Dean Smith expressed his disappointment following Norwich City's 2-0 defeat to Aston Villa on Tuesday night at Carrow Road.
A goal in either half from Jacob Ramsey and Ollie Watkins succumbed City to their third successive defeat.
However, it was the manner of the performance which frustrated Smith the most.
Speaking with canaries.co.uk after the match, he said: "(It was a) disappointing result, very very disappointing performance in the first-half especially.
"(We were) too passive and never really laid a glove on them without the ball. We've got them in good areas at times and never went to ground and made tackles.
"You only have to look at their (first) goal, the lad (Ramsey) has ran from the halfway line and nobody has laid a glove on him.
"We were too slow on the ball, it looked like we were playing low risk football, playing safe rather than risking it. Our full-backs were always going to be our out balls but we never got it quick enough to them.
"Second-half was better but it didn't have to be an awful lot to be better. I thought we looked fit towards the end of the game which was pleasing but we've given two sloppy goals away."
City's preparation for the game was disrupted by injury and COVID-related issues, but Smith was keen not to come up with excuses for the defeat.
"It doesn't help. I would normally have named the team yesterday but we've had to wait until the game tonight and name the team," he revealed.
"We didn't have an awful lot of options. Dimi (Giannoulis) felt unwell as well, so he was confined to the bench today.
"So, we were struggling for numbers a little bit. That is a reason but not an excuse. We can't allow our performance levels to drop so much from Manchester United to Aston Villa.
"We've had (Lukas) Rupp come out, Dimi who was poorly and a number of others. The pleasing thing for me is Sam (Byram) has got on the pitch for the first time in two years. He did alright, as well. But of course he'll be disappointed with the result and where we are in the league as well."
Smith now wants his players to look ahead, as their next match comes in just a few days at West Ham United.
"We believed there was an opportunity to win the game today but our first-half performance wasn't good enough to do that.
"Those big moments in games are going against us. Kenny's (McLean) has a great chance a few minutes after half-time, if we take that and score it's a different game.
"But we won't get too down about it. We've got games coming up thick and fast.
"We've got to see who's available first (for Saturday). We've got to get them ready first, we'll work hard on the training ground and make sure Saturday's performance is better."