Manchester City goalkeeper Joe Hart pulled few punches and admitted his team we "not good enough" as they slumped to a 2-1 Champions League defeat at home to CSKA Moscow.
City finished a miserable night at the Etihad Stadium with nine men following red cards for Fernandinho and Yaya Toure, but the bigger picture must be that their hopes of progressing to the last 16 of the Champions League are now hanging by a thread.
"We weren't good enough, we gave away far too many balls and there are no excuses," a dejected Hart told Sky Sports. "We didn't deserve to win and it just got worse with the sendings off.
"We can only look at ourselves when we don't perform in games like this. The fans were great, they turned and supported us and we need to have a long hard look at ourselves and see where we go from here.
"The mood is terrible [in the dressing room]. We have given ourselves at absolute mountain to climb when we had good chances away in Moscow at 2-0 up and in this game, we have given them the victory. It's not a good feeling."
Hart tried to find a silver lining on a bad night for City, as he suggested they could still get wins in their remaining two games against Roma and Bayern Munich to plot a path to the knock out stages of the competition.
"We don't give up, we have to remain positive," he added. "It's a low moment right now as we have put ourselves in a really weak position in the group, but we have proved in the past that we are capable of putting in performances. We just have to stop living in the past and make it happen."