the semi final"
With City out of the League Cup and the FA Cup, their attention will be 100% focussed on the title race as they occupy third place, two points behind table toppers Chelsea who have a game in hand but level on points with local rivals Manchester United, sitting in second on goal difference.
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City "the team on the front foot"
Despite falling a goal behind, the Citizens' manager was satisfied with how his side dominated play overall and believed that they were the side who looked the most threatening.
He said "as soon as we scored a quality goal, we were the team on the front foot."
Castellanos' equaliser was a quality goal, mainly in part due to the work by Lauren Hemp on the left wing who created space in order to get the cross to the Venezuelan who gratefully converted.
"In the second half, we dominated. They didn't have a shot on goal and then all of a sudden we concede from a free kick late on and then obviously you're up against it on a tough pitch", the manager said to further sum up the visitors' dominance in a scrappy affair.
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Attack has got to "make better decisions"
With the score still deadlocked at 1-1 at the time, the chance that will sit with most away fans was Chloe Kelly being unable to find the target whilst one on one with Hannah Hampton.
The former Welsh International analysed his attacking players, saying "We need to make more of our chances at the top end of the pitch. We need to make better selections, make better decisions. That's the game, it never changes. If you don't take care of it at that end and don't do the other stuff, you're gonna struggle."
"I felt we could probably slow things down and be a bit more patient instead of rushing things, but it's difficult when you're chasing the game in those circumstances", he added.
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Still "proud", despite the defeat
Their performance today showed just how hard it is to beat them, especially in 90 minutes, with City only losing two league games all season whilst both occasions of getting knocked out of cups have taken extra time.
Asked about the effort his side put in, he said "I wouldn't expect anything different from this group. They're great in that respect and I spoke about it afterwards about how proud we are of the effort. Again, it's taken extra time to be beaten which is frustrating but we need to learn from it."
Speaking about what needs to be learnt from Sunday's game, he added "The learnings will be that we need to be tidier when defending set plays... and obviously at the top of the pitch but that never changes. We do so much work in that space, and could have had four or five (goals) easily."
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Ready to battle for the league title
With the Citizens now out of both cup competitions, Taylor's side have one piece of silverware to play for - arguably the most prestigious of the three domestic trophies - the Women's Super League title.
He said "We've got one more trophy to go for now, so we need to give everything for that and we will do."
